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As our nation celebrates yet another birthday of independence from the tyrannical rule of hereditary monarchies, what exactly is the personality of America, at this critical juncture in our former child-star-nation's turbulent adolescence?
In the last fortnight, seventeen-year-old fame-casualty Jamie Lynn Spears ignominiously celebrated the birth of Maddie Briann -- the third Spears baby in recent years to be given the deep Southern equivalent of an anthropomorphic Disney chipmunk-name. Democrats in Congress bewildered supporters by allocating another $162 billion to continue the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan until next June, while Democratic Presidential nominee Barak Obama bewildered supporters by drifting far enough into the creamy center of the political Oreo to change his last name to Lieberman. Meanwhile, the world waits with baited breath to view the newest acquisitions in the Jolie-Pitt signature child collection.
Two men perhaps illustrate the current persona of the United States better than anyone else.
On Thursday, June 26 (the "World Day in Support of Victims of Torture"), there was a U.S. House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties hearing, featuring Dick Cheney's chief of staff and former legal counsel David Addington, and former U.S. Justice Department lawyer John Yoo, the legal spin-art geniuses largely responsible for the infamous Torture Memo and Unitary Executive Doctrine (sometimes called the 'Yoo Doctrine' since nobody else wants to take any credit for it).
Yoo, and the elusive Mr. Addington (referred to by Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank as "Cheney's Cheney") were subpoenaed in order to answer questions about the Bush administration's interrogation rules. Yoo and Addington are, ostensibly, the last human shields protecting the executive office from the full weight of accountability for these policies.
The two men, who have arguably performed more radical and bizarre leaps in legal interpretations of the Constitution than an entire Federalist Society full of crackheads, made their case by being snide, nasty and rudely dismissive on the stand in a way that seemed melodramatically excessive even for archetypal Scooby Doo villains.
"Think of Addington as the id of the Bush White House," wrote Milbank.
"Though his hidden hand is often merely suspected -- in signing statements, torture policy and other brazen assertions of executive power -- Addington's unbridled hostility was live and unfiltered..."
Addington has long been legendary for being able to emit nearly lethal malodorant toxins from his personality glands, but both he and Yoo seemed to be resorting to the time-honored teenage male technique of being unbearably personally unpleasant in order to wear down their opposition, in an apparent effort to make the authority figures in the subcommittee throw up their hands and stomp into the kitchen in frustration from a desire to strangle them.
It was lame behavior unbecoming of even a Walmart shoplifter with any self-respect. Instead of putting on a display of stunning legal pyrotechnics to stun and silence their critics, the men, supposed legal geniuses, resorted to the cheapest, most classic, lowball, legal shyster and Busted Tween techniques available - hoary old reindeer games such as the 'Conveniently Forgetting Everything That Ever Happened' -gambit, and the 'Questioning the Definitions of Even Real Simple Words Like "Implement"' - ruse. All they needed to complete their image of cartoonish evil was waxed, black Snidely Whiplash mustaches.
It was a war of attrition, with the subcommittee ultimately failing to get anywhere as the lawyers found all kinds of ways not to actually answer any questions and to casually insult the persons asking them.
"Yoo has described his role as a lawyer advising a client, in this case the CIA, NSA and other federal agencies, not as a policymaker," wrote John Bresnahan for CBS News. "Yoo has also repeatedly said that he has been told by the Justice Dept. that he cannot answer specifics of what went on within the Bush administration regarding debates over interrogation policy. Yoo has cited attorney-client privilege, or said he would be forced to divulge classified information in order to respond."
In short: I'd tell you, but then I'd have to shoot you.
"And I would have waterboarded all of the children of our enemy combatants and buried them alive, too - if it weren't for you meddling kids," Addington didn't say, but may as well have said, given the impression he left with everyone who still cares about stuff like common courtesy and politesse.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the Washington Monument, Amnesty International opened their "Guantanamo prison cell replica" on the National Mall, because nothing fights torture like a diorama.
Perhaps next year, Amnesty International can convince Brad and Angelina to adopt a Guantanamo detainee - until then, fiends, few people will really be very aware of any of this.
But in the scheme of things, it's all just part of America's awkward coming-of-age. But if Lindsay Lohan can turn over a new leaf, perhaps so can the White House.
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N-Word: Use At Your Own Risk
Hi. My name is Danielle Belton and I am an official, 100 %, born n' raised American black woman. I popped out of my Mama's womb black. I'm gonna die black. I'm the descendant of slaves and their masters. I say this to let you know that this is the authentic view of one solitary natural born Negro. (Not all, so don't get it twisted.) And this is my message to non-Negroes about a troublesome word so powerful that it makes pretty white girls cry.
So listen close to what I'm about to say.
You can use the "N-word."
Seriously. Use it.
I only say this because Thursday's edition of ABC's The View drove me to a Bloody Mary and a marathon of B-boys breaking it down on MTV because that's my idea of soft-core porn. Very relaxing.
But for those who don't know, last Thursday, conservative, normally perky yakker Elisabeth Hasselbeck was reduced to tears of the N-word.
She hates the N-word, ya'll. She would never use it or any racial epitaph. So she wanted to know why black folks, could fling it around. Co-hosts/comedians Sherri Shepherd and Whoopi Goldberg tried to shut Hasselbeck's shit down with the usual, "I'm black. It doesn't mean the same when I say it to my kinfolk and you can't tell me what I can't say to my own peoples. But you, white girl, can't say it because of the history of white folks just being dicks about it, coming up with this singular word that reduces us to chattle. So we took the word back and now you just can't say it, white folks! We live in different worlds! Nigga, what! What!"
While I agree that the word comes from painful origins, I really think black folks should stop with the you can't say it dogma and white folks should stop acting like there is some rule, some ghetto pass that can be distributed that would absolve them of all historical white privilege and guilt and let them rip into that word like an Arkansan on chicken neckbone.
Fact is, the situation is a lot more complicated than, "I can say it and you can't," because in all reality -- We Negroes can't say it either.
The N-word, nigger, is a racially charged curse word. Like the vagina-laced C-bomb but with an ethnic lineage, the N-word is not cool in all black circles. A lot, and I mean A LOT, of black people hate the N-word and would not use it under any circumstances. They get offended when it is used around them by other black people. They, like me, stopped listening to certain types of hip hop years ago because the "nigga, nigga, nigger" shit got old fast.
It reeked of self-hatred and acting out the pain of our history through the adoption of the words of our captors. Trying to make love out of a mass of fecal matter. In my house the word was banned. My mother didn't use it. She didn't even curse and as far as she was concerned the N-word was a curse word. My dad used it, but only while joking with his younger brother. He knew how my mother felt and even though he came from a place where the N-word was fine among family and friends he didn't use it anywhere else.
The word, even when used as benign slang by other black people has historically been seen as tacky and low class. It was too rude to use out in public, in front of old folks or at work. Like the sexist dig "cunt" there was no appropriate place to fling the term around other than amongst your friends and family.
I don't use the word personally. I have in the past, but in the end I came to the same conclusion as my mom. There wasn't enough soap in the world to make that word clean. I've been called a nigger by a black person and by a white person in my 30 years and it hurt both times. It was shocking both times. It was hateful both times. And it was meant to "put me in my place" both times.
Don't go thinking you're smart or talented because you're still a "nigger."
But that's not why I'm saying white folks should just let the word fly. My beef is that it is ignorant to ban words. Rev. Jesse Jackson proved this after making a big show of leading the NAACP to have a ceremonial burial of the N-word and lambasting rappers for their N-word addiction. Then, in a casual conversation with another Negro, he drops it while talking about black Jesus ... I mean, Barack Obama (sometimes I get them confused). And suddenly he's a hypocrite when in reality he's just another victim of his own faulty logic. You can't ban words. The more forbidden the more people want to say it and that is the only reason why this debate exists.
The truth is the N-word was invented by white people. It was once their proxy, pal and verbal weapon. Maybe deep inside some folks just want it back, want to return to the good ol' days when you could just drop an N-bomb in a black person's face and they couldn't say jiggaboo back.
But I say, don't explain. Don't equivocate. Don't make up bullshit reasons about trying to reclaim the word, black people. Don't say you can say it and they can't. Tell they can say it. Encourage them to. Tell them they can say it as much as they want, but they have to take whatever drama comes with it.
There is no ghetto pass coming. There is no black Pope coming down to let you kiss the ring and receive the blessing to be profane. There is nothing to absolve you if you drop the word in the wrong setting. This is a "use at your own risk" situation. You can say the N-word, but you have to accept the burden of the N-word. You have to be prepared for the criticism, the stares, the denouncing and the controversy. You can't have it all. You can't use it freely because you can't change the past. You can't use it liberally because black people can't even use it freely amongst each other. Hearing a black person say "nigger" may feel slightly different, but it is disrespectful all the same. But I have no right telling you what to say any more than Elisabeth "Pollyanna" Hasselbeck has the right to say that no one should use the N-word.
Yeah, it's hateful. Yeah, it's wrong. But go ahead and say it if you want. It's a free country. Just beware of the free beatdown you may receive for expressing that right.
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Thursday, July 3, 2008
The Hot Comb Bible
Madam Walker was an entrepreneur who built her empire developing hair products for black women ... When confronted with the idea that she was trying to conform black women's hair to that of whites, she stressed that her products were simply an attempt to help black women take proper care of their hair and promote its growth. -- Women In History, Madame CJ Walker
Assimilation is a bitch.
Twice a month I got "assimilated" as a kid sitting between my mother's knees either getting my long curly hair braided, or worse, holding the cap from a jar of Afro Sheen over my ear, protecting it from the hot comb as she pressed my hair straight.
This is the penitence countless black women and girls pay to pretend our hair just grew out that way.
Simply because of racism and the works of first black millionaire Madame CJ Walker, the First Lady of the United States cannot rock an afro.
Michelle Obama, definitely black enough ball up her hand in a fist, shout "down with The Man" and rock an afro, cannot do so because the rules of engagement require her to fashion her hard to straighten hair into a killer bob more brutal and precise than the laser-like precision of Condoleezza Rice's killer bob.
I hate the bob. It is, by far, the least attractive 'do. It's corporate black hair designed by committee. It's been marketed and tested as patented follicles that don't scare white folk. Although I don't know how much good it does her with people opening up emails about "Michelle Obama Whitey" tapes only to find Rick "Singin' Like A Negro" Ashley telling them how he's never going to give them up.
But while Rick can ululate like Frankie Beverly and Haddaway, Michelle can't embrace her nappy roots.
It was Sarah Breedlove, aka Madame CJ Walker, who made this dream of straight hair assimilation a reality by inventing the pressing comb.
An ingenious device made of iron, it was comb you heated up on stove whereupon you would apply oil to your hair and sizzle the curls away. Finally, the Western standard of beauty was half-ass obtainable for black women. The hot comb created the black hair care industry and launched the careers of millions of black women who became economically self-sufficient as beauticians. The press n' curl was a lucrative 'do that kept the sisters coming back. After all, a drop of water, a touch of humidity or a slight sweat on the scalp returned the hair to its naturally nappilicious state.
Today, taking natural hair and turning it into something unnatural and making that look halfway coherent still takes work. They can event an iPhone, but they still can create a way to conform black hair to white standards in less than two hours.
The best technique is using hair that's not your hair. Back when white girls were still working a crimping iron and dressing like Mayim Bialik, black girls were mastering the glue, the sew and the braiding of synthetic/"treated" hair grown from the heads of broke chicks in Asia, then textured to better match our wave patterns.
So the secret's out. That is not all of Michelle's hair.
I've seen the older pictures of her. She's done what it took Condi four years into the Bush Administration to figure out. Get some damn weave to fill out that killer bob. Create the illusion of health and thickness to give your natural hair a break, lest it break off.
Most black women with straight hair go for the chemicals, but that can lead to the ever-expanding of your forehead space with the sides and the top breaking off over time. There's nothing worse than a perm that's put in for too long, the acid burning into your scalp leaving it scarred, sore and scabby like you just rolled around the the toxic dust of Chernobyl.
That's why the best method, but the least permanent technique to straighten hair is the pressing comb. You might get burned but your hair isn't going to fall out (unless the presser doesn't know what they're doing).
But black beauticians nowadays look at you like you're crazy if you want your hair pressed over a perm. Perms make more money. Historically a press n' curl was cheaper because you already bought the comb. All you're paying for is time. But rather than charging $25 or $35 for good hair sizzle they want to charge as much as they charge for the perm -- $50 and up.
While money is an issue for me, it's not for Michelle Obama. She probably has her own weavologist, press n' curl genius maintaining that killer bob.
I'm sure that if I asked sweetly my mom would let me sit between her knees again from another round with a jar of pressing oil and tensing up as she gets closer and closer to the back of my ears, but I choose just to wear my hair natural.
After all, I'm not trying to assimilate my way to Pennsylvania Avenue. I'm free, by golly. Free to wear my hair in curly twists and have well meaning, but boundary crossing white folks touch my hair like it's mink coat, petting it and admiring that it's so soft.
It's a pain in the ass, but ... eh ... it's better than bob. Rock on Mrs. O. Rock on.
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3 words, snob: hot comb alopecia. don't do it! you'll be walking round looking like danny devito about the head! lol.
Posted by: Me at July 3, 2008 10:48 PM
Going natural was the best/worst thing ever. No more $50 for a perm or a press n' curl. But about every three weeks I have to spend four hours twisting up my hair. While it's only shoulder length curly, straight it would go down to the middle of my back. I forgot my hair could grow this much, but this is about how long it was when I was a kid.
But I'm always at war with my head because the white folks, Indians and Negroes in my bloodline keep fighting over what hair I should have. The front is Halle Berry and the back is Angela Davis. The sides are Bushwick Bill -- My hair is playin' tricks on me.
At least twisted up it almost all looks the same.
Posted by: The Black Snob at July 4, 2008 10:11 AM
Amen snob! I have the same damn problem.
Posted by: Raina at July 4, 2008 2:31 PM
(found you randomly through Stumble Upon.)
It's a terrible thing, but true, that the new Ms. O probably couldn't get away with any form of natural hair. I kinda hope she does it after the election, just to be spiteful. But, maybe she actually likes it the way it is.
But, white girls can't get away with natural hair either. If it's straight, it should be curled for special events. If it's curly, you should straighten it, or you're a hideous cow. (See: Princess Diaries) Anyone else remember when every other white girl in school had a nasty, smelly perm? And, if it's wavy or doesn't respond well to discipline, or worse, you don't blow dry it every day, you'll never get by in life.
I look forward to the day when women of all shades can do whatever stupid thing they want to their hair... so long as I don't have to blow dry mine or put product in it.
Posted by: brenna at July 22, 2008 10:53 PM
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Saturday, June 28, 2008
The "Kitchen Nightmares" Business Model
Like a ten car pile-up with bodies strewing the highway, I can't tear my eyes away from the reality program Kitchen Nightmares. The pain and squeamishness I feel watching people getting their asses kicked by Chef Gordon Ramsay is tempered by the outrage I also feel at watching people letting their restaurants die through inefficiency, intransigence, and sheer stupidity. As disingenuous as the reality show can be, Chef Ramsay and his team have actual knowledge, informed by experience, as to why these businesses are failing, and make an attempt to turn them around. And as dippy as it may seem, I have come to believe that Ramsay's techniques could be used successfully for all kinds of businesses. If he could tone down the restaurant-bred rage and profanity, I believe that Gordon Ramsay could be the progenitor of an improved business reality.
Like most reality shows, the action in Kitchen Nightmares follows a prescribed format. Chef Gordon Ramsay surprises the restaurant employees as they're preparing for dinner service. He talks to the owner about the restaurant's problems. At dinner, Chef Ramsay orders from the menus and judges the meal, unanimously negatively. He rips into the management. Then, during dinner, he stands over the chef and the staff, screaming at them in derision. A major conflict between Chef Ramsay, the owner, the manager, and the chef ensues. Things get uglier as Chef Ramsay issues pointed insults and character assassinations, usually resulting in someone storming out. He returns the next day with a plan that he believes will save the restaurant. The staff tries it, and lo and behold, it starts to work. There are hugs and tears, as Chef Ramsay then gently explains to them, with convincing sensitivity and concern, that they are all wonderful people, and that all he really wanted was for their restaurant to work. Ramsay returns two months later, and if they have adopted his methods, the business is no longer in peril.
Most of Chef Ramsay's business advice is common sense, something which most of the restaurant owners that are selected for the show do not possess. This is revealed by restaurants that are filthy, disorganized, and rely on menus based on frozen and pre-packaged ingredients. Kitchen Nightmares forces them to try something new, or risk televised humiliation. The other strategy that Chef Ramsay relies upon is also straightforward, if brutal, in its simplicity: breaking someone down to build them back up, shaking off their old, bad habits that are the products of the restaurant owners' bizarrely huge egos. Gordon Ramsay is skilled at psychological confrontation. His bullying is perversely effective, and always squirmingly fascinating to watch.
True, the restaurants that are featured on Kitchen Nightmares are going to be the worst examples of business ineptitude in order to provide television drama. I sometimes feel sorry for the poor idiot who is getting torn a new one by Chef Ramsay, but one has to remember that these people signed up for this. Their dual desperation of wanting to be on TV and trying to dodge bankruptcy has caused the reaming, and so it seems warranted.
Wouldn't it be great if Gordon Ramsay expanded his bellowing métier to other enterprises? Wouldn't there be immense satisfaction if he showed up to turn around the swindling realty in your neighborhood? Gordon, scream at the dishonest louts and force them to return rapacious broker fees! Offer discount incentives in order to sell new property! The too cool for school hair salon? Chasten the staff, who desperately cling to their snotty prejudices! They'll make more money if they're nonjudgmental, not just tragically hip. The rude delicatessen? Why should customers endure abuse to order food from them? Constrain them to volunteer in a soup kitchen and see what it's like to have no job at all! And when these deeds are done, how about a big group hug so that they all feel appreciated and validated? Chef Ramsay, please turn your techniques into a compulsory study for all business owners, and save us from occupational ineptitude.
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yes! add to that, gordon ramsey going into doctors' offices disguised as an overweight woman, setting them straight on how patients are the subjects and not the objects.
or gordon ramsey attending gallery openings, and busting up the little gallerist-sidle-up to the rich collector-looking dewd, by insisting on interpreting the white walls racially.
or gordon ramsey, breaking into the last segment of a hetero date, and observing the poor technique of the hapless male, pointing out to him, with much contempt and profanity, where the clitoris and the g-spot are, and demonstrating how to touch a breast effectively.
I like it!
Posted by: claire at July 14, 2008 6:12 PM
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Thursday, June 26, 2008
SHOPPING FOR THE RIGHT WEAPON
This week's NY Times Critical Shopper takes us to Beretta, where they sell beautiful guns that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. It's right next door to a cafe where even a bottle of sparkling water costs hundreds of thousands of dollars. If you're like me, you realize this could spell trouble.
BERETTA: NOT JUST FOR ROBERT BLAKE ANYMORE
Also, next door on your right over there, there's new Dregulator flogging an old DARPA robot-horse in a Brave New Way....
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Thursday, June 19, 2008
THE PENTAGON DIVA STRIKES, AND IT FEELS LIKE A KISS
OUR beloved girl in Washington, the Pentagon Diva of I LUV A MAN IN A UNIFORM-blog-fame, wrote such a "cave-smokingly hot" blog about fellow counterinsurgency expert and all-around PowerDandy Dave Kilcullen that even the WIRED national security blog, DANGER ROOM picked it up.
Who Wouldn't Pick Up Such A Juicy News Item
Yet more proof that life within the Pentagon is infinitely more varied than scientists ever previously imagined possible. As the Diva herself would say, "MEEOOW!"
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Wednesday, June 18, 2008
INTRODUCING: THE BLACK SNOB
It is with outstanding and chest-beating pleasure and pride that we who are Cintra Wilson introduce yet another whomping talent from the creedly corners of outer Blogovia, THE BLACK SNOB. I hope you enjoy her incredible talent for nailing everything you ever wanted to know about black chicks but thought you'd get your ass kicked for asking as much as I do. Ms. Snob, as you can see below, truly roasts the written word, and we are honored to have her.
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Tuesday, June 17, 2008
The Unfuckables: Asian Men, Black Women Surprisingly Pissed Over Interracial Dating
In America and if you're a man who enjoys getting head it really helps, statistically, if you're a white guy. You have way more options because something must be magical about white dick considering when it comes to interracial dating for Asian and Latina women, white penis is where it is at.
If you're not white and you want to get ass, being a black guy is the next best thing. Fucking a black guy is still the number one way to piss your parents off if you're a white girl. But statistically the one man in America no one wants a triple X throwdown with is sideshow William Hung, actor John Cho and a multitude of their Asian American male counterparts.
I didn't know anyone could be more pissed about interracial dating than black women, but Asian American men give us sisters a run for our Haterade. While it doesn't bother me much, a lot of black girls treat every stringy haired, flat-assed, orange fake tan Aryan Goddess like Buffy the Negro Slayer.
But color me surprised, the Asian man wants to put a foot in the ass of every white boy coveting their shojo princesses.
A few years back I started reading blogs and internet forums by Asian American men and I learned that they were crying out in silent pain over what is the mantra of both our kind:
No one wants to fuck us.
Now technically, some people want to fuck black women, but usually that becomes "fuck over." But East Asian women date outside their race at a much higher rate than black men or women. As for black women we hardly date outside of their race no matter how high up we go careerwise. To this day black magazines write articles suggesting successful black women to consider "marrying down" by fucking a plumber or a guy who sells mixtapes at the swamp meet. So what if you have an MBA from Harvard? That cat on fries looks like he could get us pregnant before we hit forty.
For the sisters if it ain't black they don't want it. It's Negro or nothing.
Asian men just want the benefit black and white men get. They want to be fucked. They want to be desired. No white or black girls are dreaming about swallowing an Asian man whole. Everyone is a fetish but them. (Well, the gays have an Asian man fetish, but that really doesn't help the rice grinder riders who like pussy.) They want girls to want to give them head too. They want a fucking date. And this shit isn't a joke, this time, it's personal.
You can sell post-feminist Americans on men who can keep their jobs, treat women well just because they're supposed to, and won't run off with some other girl after 2 years leaving you holding the house and kids. (Of course that's a lie too...) And then there's the final option ... Just grab your trusty AK-47 and simply fill every goddamn racist white male SOB full of lead and tell them to keep their !@#$ hands off of Asian women. It's your move.
It's hard to live down the stereotype that Asian guys are controlling, mama boy nerds with limited penis power and suffer from a bad case of "Otaku wuss."
A few Asians commenting on the message boards noticed that black women can't get a date either and suggested the obvious: a black woman/Asian man case of Yellow Dengue Fever. And while this sounds delicious to me, black women are notoriously intimidating. (Re: Negro or nothing!) I know I scare the shit about of men all the time. But I say try anyway. I mean, I've checked out some Korean boys and thought "I'd hit that," so live dangerously, Asian man.
But I realize most won't take the black bait because of the myth of the Negresses being undesirable (we're apparently butch harridans) and how we all must be used to being fucked by monster cocks.
Try as one might, you can't explain to the men of America that the dick thing is overrated and that it's "open season" on at least trying to love up the black girl. But apparently the black man put a "hands off" sign on all of us and for some reason everyone respects it. Which is odd given that the minute they stopped getting hung for it black men started ignoring the hands-off signs on white women.
But my Asian brothers, try not to dwell too much on it. After all you don't want to be forever bitter like black women who are still all sour patches over Tiger Woods, who technically is insulting three ethnicities with his wife, Elin, the ultimate fembot. Tiger dissed black women, Asian women and White American women. Us all filled with impurities, he had to find the WHITEST WHITE WOMAN IN THE WORLD OF WHITE WOMEN, venturing the valley of the Nordic blond in Europe to find his prize. She's so pure if you cut her she'd bleed unicorns and Summer's Eve.
Which would explain why she always looks like a douche to me.
But, oops. I let the bitterness slip. Yeah for black men fucking white women. Whoo-hoo.
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The Unfuckables is priceless. Thanks for the funny, Black Snob. And thank you Cintra, as usual, for throwing such a fine shindig.
(Pardon me in advance, if you can, for generalization without a license).
The joke used to be that black women and white men should have a summit meeting about sex, since they were the ones most miffed by miscegenation. White men, I assume, wanted to preserve race purity.
But if my celebrity magazines are any guide, it doesn't seem like black women still have the singular desire for black men. I'm also unsure if the age old hands-off sign warning other away from black women still applies.
The hottest black women cross all sorts of lines. From Whoopi Goldberg (Frank Langella) to Serena Williams (Brett Ratner); from Naomi Campbell (many different ethnicities) to, well, you get the (celebrity) picture. For civilians, I can only use anecdotal evidence. I see the most attractive black women being escorted by super hot dudes of all flavors and varieties.
I think you're right about Asian men though. While that guy in Lost is popular as all get out -- perhaps they could use a love boost. Good stuff -- I liked.
Posted by: Hilarious at June 18, 2008 2:12 PM
Speaking as a pearly white-ass, Elin Woods-white, ofay, part-of-the-problem-being, racial barrier-stomping serial dater, in honor of this brilliant screed I hereby pronounce myself 'on the wagon' when it comes to the brothers in order to do my part to annoy black women less.
That said, I have dated a couple of Asian guys, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with them. Uniting Asian men and black women with mutually disenfranchised feelings might be a truly great cultural movement - I think we should start writing a script for "The Fast & The Furious III: Gull Wings Over The Escalades." Perhaps this might set a romantic mood for a pan-ethnic makeout mixer.
Posted by: Cintra "Miscegenation, Ho!" Wilson at June 18, 2008 5:54 PM
Thank you, Hilarious.
In the region of the US I'm from (the Midwest and the South) it's still "Negro or Nothing." You see some black women dating outside their race, but it's a rarity in my hometown of St. Louis and I don't know how many "I will never date a white man" conversations I have had with black women over the years.
I lived in California for five years and people seemed less uptight, but I think that's a coastal phenomenon. We're still wearing the "hand's off" sign in flyover country.
Posted by: The Black Snob at June 18, 2008 6:12 PM
No, No, wait, I didn't read carefully enough....you're right.
Compared to Elin Woods, I am BLACK. And offended.
Posted by: Cintra "Not as White as Elin" Wilson at June 18, 2008 6:14 PM
As you should be, Cintra. American white women just weren't white enough for Tiger. You all have too many random Italians, Russians, Irish, Native Americans and potential secret Negroes running around in you. That's why he had to go the land of the Finns and the Swedes. The natural blonds. Places where they grow 'em tall and as pure as the driven snow.
You're just not a high enough quality white woman. Tiger wanted the 250-count threadsheet of white women.
Posted by: The Black Snob at June 18, 2008 7:51 PM
Sigh. Too true. Elin Woods is the Grey Goose of white women and while I might not be the plastic carry-handle Popov jug of white chicks I am definitely in the mid-shelf, Finlandia-maybe-Stoli-on-a-good-day category, and therefore not the solid platinum blonde standard that a basquillionaire like Tiger would demand in vodka, furniture, and cooz.
Posted by: Cintra "Mid-Level Blonde" Wilson at June 18, 2008 8:52 PM
Elin is Grey Goose while Cintra is Finlandia on a good day? Yikes.
According to Slate, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms defines vodka as a neutral spirit "without distinctive character, aroma, taste or color." Might I suggest that, if you were a beverage, Cintra, you would not be a vodka of any sort, but that you would reside on the top shelf anywhere in this time space continuum.
I was wondering what you folks make of Ms. Obama's latest television appearances.
The day after I suggested in these comments that Michelle begin the final transformation from civilian to presidential, it seems that that is exactly what her team is doing. From her most recent appearance on The View with its clever daps and the obviously pre-written joke from Baba Wawa about terrorist taps; to the muzzling of Horrendous Hasselbeck on the same show -- it seems like Ms. Oh has undergone an executive style makeover -- with all the media savvy, ease of affect and textual control that implies.
Given the challenge she faces in November, I was concerned that she'd follow Andre Leon Talley and end up dressed in some horrendous De La Renta bolero jacket denying Fox's attempts to portray her as the grievance harridan instead of "controlling the mic like Fidel Castro," so to speak (thank you Jeru the Damaja). I just wondered what you all thought.
Posted by: Hilarious. Not Foolhardy at June 18, 2008 9:32 PM
Great rant, Black Snob!
As one who has been wearing an Asian male body in America for the past 47 years, this is a subject I'm all too familiar with. I have no problem with white guys dating Asian women, but maybe that's because I have a girlfriend.
Most of my girlfriends have been white; while I could say that's because whites are more numerous, of course that's not the whole story. Consciously or unconsciously, people the world over select their partners on criteria other than how much pleasure they'll experience in the sack. A lot of Asian-American men, for ex., aspire to "honorary white" status. The real proof of having arrived is a white girlfriend. I have no doubt the same motivation drives Asian-American women towards white men.
Yes, such values can really screw your head up. In an ideal world, we would not be using each other as color-coded status objects, but loving each other as individuals. Who knows, maybe Tiger & Elin are true soulmates on a mission to end racism as we know it. :) But looking at mixed-race countries like Brazil, one can still see class division by skin tone & facial features. It just gets more subtle when labels like "black" & "white" no longer apply. It's safe to say that had Obama been born 100% black, as ebony as a native of Senegal, he wouldn't be where he is today.
In my case, there's another crazy-making contrast: had I been born in Japan, my race would not be a liability at all -- instead I would be getting leading-man roles in film & TV. Over there, Asians see themselves as the master race, though they're too polite to say so. They actually look down on whitey. Too fucking ironic!
Posted by: Wayne "Not George Clooney" Mathias at June 20, 2008 10:11 AM
Awwwww. I'll totally fuck John Cho, the reason that the relationship won't last though, is just that the personality won't compliment well enough. I'm Career Minded, and so I need someone who is both sensitive and BOLD. Unfortunately, Asian Male as popularly depicted (and then followed by teenage boys who pay attention to the media), aren't a match for ME. There was this one boy from Mainland who I wanted to have babies with, but I wasn't a match for HIM.
Due to the Cultural Framework (of race AND gender together, which explains the disparity between AF/WM and WW/AM), it just so happens that the bold and sensitive people I tend to be attracted to, are /usually/ either (some) white guys, or (some) black women. Due to the complication of homophobia by society at large, there is a higher chance I'll end up with a white guy.
I don't think being passed over by some type of people means one is unfuckable, it just means that the match isn't right...or time wasn't given to let it happen. It's true that the timid type of Asian guys would be intimidated by the bold type of Black women, but this doesn't mean that it won't be a match well made (unless the guy is actually a sexist pig afraid of women, instead of being harmlessly timid in nature). Watch My Sassy Girl (2001), in which the timid AM was extremely intimated by the BOLD AF, but they end up a perfect match because they balance each other out. Of course, unlike the movie, in IRL, you can't be THAT aggressive with a timid guy, though you still have to be the one who asks and keep asking.
Then there is the issue of Racist Parents. Some HK starlet's mom in the Ming Pao SunMag about a decade ago...actually said that it's okay for her son to date white women but not black ones. Recently, Ming Pao had to address the race issue too, but it is being dealt with. If he's not living with his parents or answer to their beck and call, it shouldn't be a problem what the hell the parents think. If the parents get horrible though, no matter how timid he is, he should still have the decency to defend you. If not, dump him. There are moar straight women than straight men, the market is on our side.
Posted by: Georgia at July 13, 2008 3:56 PM
Black Snob, you rule.
I notice that, whereas in London you see loads of mixed-race couples, in NYC my very white snowflake of a husband never even gets LOOKED at by women of color. Is this an American phenomenon perhaps?
Posted by: Lauren at July 18, 2008 12:46 PM
Lauren, in America we're all still fighting about race while pretending to not be fighting about race. That might explain why women of color assume your husband isn't interested. Usually white guys who are attracted to girls of different ethnicities have to be the initiator. I know I've been attracted to white men in the past, but I wasn't making the first move. Rejection is bad, but rejection because of your race is like getting punched in the gut.
Not pleasant.
Posted by: The Black Snob at July 22, 2008 5:40 PM
CONTRIBUTE TO THE CULTURAL DOGFIGHT
We know global warming is bad, and we know that human beings' misuse of natural resources has caused it to occur. The explanation of accelerated global warming being due to the Earth's natural climate swings has been discredited. Has tangible global warming not yet taught us that a reactive response to scientific research is quickly ruining our planet? Yet it is our duty to try to figure out how to decrease the intensity of global warming, and fast. I grope for new models that will provide effective information.
Though we are now blazing under unrelenting heat, up until a week and a half ago, it has been chilly while I work in my studio in upstate New York. Global warming involves massive swings in the highs and lows of the Earth's temperatures, and it is still spring in these northern climes until late May. In New York, spring and fall are represented by two-week periods between winter and summer. The rest of the year is dominated by severe weather; I now call our two seasons "Freeze" and "Inferno."
There are many arguments against alternative fuel sources used by the U.S. government and other capitalist-based fossil fuel addicts. Wind energy uses spinning turbines that cause noise pollution. Solar energy isn't powerful enough for a typical household's increasing fuel needs. Combustibles, like wood and coal, pollute the air. Hydroelectric power, because of the use of dams, has ruined ecosystems. Geothermal energy is only available to a small part of the world. But if more funding was given to develop these alternative energy technologies, answers to these arguments will be discovered.
It is interesting to look at recently planned eco-towns and see if these will offer any viable alternatives. Prince Charles has completed the development process for Sherford, a new community in England that has been planned to be mostly sustainable. Solar and wind power will be used in the homes and businesses, which are quaintly designed to evoke the kinder, gentler (for some) Georgian era. I also discovered that Prince Charles already designed one of these communities, Poundbury, in Dorset. Why hasn't this been all over the news? The architect Lord Norman Foster has designed a city in the desert of Abu Dhabi, called Masdar, which will also be almost fully sustainable and self-contained, despite its harsh surrounding terrain.
Average citizens, it is argued, must struggle every day to survive in an unrelenting economic downturn, and do not have time to worry if their coffee is heated with purloined fossil fuel, or a pinwheel. Sherford and Masdar have been criticized as the pet projects of imperialist aristocrats with too much time and money on their hands. If that is the case, then shouldn't we encourage the heirs of wealth and power to shoulder this burden? If they have the time, money, and energy to apply to a global problem, shouldn't we let them? Tracking the success of these communities, and applying the lessons learned as an essential part of urban planning, could alter our global future. We should not reject anything that offers a possibility to clean up this apocalyptic-level mess.
Check out information on these projects:
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COMMENTS
I like this entry. I learned things. Thanks, Mo.
Posted by: Cintra "Concerned Citizen" Wilson at June 19, 2008 11:04 AM
CONTRIBUTE TO THE CULTURAL DOGFIGHT
Monday, June 2, 2008
EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO BE KEITH RICHARDS AND ANITA PALLENBERG
Greetings, Dregublog Fiends.
Firstly, I'd like to say that if Anita Pallenberg is your style, then you probably don't shop at Tory Burch, Critically or otherwise.
May I nextly say thank you to the diehards like Phil for hanging around and being generally swell and loquacious as always despite my prolonged absence on the comment-pile. The dirty deed has been done dirt cheap, and I have it on good authority that my new book (drumroll please):
CALIGULA FOR PRESIDENT: BETTER AMERICAN LIVING THROUGH TYRANNY
BOW DOWN AND TREMBLE
...will be OUT and in stores hopefully by September, definitely by October, and definitely before the next presidential election.
In the meantime, there is a new-esque Dregulator over yar ---->>>
....another Critical Shopper in the NY Times extolling quality Eurotrashinita par excellence, CATHERINE MALANDRINO....
....and a lovely shout out from the Great Lady of Salon and MSNBC punditry fame, the lovely and scary-smart Ms. Joan Walsh, who re-discovered my Scott McClellan piece from 2005 and linked to it on her Salon blog.
Anyone who hangs around most evenings arguing publicly with Pat Buchanan is more than OK by me.
In short, there's a whole lot of shakin' going on, and hopefully all the pretty little rocks don't fall out of my head.
Love,
Cintra
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COMMENTS
crickets. *chirp*
Posted by: Cintra "Late as Usual" Wilson at June 12, 2008 8:31 PM
Let no one say that you are incapable of illumination, Ms. Wilson. Truer words were never written about Pax Clintonius and the matter versus antimatter negative potential of any kind of Michelle/Hillary proximity. And, might I raise a small but heartfelt voice in favor of a Mrs. Obama makeover? Someone needs to do something about that hairstyle and those outfits, Andre Leon Talley's fashion hosannahs to the contrary. I look forward to Caligula and I thank you, as usual, for the Technicolor truth telling.
Posted by: Hillary/Us, Not Hilarious at June 13, 2008 2:49 AM
Grazie, whomever you are.
Ya know, I keep thinking that if Michelle O. had her druthers and wasn't leading a political life, she'd probably have stronger hair: Badu bald, perhaps, or a head of those cool little tiny braids. Hopefully her presence in the White House will liberate ethnic hair the way JFK unshackled the male Presidential head from blocked hats. One hopes she will modernize, as opposed to re-Condify.
Posted by: Cintra "She Said I Was Evil" Wilson at June 16, 2008 7:26 PM
CONTRIBUTE TO THE CULTURAL DOGFIGHT
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Film School and the Perpetuation of the Myth of the Independent Filmmaker
I committed myself to learn the craft of filmmaking so that I could create an escape from a drab and mundane existence. The power of creating motion picture images was intoxicating to a novice filmmaker. If given the chance, could I ever make something as transporting as The Wizard of Oz or La Dolce Vita? Would attending an elite film school make this possible?
Be forewarned: attending an expensive university film program may teach you how films are made, but they will not help you become an independent filmmaker. There are reasons why it is called the film "business." Heed my tale.
I attended the New York University graduate film school. Learning from the same instructors who taught Jim Jarmusch and Spike Lee seemed like a dream come true. I would learn motion picture production skills by which I could earn a living. And the greatest hope of all would be that, like Jarmusch and Lee before me, I would have the opportunity to become an "independent filmmaker."
At NYU, we learned of the rigid hierarchy that Hollywood dictates to American filmmaking, and how it was crucial to honor and respect it. It soon became clear that filmmaking was the dominion of the wealthy, steeped in nepotism, and that the school was, in actuality, a male-dominated Hollywood prep school.
Still, this went against the messages we were hearing about the burgeoning profession of "independent filmmaker." Look at Susan Seidelman! Look at Tom DiCillo! These people were making the films they wanted to make on their own terms, and no movie studio could tell them that quirky characters and black and white images were a no-go. Why, Robert Rodriguez made El Mariachi on just $5,000 that he charged on his credit card. And it's the hit of the year, and heavy-hitting producers are lining up to work on his next picture!
Those of us who were not making slick, predictable film "products" with the assumption of working for a studio were advised to write a screenplay and shop it around to production companies. You had to work hard and pay your dues, but if you were willing to do so, you could be rewarded by having your film independently produced, your vision as an artist left relatively intact.
I was willing to work hard. I shopped my screenplays around for years, slogging away at the drudgery of freelance motion picture productions in order to earn a living. Working fourteen hours a day on MTV reality shows and A&E intro sequences would all be in the past once I hit my stride as an independent filmmaker. But somehow my screenplays weren't attractive to the production companies. They were too "arty," too "literary." American audiences don't understand subtlety, I was told. Try writing a chick flick.
Why weren't any of my colleagues becoming successful filmmakers by making their own feature films, and "creating a buzz" that would allow them to continue to do so? After ten years, I realized that no one I knew from NYU had become an independent filmmaker. Nor had any of the people I knew from the other major league graduate film schools. Most had given up and started new careers, and the only ones who had hung on were being financed to retain this extravagant dream by affluent and indulgent parents. The luckier Hollywood scions had administrative jobs at studios. What had happened to the El Mariachis of the world?
The answer is that independent filmmaking does not exist. El Mariachi was not made for $5,000. Neither was Tarnation, a 2003 film supposedly put together on the filmmaker's home computer. These films may have been shot for nominal amounts, but the filmmaking process doesn't end there. Films must be edited, a long-term and time-consuming process. Once that occurs, if a production company shows interest in the film, they must put it through innumerable stages of better edits, credit sequences, prints, marketing, and the like, to prepare it for the possibility of commercial distribution. Without distribution, the film will never be seen. Who controls virtually all film distribution in this country? Large Hollywood monopolies consisting of movie studios, cable television giants, and multiplex theatres. These monopolies depend upon polished and formulaic film products that will make them as much money as possible. Remakes are popular, as they are known entities that have already earned large profits in previous iterations. Films holding new ideas and styles outside of familiar genres are not going to be distributed, because their profit margins are unascertained.
Why perpetuate the myth that independent filmmaking exists? Because exclusive institutions such as NYU, staffed and attended by Hollywood progeny, need breeding grounds where the misinformation that filmmaking is a democratic pursuit is maintained. And more importantly, because Hollywood is an industry that relies on myth making and mystique, and on the collective fantasy that anyone can do anything in America. Hollywood executives love the delusion that they will be the ones to discover the next, hugely profitable talent. That almost all of this talent has no possibility of reaching them is of negligible concern to the myth itself.
I have since learned that all the big names in "independent filmmaking," including some of the aforementioned, have rejected the notion as well. They have either been absorbed by the Hollywood system, or burned by it to the point that they work only on its periphery. Some operate in other countries, or, if they have been commercially successful at some point, by financing their own production houses. They do not believe in the existence of the independent filmmaker, and neither should we.
Because the commercial formula that we see in every Hollywood film was cemented early on, the artistic and experimental possibilities of the medium were eschewed to the netherworld, where they remain. Motion picture is too expensive a medium to play around with, and due to this country's distribution system, we will never see the few experiments.
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COMMENTS
I have nothing useful to add. This brilliantly says it all.
Posted by: Sarah at July 21, 2008 7:51 PM
Very, very, very, very nice post!
Posted by: Lalita at July 22, 2008 2:59 PM
What an excellent read - Nicely done!
Posted by: Michelle at July 22, 2008 3:22 PM
Aww! Thanks. I'm glad everyone is enjoying it. I just get sick of people acting like the "n-word" is 100 percent cool in my community and it is not. It's still pretty controversial and as long as it is sooo toxic that a white person can't use it at all without a black person taking offense is proof of its universal toxicity. I find the whole debate silly.
Posted by: The Black Snob at July 22, 2008 5:35 PM
Excellent post. I just posted a couple days ago about the word with a video from mjul from YouTube that kind of breaks down through images why the word is so offensive to many people.
Posted by: a.eye at July 23, 2008 11:32 AM
Why are we worrying about what black folks call each other in the privacy of our own culture when we are 70-80% of the prison population? Sounds like a distraction to me- address it later if you MUST, but we have more important things to fix. Planned Parenthood? Look up the founder. Lopsided marketing of more harmful versions of harmful products? Find menthol smokes and a 40 of Old English in a non-black neighborhood. Sean *fucking* Bell, anyone? I have not the time to list all of the issues more deserving of discussion than this nigger foolishness. That said, I applaud this post.
Posted by: Fly South at July 23, 2008 2:41 PM
I agree with you that it's doubtful that most black parents are telling their children it's okay to use the word and white parents are telling their children it's not. Probably what is being taught in black households is similar to what you were taught. That it is ignorant and tacky for anyone to use the word as a "term of endearment" after it was used so vehemently for so long. And your right about another thing...if black people can't help but get offended by a white person saying it then it's probably an offensive word...period.
Posted by: Jes at July 23, 2008 5:23 PM
i personally thought the post was kinda boring. all that was really said was "use at your own risk". as far as i knew, that was already the rule. any white people know what may happen if they say N around blacks. this post didnt shed any light, or offer a fresh perspective on the issue. straight mediocre.
Posted by: grizzay at July 24, 2008 10:09 AM
Glad Cintra has you aboard, Danielle. Really like what I've been reading you. Nothing I could possibly add other than: somebody should forward this post to Patti Smith.
Posted by: MP at July 24, 2008 11:29 PM
Thanks, MP. I'm glad to be here. I love Cintra's work. She's the total shizzz-nit.
Posted by: The Black Snob at July 25, 2008 1:54 AM
i like it.
when i think of it succinctly, censoring the word, "nigger" is the same as censoring any word. and when you censor ANYthing, you give it power.
there is nothing inherent about he sounds F UH KKKK that makes the word disgusting. it is the meaning that we give it, and interpret, and (many of us) try to vainly avoid, as if that were enough to get "us" into "heaven."
as you said...even when it's said with love, its usually said with some semblance of the, "you're put in yer place," idea. Even people who say it out of, "love," are still nicknaming their friends. Not that I mind nicknames...
i like them.
Posted by: johan at July 25, 2008 6:19 AM
and grizzay is a total dizznick. surrously.
Posted by: johan at July 25, 2008 6:21 AM
I agree, Johan. Banning words is pointless. Even before I was a journalist I was pro-speech to the nth degree. Even speech I didn't agree with. So word banning, book banning, music banning -- just dumb. Ban a book and you've just made that book the most popular and sought after book ever.
I personally just accept the N-word's existence and ask that people try to keep it to a minimum to not-at-all around me. Although most black people can tell who it's appropriate to use the word around and who's not. I've had friends who used the term all the time, but didn't use it around me and I didn't even tell them not to. It's simply a matter of manners.
I just wish people (including my people) would take away its magic and power by not going through these ornate "I can use it/You can't use it" exercises with white people. It's really a "no one should use this in polite company" word. But I can't tell you how many N's you want to drop at home. Go crazy. Just don't do it around me.
If people could just be ... dare I say it ... more nonplussed about it. Like acknowledge that it's a offensive word, but decide I'm not going to let it hurt me any more and have that power. I'm not going to give racists the reaction they want. There are other ways to express your displeasure without yelling in poetic parameter with Michael Eric Dyson, delighting bigots that they can still get our goat.
Posted by: The Black Snob at July 25, 2008 1:38 PM
CONTRIBUTE TO THE CULTURAL DOGFIGHT