Food for thought...
...So, this little old lady calls the police and tells them that her neighbors are running around naked and screwing. The cops send a squad right over and the two officers walk around the house, but they don't see the alleged conduct. They knock on the woman's door and when she answers, they tell her that they don't see anything. She says, "Not from out there. You have to come in the house." They go in and one cop looks out the window on the side where the lady is pointing. He still doesn't see the reported conduct. The woman says, "Not from down here. Come upstairs." They do so and look out the window. Still no naked people having sex. The lady says, "Well, you have to try. Open the window, lean out and bend as far to the right as you can. Then you will see them"The old lady was right. If you try hard enough, you can find a problem. That's the way it is with racism. If you dedicate your life to rooting out racism, you will find something resembling racism every place you look. Otherwise, your like is meaningless.The "litigator" who wrote earlier tells us that she is giving McKiney the benefit of the doubt when she claims that the guard who stopped her was a racist. The guard was doing his job as he was directed to do it. It takes some kind of an obsessed "little old lady" to find racism in this conduct, but litigator finds it. She always will. Sad
But, I prefer this one:
Politics is very much like your daily life. One of the shrewdest politicians I ever met liked to tell us that, "In politics, you win by addition." No matter what your profession, vocation, avocation or status in life, you are in a better position at the end of the day if you can honestly say that you have one more friend than you had when you woke up that morning. When I see a person, politician or otherwise, go out of his or her way to offend and annoy people, I think, "How sad". We have all lost something. Even if you don't immediately see a loss, you must know that you would have been better off had that person been intelligent enough to use the occasion to make a friend.
I'd like to think that someone, anyone, walked away with a couple of new thoughts. But, I kind of doubt it. What I know about human nature tells me differently. That's a shame.
In the 70's, All in the Family was about the most popular show on television and Stir Crazy was the funniest movie that I ever saw. But, neither one of them would be made today. If a person dared, they'd be accused of racism as sure as my keypad has a Q. Why is that? What in the world has happened over the past 30 years to change us in such a negative way? Why is it that we can't laugh at those things anymore?
Surely racism is not dead, far from it. But I've been around long enough to see the shifting of the tide. It is no longer the usual suspects who are racist. Prejudice has a new name and face.
The man who wrote to say that we politely dance around such issues was exactly right. Why is that? Why do we politely dance around such things? What has happened to change the world from a place where we could ALL laugh at the likes of Archie Bunker and Cleavon Little to one where we dare not acknowledge that differences amongst people exist?
It's been a very long time since I could sit comfortably with a person of color and behave as naturally as I did at one time in my life. Why is that? Why am I afraid to point out that I don't like something they might have said or done? I am about as outspoken as a person can be and if a white person annoyed me, I'd be on them like a fly on shit. But, with a person of color, I would smile and politely walk away. I don't know why that is or when it happened. But it is most certainly a truth and I do not fear truth in most aspects of my life. I do not believe that I do anyone a favor by behaving like that but I must because it is socially appropriate today. It isn't honest and it does no good. Rather, it makes me feel rather awkward and I never felt like that 20 years ago.
I have no answers to this dilemna and a dilemna it is. I'm damned if I speak my mind and I'm damned if I politely dance around the subject. Oh well. If we don't learn to get over ourselves, we're all damned to repeat the abuses of the past and widen the gap between people. I see where it's going and it isn't going in a very good direction.
Meg
...So, this little old lady calls the police and tells them that her neighbors are running around naked and screwing. The cops send a squad right over and the two officers walk around the house, but they don't see the alleged conduct. They knock on the woman's door and when she answers, they tell her that they don't see anything. She says, "Not from out there. You have to come in the house." They go in and one cop looks out the window on the side where the lady is pointing. He still doesn't see the reported conduct. The woman says, "Not from down here. Come upstairs." They do so and look out the window. Still no naked people having sex. The lady says, "Well, you have to try. Open the window, lean out and bend as far to the right as you can. Then you will see them"The old lady was right. If you try hard enough, you can find a problem. That's the way it is with racism. If you dedicate your life to rooting out racism, you will find something resembling racism every place you look. Otherwise, your like is meaningless.The "litigator" who wrote earlier tells us that she is giving McKiney the benefit of the doubt when she claims that the guard who stopped her was a racist. The guard was doing his job as he was directed to do it. It takes some kind of an obsessed "little old lady" to find racism in this conduct, but litigator finds it. She always will. Sad
But, I prefer this one:
Politics is very much like your daily life. One of the shrewdest politicians I ever met liked to tell us that, "In politics, you win by addition." No matter what your profession, vocation, avocation or status in life, you are in a better position at the end of the day if you can honestly say that you have one more friend than you had when you woke up that morning. When I see a person, politician or otherwise, go out of his or her way to offend and annoy people, I think, "How sad". We have all lost something. Even if you don't immediately see a loss, you must know that you would have been better off had that person been intelligent enough to use the occasion to make a friend.
I'd like to think that someone, anyone, walked away with a couple of new thoughts. But, I kind of doubt it. What I know about human nature tells me differently. That's a shame.
In the 70's, All in the Family was about the most popular show on television and Stir Crazy was the funniest movie that I ever saw. But, neither one of them would be made today. If a person dared, they'd be accused of racism as sure as my keypad has a Q. Why is that? What in the world has happened over the past 30 years to change us in such a negative way? Why is it that we can't laugh at those things anymore?
Surely racism is not dead, far from it. But I've been around long enough to see the shifting of the tide. It is no longer the usual suspects who are racist. Prejudice has a new name and face.
The man who wrote to say that we politely dance around such issues was exactly right. Why is that? Why do we politely dance around such things? What has happened to change the world from a place where we could ALL laugh at the likes of Archie Bunker and Cleavon Little to one where we dare not acknowledge that differences amongst people exist?
It's been a very long time since I could sit comfortably with a person of color and behave as naturally as I did at one time in my life. Why is that? Why am I afraid to point out that I don't like something they might have said or done? I am about as outspoken as a person can be and if a white person annoyed me, I'd be on them like a fly on shit. But, with a person of color, I would smile and politely walk away. I don't know why that is or when it happened. But it is most certainly a truth and I do not fear truth in most aspects of my life. I do not believe that I do anyone a favor by behaving like that but I must because it is socially appropriate today. It isn't honest and it does no good. Rather, it makes me feel rather awkward and I never felt like that 20 years ago.
I have no answers to this dilemna and a dilemna it is. I'm damned if I speak my mind and I'm damned if I politely dance around the subject. Oh well. If we don't learn to get over ourselves, we're all damned to repeat the abuses of the past and widen the gap between people. I see where it's going and it isn't going in a very good direction.
Meg
posted by Meg Kelso | 6:41 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home