Rolling Thread on Race 2020

https://www.laopera.org/discover/laoathome/lift-every-voice/
https://www.instagram.com/operaisracist/

appreciate this convo. I've been personally internally chewing on the utility or inutility of "BIPOC" from a few directions--its political utility, descriptive utility (neither of which i'm convinced of at the moment) as well as who seems to be using it.https://t.co/M2J4BvnVoE

— wikipedia brown is behind the fireworks. surprise (@eveewing) June 30, 2020

i can understand the frustration with BIPOC in its flattening use as "not white."

But over time, miles-hercules says, the term “people of color” lost its political force. “It then became a way to just kind of group all nonwhite people together in ways that weren’t necessarily productive,” they say. “In my own work as a linguist, and from my own perspective as a linguist, I see this as an erasure, which I consider a linguistic violence.”

putting aside my own kneejerk revulsion to claims of things like "linguistic violence" i think miles-hercules just expects too much that all uses of language be productive in every instantiation. the process by which radical political language gets smoothed out is inevitable and ultimately ppl need words that are merely descriptive/pragmatic. if you tell them that X is the right term and not Y they'll gravitate towards X but you'll inevitably lose the radical component. i don't see a way out of this - you can't create language that is radical enough for its imparted politics survive its own mainstreaming and you can't [reasonably] demand that ppl bring political consciousness to every conversation much of which is be purely functional or mundane. if you ever wondered why the terms keep getting updated possibly it's out of a misguided attempt to outrun this process?

Soda, will send later this afternoon. Away from the laptop atm

Apologies if this is the wrong thread, but is there a good article or link that puts more context to the march in front of the crazy armed lawyers' house in STL? I'm seeing a barrage of people defending the couple because "the protesters tore down the fence" (not that even that would have excused two clearly untrained idiots to wave guns around with fingers on triggers and safeties off), but I haven't seen one single angle or video that shows anything of the sort.

ex-St. Louisan here.

1. There is a gate blocking vehicles. Not pedestrians. Pretty sure there is an open entrance for pedestrians and sidewalk is still public. Lots of streets in that neighborhood are that way. You can walk through - and sometimes people do, just to get to another street, but not drive through.

2. I have seen photos of *a* gate bent downwards and partly torn away, but I can't confirm which street gate that is, or when it was bent, etc. It's irrelevant to the pedestrian situation.

3. As you note, Jesus fucking Christ if anyone is more concerned about the gate than the injustice being protested, or more than the sheer fuckedupedness of posing like Rambo in a pink polo shirt.... gah

Thanks, just trying to understand more and sort through the disinformation. There's a lot of morons defending these two, some I'm unfortunately related to, on a lot of grounds and I want to be able to more confidently discredit some of the more obvious bullshit.

Sounds pretty similar to some streets I've seen in north shore suburbs - closed to vehicular traffic, but openings on the sidewalks to allow pedestrians to pass through easily.

https://www.curbed.com/2020/6/29/21306868/st-louis-gun-couple-protest-street

Thanks for that link, in orbit.

This video is instructive

In this video you can see protestors walk right through the gate. It’s not destroyed when they walk onto the street.

You can hear McCloskey, “get the hell out of my neighborhood.” pic.twitter.com/ZbBNP2Xc4v

— Alexis Zotos (@alexiszotos) June 29, 2020

Thanks, hadn't seen that one.

This property is BOTH public and private. The residences are private. (Homes tend to be that way.) The roads and sidewalks are maintained by the city, and therefore... *drumroll*... PUBLIC.

I know this, because zoning is public record. There are like, maps and shit. pic.twitter.com/k7mGmhMS6m

— Shane Morris (@IamShaneMorris) June 29, 2020

Different topic: I thought this was very good
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-messy-politics-of-black-voices-and-black-voice-in-american-animation

(I was reminded how shallow the pool of human black characters is, recently, when I attempted to find my cartoon doppelgänger to participate in the “cartoon me” meme circulating on Twitter.)

man, it's this shit. over and over.

i'm old enough to remember sucking on an otter pop and watching Channel 17 reruns of amos and andy on a black-and-white television with a wire hanger antenna

(which is to say, as if it were necessary, this shit is not ancient; it's recent)

This is pretty satisfying to see (long overdue, but still).

https://www.newsleader.com/story/news/2020/07/01/stonewall-jackson-richmond-va-confederate-statues-civil-war-general-us-history/5358621002/

https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/02/us/banking-while-black-racism-trnd/index.html

Benndrick Watson's story is insane

That Sauntore Thomas one I remember as being particularly fucked up. Guy was cashing a settlement check from an anti-discrimination suit, right? And then he had the cops called on him for trying to cash the settlement check. Absurdly racist.

reminds me of this case that happened here in Vancouver late last year https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/indigenous-girl-grandfather-handcuffed-bank-1.5419519

Fucking shameful. Did BMO end up taking action beyond issuing a lame semi-apology?

I don't believe so

https://i.imgur.com/H6FMe1S.gif

https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/02/us/banking-while-black-racism-trnd/index.html

Benndrick Watson's story is insane

― shout-out to his family (DJP), Thursday, July 2, 2020 3:57 PM bookmarkflaglink

how does one just "accidentally" say a racial slur in the midst of doing a transaction, and try to play it off like anybody coulda made that "mistake".....

perhaps he was casually quoting The Coup

I think he was nervously looking for a chance to bring out his mixtape and overstepped

Thomas Jefferson Portrait Recreated By His Sixth Great-Grandson

It's fascinating because the chin is there, the cheekbones are there...the second you look at it, you think, "Yep, those two are related."

https://petapixel.com/assets/uploads/2020/07/thomasjefferson_shannonlanier.jpg

https://bloomingtonian.com/2020/07/05/bloomington-man-threatened-with-noose-during-assault-at-lake-monroe/

Terrifying.

was just about to post about that.

that is a terrifying story. the videos...ugh. it makes me so deeply ashamed of my upbringing. i recognize those "kind" of people, which is a rude way to characterize people, i know, but fuck, i KNOW those racist assholes, every single one of them in the video, from the old racist drunk guy to the young racist girl holding a beer can while a man almost gets lynched, to the drunk guy who is sort of trying to help but can't speak, the dumb fucking racist bystander who stands there 10 feet away doing absolutely nothing. etc etc. i fucking hate all of them.

just as i was typing that, an old friend of mine (grew up in the same area) said pretty much the same exact thing to me, unprompted. he said "i feel like i've seen these exact people before in Missouri, even though I obviously haven't".

Fuck, that is scary.

i hope every single one of them is identified

the one time Doxing would be justified and just

multiple people on twitter are fainting about "irregardless" now being a word according to merriam webster. english has a million contradictions in it and prescriptivism, particularly about 'irregardless', is racist and classist.

I'm cool with 'irregardless' but 'I could care less' is indefensible.

irregardless has been a word forever, why do these self appointed language experts refuse to learn how language works or what dictionaries do

I could care less is fine, I’m a huge fan of the non-literal literally

language pedants are the worst

i used to kind of be one and i was kind of the worst

"Can I use the restroom?"

"I don't know, can you?"

"gtfo out of my way you pedantic cockface"

'Literally' is hyperbole whereas 'I could care less' is just a fuck you to meaning, which I guess I should endorse, since I hate it too.

xpost the previous example actually was my linguist friend's biggest bugbear for a while

"i could care less" is just "i don't give a fuck" for uptight people

I say "I could care east"

It works when it's aggressive, i.e. 'I don't give a fuck about getting the expression right either', but it annoys me to no end when it's just 'I've never paid attention to the things that come out of my mouth when I'm speaking'.

It's weird how "I couldn't care less," "irregardless" and "literally" are the three bugbears of popular prescriptivism when English has a million other illogical expressions (literally a million) and those three expressions aren't even used that often

I knew someone that thought the term was "minds a well" instead of "might as well", I'd like to see that adopted

I hole-hardedly agree, but allow me to play doubles advocate here for a moment. For all intensive purposes I think you are wrong. In an age where false morals are a diamond dozen, true virtues are a blessing in the skies. We often put our false morality on a petal stool like a bunch of pre-Madonnas, but you all seem to be taking something very valuable for granite. So I ask of you to mustard up all the strength you can because it is a doggy dog world out there. Although there is some merit to what you are saying it seems like you have a huge ship on your shoulder. In your argument you seem to throw everything in but the kids Nsync, and even though you are having a feel day with this I am here to bring you back into reality. I have a sick sense when it comes to these types of things. It is almost spooky, because I cannot turn a blonde eye to these glaring flaws in your rhetoric. I have zero taller ants when it comes to people spouting out hate in the name of moral righteousness. You just need to remember what comes around is all around, and when supply and command fails you will be the first to go. Make my words, when you get down to brass stacks it doesn't take rocket appliances to get two birds stoned at once. It's clear who makes the pants in this relationship, and sometimes you just have to swallow your prize and accept the facts. You might have to come to this conclusion through denial and error but I swear on my mother's mating name that when you put the petal to the medal you will pass with flying carpets like it’s a peach of cake.

xp which reminds me of one of my favorite stories from the year i spent working as a stocker/register jockey at a rural salvation army
wherein my boss at the time left a note on an armoire informing me that "THESE ARE MY CHESTER DRAWERS"

Roland Barthes: 'language is, quite simply, fascist . . . for fascism does not so much prevent someone from speaking as it forces them to speak.'