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June 16, 2003

The Shelly Long Syndrome

Comedian Colin Quinn is on NPR this afternoon. His theory is that jokes about midgets and handicaps are sublimated racial jokes. I can buy that. So on one of his shows, he asks for 5 things black people want white people to answer truthfully. You understand that the blackfolks will always have deeper questions, but that's beside the point. He's a comic.

I don't have any special questions reserved for whitefolks. Primarily because I don't give a crap about race relations, and secondarily because I see whitefolks for who they are. (It's a mystical power, I admit). But I was provoked into thinking about it for a minute. So I thought up the question "Do you believe that sheltering your children will make them better adults?" Whitefolks believe in sheltering their children, and this is what white means. I don't mean white like caucasian, I mean white like Barbie. Whitefolks believe that special privileges are reserved for people who are dainty. People who don't get their fingernails dirty rise up a chain of meritocracy populated by people who don't make jokes about midgets and retards. Up there are only folks with high SAT scores, straight teeth and zero percent financing.

Of course the dirty secret is that those who live out this fantasy find that their bosses are scumbags. Because, of course relative to the Barbie life, everybody is a scumbag. And so the BMW couples learn to live down one or two dirty secrets about corruption and power, which only makes their obsessions with sheltering more profound. They learn this late in life and it dawns on them that they could have been black all along. That is to say they could have kept it real and not sheltered themselves from the real world, and all that dirt. But that is what stupid people do, right? It's a big hangup. An upper middle class dualist dilemma.

Now you have one more clue as to why I know the secret of life.

Out here in California, the Workman's Compensation insurance framework is all blown to shit and bound to go broke within a year or two. Of course the political majority is incapable of electing politicians who can say the word 'shit' and 'responsible' in the same paragraph let alone legislative session. So there will be no reform and (read my lips) no new taxes.

But hey, we're sheltered from all that. Right?

Posted by mbowen at June 16, 2003 08:07 PM

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Comments

I fail to see what Quinn's statements have to do with Shelly Long. She's attractive, talented and apparently organized. What's the problem?

Posted by: T. Collins at July 5, 2004 01:09 PM

I fail to see what Quinn's statements have to do with Shelly Long. She's attractive, talented and apparently organized. What's the problem?

Posted by: T. Collins at July 5, 2004 01:11 PM

Well it's not Shelly Long so much as it is Diane Chambers from Cheers. On the other hand, all of the casting directors in Hollywood haven't seen fit to see her in any other way than an uptight sheltered princess.

Posted by: Cobb at July 5, 2004 01:21 PM

If blacks are equal or even superior to whites then why do black leaders support affirmative action?
You should not need government assistance to legitimize your "rising Up!"

Posted by: Mr. Reality at October 21, 2004 09:57 PM

Some black leaders call for some affirmative action for some black people. Everybody doesn't need an equal hand up, but some people absolutely deserve it.

Posted by: Cobb at October 22, 2004 10:44 AM

"Everybody doesn't need an equal hand up, but some people absolutely deserve it."

What the hell does that mean? I can understand helping the poor but deserving, but color of skin or ethniticity certainly has nothing to do with it. Affirmative action had its time and place, but I fail to see its applicability in our current society - as long as the race card is removed from the deck. As far as I am concerned, affirmative action for blacks today is prejudicial against non-blacks, and actually harms those blacks who are sincerely trying to establish a legitimate and respected place for themselves in our society.

Of course blacks like Jesse Jackson certainly do not help the black's cause, and those blacks who hold him and his kind up as a leader - or THEIR leader - are only blinding themselves to the facts and crippling themselves mentally for self-esteem and their rightful place in an ownership society.

Posted by: ernestek at November 28, 2004 03:47 PM

what is the dumb comment about blacks have deeper questions..... fucking idiot

Posted by: Dustin at November 30, 2004 08:09 AM

You are a complete retard! Your problem is.. you want to blame others for your obvious failings. You destroy your own neighborhoods.. you spray paint your neighbors homes and buildings.. you drive by shoot your own kind.. you refuse to go to school. You leave your children fatherless...Your rap music is all about drugs, killings and spouse abuse..... one in 5 is a felon.. you commit 4 out of 5 violent crimes and yet blame white America for you lack of balls

Posted by: Jaun Jimenez at January 21, 2005 10:54 AM

Sounds like angry white math to me.

Posted by: Cobb at January 21, 2005 11:34 AM