Comments on: Transcending Race…A History Lesson

By: John

John — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 11:17:50 +0000

I read all of that and… I am almost at a loss for words. I knew that racism in America is and always was a serious issue. But Christ, some of these things terrify the living shit out of me.

I cannot understand the horrors that these people suffered I can only imagine.

Damn…

By: Will

Will — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 09:49:19 +0000

It’s good that you posted a list of historically important black people, but it does always grate on me when people keep bringing up the guy who “invented the traffic light”. It even says in the article that this is a myth, and that he only designed one particular modified version.

By: BOMOORE

BOMOORE — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 00:27:23 +0000

When I listen to Chris Matthews I never forget he’s a white guy – isn’t that the same thing? He talks (yammers) like an egomaniacal white guy, right?

By: badhedgehog

badhedgehog — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 14:41:15 +0000

How would it actually be possible to forget that a black person is black? It just doesn’t work. *Pretending* that a black person isn’t black, or finding it hard to remember that “black” and “any good” can go together – I see how those might work… but why would a person want to be doing those things? Hmmm.

By: dcotler

dcotler — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 00:00:38 +0000

When someone admits that he is xenophobic and conscious of superficial differences between people (most of us are) and then celebrates the (even temporary) shedding of this burden (most of us don’t), i think it makes sense to commend the best of what he says.

By: Jeff

Jeff — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 23:52:28 +0000

Chris showed obliviousness to racial history and feelings, and his statement revealed a lot usually obscured about race in our society. He’s also not a bigot, and he’s probably learning a lot from friends about his obliviousness. He’s racist in the sense that this society is racist; however, he’s not *a racist* in the sense you imply. At least, that’s my strong impression given the context.

I hoped those whites who care (like me) would learn something from this, as I did. I don’t have anything to learn from actual white racists, but I do have something to learn from whites who are clueless when we blurt out something like this and don’t even know, at first, why it’s so wrong. So, I agree with what I think Bennett is saying.

The harsher interpretation requires both bracketing off the larger context and also assuming the worst of someone…

By: Greg Laden

Greg Laden — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 16:00:34 +0000

Bennett, there is also this: There is a difference between “meaning” as to what someone intends, and “meaning” as to what meaning is invoked, or what the outcome is. I myself am very willing to give Chris Matthews all sorts of breaks because on balance (while he frustrates me a lot) he is more progressive than not. But I never heard Matthews note that he “forgot George Bush was a Yahoo from Texas.” I’ve heard his color-blind comments a number of times and it is always a little strange.

I’m waiting for him to say this to an African American commenter. “Oh, for a while there I forgot you were black. But then you said this thing you just said and it all came back to me…”

By: karnythia

karnythia — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 22:34:34 +0000

I am under no obligation to give him the benefit of anything. Least of all because he’s “pretty good” since if he were he wouldn’t have felt the need to express an idea that forgetting skin color was necessary to pay attention to the message. Colorblindness is never a useful or respectable tool in discussions of race.

By: Bennett

Bennett — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 21:06:02 +0000

karnythia, You seem to have no awareness of how much meaning you are projecting onto his statement.

There is nothing from the context of what Chris Matthews said, or even from what he has said recently about race, that supports the meaning “you’re not like those other black people.” You jumped to that conclusion that is without merit.

As for his “post-racial” position, you are absolutely right. This country is far from “post-racial,” if there could even be such a thing today. But cut Chris some slack. He will never understand what it is to be Black, but for a White guy, he’s pretty good at racial consciousness.

Chris’s comment was racist only if you heard something different than he was trying to say. If he didn’t say it well, and stumbled into some easily misunderstood words, that doesn’t merit character assassination, and should simply be shrugged off. The benefit of the doubt is the best tool for this situation.

By: karnythia

karnythia — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 17:06:45 +0000

I’m disappointed that you ignored the real context in favor of some later backpedaling by way of explanation. The entire spoken context actually makes the “forgetting” even more offensive in light of the historical and social context. The fact that you agree with Chris just shows me that you are also ignorant of the historical and social context of such a statement.