I thought BoingBoing, of all places, had a pretty reasonable take: "At best a darkly ironic self-deprecation that could never fit into 140 characters"
You know what would be a pretty sweet troll? Arguing that the Internet, by making intuitive judgments of context, audience and tone much more difficult, actually makes people racist.
Thirdly, I blame a former commenter for the fact that I've had Toto's "Africa" stuck in my head since before that woman's plane landed.
But I (privately) make this kind of joke all th time
Like supporting the Iraq War
Well yes, and some of us have done so on the pages of this very blog. There is a cherry-picked blog me that is truly a monster.
In keeping with the grandest traditions of the blog, I'll be humorless. Talking about whether Sacco's really a racist isn't really a meaningful question -- depending on how you're using the word, either we're all somewhat racist, or no one is unless they're actually burning a cross right at this moment.
But the tweet (made outside of the context of a group of intimates who would understand the sort of joke you might make) was absolutely a racist thing to say, and it's fine to react to that without worrying about not being able to look into her soul and know if she's really consumed by racial hatred and contempt or is just astonishingly dim about how people communicate.
This is fairly fascinating. Might be totally racist!
Might be indeed, but it's apparently no longer available, so we'll never know.
We agree, LB, hence the bit about policing the discourse. Try harder!
The BoingBoing line is perfect.
Weird, works from here. Any better?
Arguing that the Internet, by making intuitive judgments of context, audience and tone much more difficult, actually makes people racist.
I've read enough Internet to know that everyone is always already racist.
I think I need someone to explain this to me. Surely there is no legitimate confusion about whether this statement was sincere or sardonic. Given that, it seems to me to be an example of what ogged describes as a joke where "we can both feel comfortable that neither is being sincere", except "both" here refers to "anyone reading it". Given that, I'm having trouble getting to LB's conclusion that it "was absolutely a racist thing to say".
Confronting a stranger upon arrival at the airport because of one of her [cough, hack, complain about Benjamin Disraeli, comb Flashman-style cavalry whiskers, drink port, complain about gout] tweets is the sort of thing that the 21st century is going to see a lot more of, isn't it?
"Confront" is a strange verb, there. "Gawk"?
8: Yeah, but I think there's a real problem with even treating "is she racist" as a meaningful question. There's an easy answer to what's really going on in her head, and it's that on the basis of public information, there's no way to know anything exculpatory, so no sense speculating.
Focusing on how having said something undeniably racist doesn't absolutely necessarily mean anything bad about the speaker's soul (outside of the kind of relationship where you do have intimate knowledge of someone's thought processes) seems like a bad habit to me.
It's the long flight during which she changes from lame jokester to unknowing butt of a worldwide joke is what makes this thing so amazing. She's an absolutely perfect candidate for butt of a worldwide joke -- daughter of SA billionaire, PR exec for a big internet company, prone to stupid cliche humor (I mean really, British dentistry? ).
11: There's no ambiguity about whether it's a joke (it includes the words "Just kidding," after all), but it seems very clearly to me to be a racist joke. Thinking that it's funny to say that going to Africa means getting AIDS is straightforwardly racist.
Thinking that it's funny to say that going to Africa means getting AIDS is straightforwardly racist.
Well, no, it's not. But I'm away most of the rest of the day!
12 Not anymore if the FAA allows in flight cell phone use.
Suddenly I find myself refreshing the Et tu, Mr. Destructo? blog and hoping for a fresh post on this mess.
15 If twitter allowed longer than 144 characters we'd have been treated to dig at the cuisine too. How old can she be and has she actually ever been there?
The gist was going to Africa means getting AIDS -- but only if you're black. The 'just kidding' because it reinforces the second part, doesn't demonstrate that it's a joke, it's part of the joke.
OT: Whenever we get a moment, let's all pile on this milquetoast:
Everyone knows America is "coming apart," with the most affluent, and generally best educated, 10 or 20 percent of families living very differently than everybody else. We eat different foods, shop at different stores, watch different shows, enjoy different movies.
Introducing our children to some pop culture, then, makes it more likely that they will grow up to be able to transcend these class divides. When my boys are in their twenties I want them to be able to hang out with (and respect) kids who didn't go to college, who spend their Sundays watching football, who would never dream of going to a drum circle. An appreciation for pop culture, I believe, will help. And a pop-culture blackout--which is likely to become an upper-middle-class phenomenon--might actually hurt.
[Emphases added.]
Arguing rubbish like "Shared references will serve in stead of sympathy in our alienated future" is no way to go through life, son.
Doesn't the Red Cross assume that going to Africa means you'll get AIDS? Like you can't give blood if you've spent more than a certain amount of time there?
Apparently that may be more about malaria than AIDS so I guess we know what disease to joke about in the future.
22 Same deal if you go to the UK because of mad cow. I sense a strange convergence in the force here.
21 I can't get past this: who would never dream of going to a drum circle. Are these millionaire hippies?
Other joke for thoughtful contrasting!
"People don't like people as much as they like dogs, because they don't see what they hate in themselves looking back in a dog's eyes, if Africa was just all labradoodles dying of AIDS, we would take care of it in one day."
Yeah, my wife was banned because she spent six months in Ireland, even though she's vegetarian.
Ogged saying "I'm white!" is totally hilarious, though.
The gistJOKE was going to Africa means getting AIDS -- but only if you're black.
It's funny because it's preposterous. And the person telling the joke obviously realizes it's preposterous.
Just to try and pin down what you're saying, what makes it preposterous is that it's racist -- if it wasn't, on some surface level, racist, it wouldn't be a preposterous thing to say at all. Is that what you meant by preposterous, or is there something other than racism that makes it preposterous?
OK, Moby Urple, what if it had said:
"Going to Somalia. Hope I don't starve. Just kidding. I'm rich!"
Okay, that one's pretty good, actually.
Going through security, hope they don't think I'm a terrorist. Just kidding, I'm white!
And similar to the Duck Dynasty, her position in corporate communications for IAC adds a further layer of poor judgment. Although she seems to pride herself on being a "maverick." In a short biography on Twitter, Ms. Sacco says she works in corporate communications at IAC and is a "troublemaker on the side. But mavericks who maverick down are the exception rather than the rule.
35: That's clearly a joke about racism, not a racist joke.
Ogged saying "I'm white!" is totally hilarious, though.
It's not funny, and it's also not well set up to be "outrageous commentary on racism." Sarah Silverman this is not. What the hell is she even talking about? It's like she thinks just tossing around the words "AIDS" in an inappropriate way makes something funny, which IMO makes her not only not funny but also likely an asshole.
Obviously if your job is corporate PR this should be a fireable offense, since it is literally your job to prevent things like this from happening and you should know as much.
38: Freddy Mercury "passed" pretty well (and somewhere in there is an AIDs/South Africa joke (Queen notoriously played Sun City) that I can't tease out*).
*Maybe ""Going to South Africa. Hope I don't get AIDS. Just kidding. I'm not Freddie Mercury.!"
"Going to leak some classified information. Hope I don't get arrested. Just kidding, I'm Bob Woodward!"
I agree that it is a firing offense for a corporate PR person, don't see what that as strong evidence of wrongness.
Sarah Silverman this is not.
That was my first reaction. "Who does she think she is, Sarah Silverman?"
41 is a better joke than the one in the OP, but I doubt Woodward is self-reflective enough to make that kind of remark.
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Now that I have a new phone, and perhaps more crucially am using the Chrome app rather than the built-in browser, on many occasions I'm seeing a post on the mobile Unfogged site have appended to it the complete text of another, earlier post, and the comments link is to that post's comments. I think the appended post is rarely or never the post immediately preceding. The error always disappears upon refresh.
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"Going for a walk around the block. Hope I don't get harrassed by any cops. Just kidding. I'm white!"
But I'm away most of the rest of the day!
"Gotta run some last minute Muslim Christmas errands. Just kidding. I'm Mexican!"
what makes it preposterous is that it's racist
What makes it preposterous is the idea that the degree to which a traveler to Africa is at risk for AIDS depends in some way on that traveler's race. Layered on top of the preposterous idea that merely going to Africa means risking AIDS. The tweeter was mocking both of these preposterous ideas.
Good grief. 39 gets it right: it's not funny, and not in a "That's not funny!" way, but in a "Huh?" way.
Anyway, context is everything. I haven't bothered to check for the conversational context (if any) for the Sacco tweet, but read in isolation it's bizarre, as though the speaker's first thought regarding going to Africa is that a person might contract AIDS there, so she chose to remark upon, or joke about, that. It's not the first thing that would occur to me, so it's just bizarre.
Oh, I just read the link posted in the OP. Apparently there is some question whether a variety of tweets from Sacco's seeming account are actually hers. Is the question whether she herself is racist, or the Africa AIDS post specifically (as opposed to the snotty posts/tweets about Germans and Brits) is racist?
Buh. I find myself impatient with this. The poster, or tweeter, whether Sacco herself or an imposter, is engaging in a deliberate exercise in political incorrectness. That is boring.
It reminds me a little bit of the worst kind of Seth MacFarlane/Family Guy humor, only it was even more ineptly pulled off because she's even less talented. Hey, let's make a reference to something offensive in a way that makes no sense at all, because referring to things and being offensive is ALWAYS funny.
I've gotten the idea that it actually is funny to some people. They don't get why it isn't funny to everyone. And there's your structural racism/sexism/what have you.
I absolutely do not understand ogged's 17.1, but he's away for the day. Worth noting that the topic here is pinging back and forth between "Is it racist?" and "Is it funny?" There's been a lot of contentious discussion on this blog about the varieties and nature of comedic humor, and they'll not be resolved.
Parsi, the joke is that everyone knew she was going to get fired before she did. As to the text of the tweet, it doesn't matter whether it was arguably non-racist, or arguably funny -- everyone who saw it assumed (correctly) that it was fireable for someone in her position.
(And you can tell because the hash tag wasn't about 'is she racist' or 'is it funny' but 'has she found out just how dumb she was.')
Urple and I obviously know different people, because I have no trouble at all imagining someone from whom that tweet would not only not be preposterous, but would be intended as a kidding-on-the-square commentary about how scary it is to be going to continent-full-of-darker-skinned-people.
Didn't she have an earlier tweet about getting her immunizations? I have no trouble at all picturing someone who is frankly fearful and ignorant, and is managing that fear by talking about it in a joking way to (she assumes) a sympathetic audience.
Confidential to Charley: Apparently the billionaire who shares her last name has two sons. She doesn't seem to be related.
Oops. Oh well, I hope she lands on her feet, then.
53: Parsi, the joke is that everyone knew she was going to get fired before she did.
Oh. Apparently I missed that. I didn't see any hashtag.
55.1 is right, of course.
Somewhat related: Edroso has been a roll lately, this time on Jonah Goldberg on Pajama Boy. Quoting Goldberg:
By the time this "news'' letter reaches your e-mail box, pretty much every joke imaginable about "Pajama Boy" will have been made. But I reject such a dour Malthusian view of Pajama Boy humor!
When the brouhaha started, I was tempted to make the following joke on Twitter: Q: What's the hardest part of being picked as the poster boy for the pajama-boy ad campaign? A: Telling your parents you're gay.
Now, quick, before you call A&E and have my reality show canceled, the first problem with this joke is that you're not supposed to make any derogatory jokes about being gay anymore. And that's okay by me so long as people avoid being complete tools about enforcing that rule.
...
The high level of aids in south Africa has caused governments to warn tourists about it
Here is one from Australia:
http://www.smartraveller.gov.au/zw-cgi/view/Advice/South_Africa
One study study had the HIV rate for blacks at 13% and for whites at 0.6%
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/HIV/AIDS_in_South_Africa
It isn't like governments can say " be especially careful if you are going to have sex with black people.". But you probably should. Thus, the joke that plays on what the public statements leave out.
It reads to me like someone trying to make a joke about racism, not a racist joke. Everyone's right though, it doesn't work, and it's not funny. I think 33 and 35 get it right.
Thus, the joke that plays on what the public statements leave out.
Sure. The joke plays on the notion that since the speaker is white, she isn't going to be having sex with black people.
"I am just going outside and may be some time. Just kidding, I'm white!"
"Going out in the rain, hope I don't turn into a gremlin. Just kidding, I'm not a mogwai!"
That's feeding after midnight, not getting wet.
64: Plus, they won't let me. Turns out when they say "don't leave the hospital until you're released" they actually mean it.
INR of 1 point fucking 4, and I think they are going to make me wait for >2 despite my newfound belly-jabbing abilities. Now up to 10 mg of Coumadin.
What's that dose in terms of dead mice?
Number of dead mice (or rats, which is canonical?) times expected number of remaining orgasms in their life to get into the appropriate units. try to keep up, Moby.
That sounded better when Charlton Heston said it.
"Get your hands off me you dirty rat masturbator."
"Going to rob a payroll in South Braintree. Hope I don't get executed. Just kidding! Italians are white now."
Get your hands off me you dirty rat masturbator. Just kidding. I'm white!
It reads to me like someone trying to make a joke about racism, not a racist joke. Just kidding. I'm white!
Am I the only one who can't read the title of this post in the sidebar without hearing Rutger Hauer say "You troll in pieces ... asshole."
If we needed any further proof that my age cohort is running Hollywood now, there's apparently a Beetlejuice sequel in pre-production now, starring Winona Ryder.
Natty, we're now spending tonight in your city. But we get in (without jackets) at 11 and leave for the airport at 6:30. So I'll just say hi to you now.
Right on. I'm going to go out and meet college friends for dinner, but I'm probably not going out with them for drinks afterward, as we aren't dining until 9:45, and I'm not as young as I was. I suppose you could take the light rail over to the MOA and catch a late movie, but I wager that would be more trouble that it was worth, what with the three kids and all.
If you're near the airport La Quinta, you should totally stop by.
Hotel party! What you do is, go to the ice machine a bunch of times, and fill the bathtub or sink with ice and beer, and put on some bad TV, like maybe VH1 or a weird animal show, and oh heebie's situation is actually probably much different from being on tour when you sneak eight people into a single room, yeah, never mind.
We got puke and passed out people who like terrible TV. So you're saying we need a lot of ice?
Dolph Lundgren at his peak
Was Bryan Benben ever in a better movie?
But hell, married to Madeleine Stowe for 31 years.
Benben is like unto a god.
Up through this part I thought 82 was describing the setup for a brilliant practical joke:
Hotel party! What you do is, go to the ice machine a bunch of times, and fill the bathtub [...] with ice
You write a note that you've taken out their liver and they should seek medical attention, make a mark on the passed-out person's torso that could plausibly look like a surgical incision, and put them in the ice bath just when they're starting to wake up (so they don't stay unconscious too long in an ice bath and get hypothermia). Then everyone clears out, and the victim wakes up in a horrible urban legend.
Are we talking about the baby or one of the kids? For maximum humor, I mean?
The baby probably hasn't heard the urban legend yet.
81: If I didn't have plans, I could, but I'll be 13 miles due north of there for my previous engagement, and getting a bus home would be inconvenient.
But hey, if anyone does ever come through for a shopping junket at the Mall, let me know.
OT: Lucy van Pelt is kind of a bitch. Poor Rerun.
In related news, Schroeder has the patience of a Simon Stylites.
Scrawl "Welcome to the world of AIDS" in lipstick on the bathroom mirror. And then "Just kidding! I was white" on the mirror in the room itself.
This kind of dark humor is what was meant by "hipster racism", right? I think this was dispatched by the Internet a few months ago. Catch up, everyone.
Sarah Silverman this is not [...] It's like she thinks just tossing around the words "AIDS" in an inappropriate way makes something funny
The part of the joke about getting AIDS in Africa was a poor setup - and in poor taste - but "Just kidding! I'm white!" is a legitimately funny line. If it wasn't, people wouldn't be repeating it.
I always feel so ignorant when I see those lists of supposedly common stereotypes. Black are supposed to be bad tippers?
"Come on, I'll hold the ball and you kick it. Just kidding! I'm white!"
"The judge said three to five years. Just kidding! I'm white!"
93: Are you watching the one about the dog? Ugh!
"I just got arrested for smoking a joint. Just kidding! I'm white!"
"They said it was only a provisional ballot. Just kidding! I'm white!"
So I thought I'd put together a mix that reflected the musical and cultural diversity of 21st century America. Just kidding! I'm white! Have a bunch of indie rock instead.
01 Jim James - State of the Art (A.E.I.O.U.)
02 Foxing - The Medic
03 Their/They're/There - New Blood
04 Speedy Ortiz - Cash Cab
05 Stinky Smelly - Guerrilla Gorilla
06 Dads - Boat Rich
07 I Love Your Lifestyle - Christopher Robin
08 NONA - Words I Said
09 The Front Bottoms - Everything I Own
10 Vulture Smile - Downrigger
11 Tancred - Twelve
12 Owen - Bad Blood
13 Throwing Muses - morning birds 1
14 Parquet Courts - Stoned and Starving
15 Pity Sex - Wind-Up
16 Odd Dates - Break
17 d'arcy - Shaking
18 Iron Chic - Wolf Dix Rd.
19 Touché Amoré - Non Fiction
20 Crash of Rhinos - Impasses
21 Foxing - Gold Cobra
Now I am become Death, the killer of threads.
111: aw. Aw, poor comment. Aw. Hey, wow. Hey, listen, I feel for you, comment. Heyyyyyyy. Wow. I just really do uh wow well. You know, hang in there, comment.
My beard is almost entirely white now.
That is a particular fear, actually. I should stop eating at Bojangles.
But 116 to 115 was SO MUCH BETTER.
I'd like the Cajun biscuit combo with a Diet Coke. Hope I don't get AIDS. Just kidding! I want Sprite.
116 to 115 is one of the best serendipitous things that ever appeared in this blog.
There's nothing "safe" about dirty rice, people.
Bojanges AIDS beard came at a really serendipitious time to make Blume and I less stressed about the painter who is painting our house doing a shitty job. Thanks, racism!
It's the theory of the moebius. A twist in the fabric of space, where your beard gets AIDS.
I'm just waiting for it to acknowledge me back. HEY SNOW.
One of Undergrad Jammies' future kid names was Sneaux.
116 to 115 really was a wonderful present.
Hi, heebie! I'm out here for the week, but I'm not going to make it to the Quintana either.
What do people think of the new Beyonce album?
135: a friend of a friend went into a store in whatever year it was and asked at the perfume counter if they had the cologne called "Joop!" and the perfume counter person haughtily replied "it's pronounced 'yeaux'."
And then all of their beards got $5 worth of AIDS, because fried chicken.
Speaking of snowclones: Perhaps many of you have not experienced this, but there is a certain temperature at which the right mixture of snow, ice crystals, sand, salt and solidified car exhaust has exactly the same texture as moist sand. It's very disconcerting to step in what usually feels like slush and discover that you have the sensation of walking on the beach.
Sigh. What a night. Next time these college friends come to town I am going to insist on someone hooking me up with a ride. Trying to go most of the way across the city on a winter Saturday night and back just sucks all the fun out of the hanging out.
This thread has been great. Just kidding! I'm black.
Snow (Hey Oh)!
Speaking of ice crystals, this recent APOD was way cool and a new phenomenon to me.
Goodnight racists., everywhere.
Mark Fisher quotes Badiou:
a brutal state of affairs, profoundly inegalitarian - where all existence is evaluated in terms of money alone - is presented to us as ideal. To justify their conservatism, the partisans of the established order cannot really call it ideal or wonderful. So instead, they have decided to say that all the rest is horrible. Sure, they say, we may not live in a condition of perfect Goodness. But we're lucky that we don't live in a condition of Evil. Our democracy is not perfect. But it's better than the bloody dictatorships. Capitalism is unjust. But it's not criminal like Stalinism. We let millions of Africans die of AIDS, but we don't make racist nationalist declarations like Milosevic.We kill Iraqis with our airplanes, but we don't cut their throats with machetes like they do in Rwanda, etc.
Participation in the Spectacle of anti-racism somehow clears our guilt over the millions of suffering Africans. Calling out Justine Sacco:We are so very Good!
Bob nails it in 148. What real purpose is served by these periodic witch hunts against various peons in the system?
Bob nails it in 148. What real purpose is served by these periodic witch hunts against various peons in the system?
This is making the rounds on my FB wall. Kind of topical.
Hello young racists, whoever you are
I hope your troubles are few
All my good wishes go with you tonight
I've been racist like you...
That article or rant or whatever the fuck it is in 152 is terrible. Is that site medium basically just always bad?
154: it's a platform for user-submitted, unpaid writing curated to optimize "shareability", so . . .
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I can think of only one thing that would make this story more Halford-bait.
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Medium seems to be the new Blogger, overlaid with a set of editors who choose things to be part of a magazine-looking front page. Apparently a lot of people use it because it's nicer than any other blogging software, and then they publish their stuff elsewhere as well.
HE IS RISEN
154: Actually, I quite liked the article linked in 152.
160 -- but there's no way that "I'm from the WSJ and I think you should let me into this possibly newsworthy but fundamentally frivolous event" is (a) morally reprehensible or (b) a pat story about white male privilege (maybe a pat story about class privilege yeah, but it's not really a white male thing.)
There's some trollbait in the WSJ about how great it was when WASPs led the nation.
HE IS RISEN INDEED
163. As trollbait goes, it's the bee's knees.