"Hey y'all! I just noticed something. Massachusetts has the word MASSA in it, a commonly used form of Master, made popular by slaves and used most often in chronicles. And Massachusetts is a primarily white state (been there so I obviously know). Coincidence??"

How ironic indeed considering that the Governor is Black. 

As far as whites in the NBA, everyone knows it's cos white men can't jump. And the reason blacks are few and far between in the National Hockey league comes down to one thing. How many frozen lakes does one have in Africa?

As more and more black people populate colder climes more and more black people will enter into sports that reflect their environment. Or even as technology allows people to simulate training this will happen. Hence the Jamaican Bobsled team.

The end sum being stop trying to shoe horn race/racism into everything when the reality of alot of it come down to simple culture. It's annoying. But you already knew that. So I guess we'll just have to keep putting up with it. Or as our esteemed Premier would say.... "learn to live with that."

Volatile? With Thaao involved? Now you're joking....

word. i can dig what you mean, but i gotta tell you...at the risk of generalising, if there's a black guy saying things that white folk nod to while making black folk frown pretty emphatically, you gotta wonder about what he's actually saying; what it means, how he's expressing what he thinks, why his perspective gets that sort of (again, generally) racially monolithic reaction.


yep. it's a chicken before the egg thing. are they wilfully catering to the broader audiences stereotyped racial notions, or are the writers subject to them themselves? it's probably a good dollop of both, i bet.



right. see, that's the broader issue, though. even the black folk who are kinda sorta normal/successful on tv somehow get painted with the same, weird dysfunctional brush of teenage lawlessness/drug addicted family members/parenting issues/etc.



no, i don't disagree with you there, it was a legitimate point of disparity that i have considered but nowhere near as frequently as race. but, the comparison is still kind of odd in that a relatively specialist career choice isn't interchangeable with something like color, especially in the current/historical social context. that's all.

good rapping with you, as always.

deuces.

PS

sg - how can you separate race and culture? or rather, how DO you? i mean, in a place as tiny/isolated as bermuda, you have very different cultural touchstones that are observed along racial lines; to the point that, some of the most clear and obvious markers of bermudian culture for white folk are completely irrelevant/non-existent to black folk and vice versa. so, how do you pull race and culture apart? where does the one end for you and the other begin?

if this is considered to be volatile, honestly...*shrugs*. disagreements are just part of the process, understanding where we differ as opposed to presumptive ignorance is the spot that respect can be built on.

deuces.

with bermuda's history, and referencing these public events in particular, yep. again, nothing explicit, wilfull or conscious; white folk aren't avoiding black folk because they're scared of them(then again, judging by your previous post...), more because they're just going through the cultural motions that were predefined centuries ago.

white folk do this. black folk do that. white folk think this. black folk think that.

and that's somehow fine, despite the fact the core reason there's a difference in racial behaviour in a colonized country with our specific history/size is because of slavery and segregation. s'the only thing that really kept us apart along racial lines; so modern behaviours that reflect those same divisions are clearly at least worth examining, at most changing on general principle.

the comparison wouldn't be that the only friends available to go grab a pint are all white; it'd be...the bar that you grab a pint at, none of your black friends really seem to ever go. or, despite having a couple black friends, the only people you grab pints with happen to be white. again, no real overt disdain or loathing, just odd coincidences that line up pretty neatly along racial structures. stuff like that. i'm not saying that's your experience, i'm just saying that these completely normal/acceptable behaviours...generally aren't, y'know?

deuces.

"how can you separate race and culture? or rather, how DO you?"

That's the whole point... you can't. You just need to recognize that. It might not be 100% one way or the other which is far too often the way things get taken. Just look at tigga's reaction to everything.... or Lavernes.

"if this is considered to be volatile, honestly...*shrugs*."

Where you at? I need to send someone round to slap you upside the head with a silly stick. Stop taking things so freaking seriously.

yep. you're completely right. based on the history of racial criticism/invective that's leaned all over the necks of black folk since media was invented, i think there's a general sense of immediate distrust of a black person who is publicly critical of black people. as in, they're breaking team solidarity. a lot of it has to do with tone and context as opposed to content. like, the fact that he's working for Fox now immediately puts him into a certain pocket, y'know?

like i said earlier, i kinda agree with his initial point that some of the reactions, although i understand where they're coming from, to the Vogue cover are overcompensatory. whitlock always has to reach though...associating tattoos with jailhouse culture, again reinforcing the implicit assumption that black folk's only cultural reference points are sourced from social dysfunction/lawlessness without ever asking why this is still the case.

it's like...his obsession with personal responsibility completely denies the systemic inequity and as a result, incorrectly puts the root of black folk's problems, and implicitly the cure for them, in their own lives as opposed to fixing the framework they live in.

but, yeah. one of the few black dudes that white folk love and black folk are uncomfortable with is not the dude you wanna be paying a heap of attention to, i think.

you're right, i DID do that. good catch! that's the stuff i'm talking about; implicit race-based inferrals that are completely presumptive. now, that said, i'm reasonably sure, considering cup match specifically/bermuda generally, when you(as in you)think gangsta-ism, you're not picturing white folks. do you?

now that i think about it, even you writing the word with the suffix dropped to a as opposed to er was a signifier as well, i think.

so, i did presume, but there were indicators that led me to that space. thoughts?