If I had a nickel for every thick-necked, fat-headed, flat-topped fratboy who quoted that bit...
I believe that the act of making the distinction has a pretty long history, even among just African-American comedians. As I recall, you can also find a version of it in the Malcom X's autobiography. But, yeah, I think it gives rise to the sort of thing that Chappelle claims drove him from his show: not-black people laughing at the wrong times and at the wrong things.
Did Chapelle say that? Do you have a link or cite? That's interesting.
4: I look for a link at some point, but, yeah, my recollection is that Chapelle said he noticed some older white guy in the wings at one of the tapings, and wasn't comfortable with what he thought the older white guy was laughing at.
Pacing, ogged!
Yeah, they went up at nearly the same time. Sorry. Becks and I have similarly attuned "the blog needs a post" sensors.
4: His wikipedia article has a quote from him about it.
There was a bit on one of Chris Rock's subsequent albums where you hear a series of black people, one after the other, come up to him and tell him how funny the n-word routine was, and boy, it was spot-on, because they all hate n-words. And then a white guy comes up and tells him the same thing, followed by the sounds of all the black people beating the crap out of him.
It was pretty clearly Rock's way of acknowledging that the bit could be used by whites to justify racist beliefs. And it was damn funny.
Also, along the same lines, see also this Chris Rock video.
3: Not to go all right-wing blogger, but I have heard African-Americans use various racial insults among themselves both in jest and in earnest, without thinking that that entitled me to start pitching inside.
4, 8: As I recall, that quote came well into the "I would like to keep some of Comedy Central's $50 million; please don't sue" tour of talk shows, etc., and so may not be wholly spontaneous.
making the distinction has a pretty long history
Richard Pryor.
Wow, that's the first time I've actually heard that routine. It's kind of like John McWhorter with laughs and swearing. I can't figure out why he's performing in front of the Colorado Rockies logo, though.
I don't know that we're disagreeing.
#12: In his earlier routines, Pryor, if I recall -- I don't know his routines like I know Rock's -- called himself the n-word, in a "reclaim-the-word" sort of way, like gays calling themselves queer. He wasn't making a distinction. Although later on in his career, he changed his mind and stopped using the n-word in reference to himself. (If I am talking out of my ass, please correct me.)
No, not disagreeing at all. Offering evidence in support.
That's what I recall of Pryor too, GB. I could have sworn that he actually has a later bit where he explains that he gave up on the word and didn't want to hear anyone use it in any way, but I might be making that up.
16: I meant to indicate, in #14, that I was responding to #11. (Somehow, I feel as if I'm sinning less if I write it all the way out.) But I didn't.
Watch #10, everybody. It's awesome.
I've heard the distinction made in a very hostile way by one black mother against one of her kid's friends. She was by no means middle class, but she believed that the kid had stolen something from her.
I don't buy Dave Chappelle's story that he quit the show because he thought he was sending irresponsible messages. If he was so concerned about the content of his show, he could have changed the content, instead of ending the show. He could have pocketed the $50 mil and gone all Cosby on Comedy Central's ass, churning out uplifting, wholesome material. I am betting that nothing in his contract stipulated a minimum quota of n-word jokes per episode.
Perhaps Dave Chapelle quit the show for many reasons, not all of which he was willing to talk about?
Nah. It was the weed. He needed to smoke more weed.
#23 I love how Oprah's website puts a whole 2 or 3 paragraphs on a page. Boost those page views!
One of the tips in 10, "Before you let your friend in your car, make sure he's not crazy" reminds me of a story I overheard on the train once. A guy was driving his friend somewhere and wanted to speed. As a precaution, he asked his friend if he had any drugs in his bag in the trunk; the friend said no. He got caught speeding, and it turned out the friend had a pound of marijuana. In jail that night, he pleaded his case to the officer, but the officer told him they couldn't clear it up quickly unless his friend admitted that he had kept the drugs secret from him, which the friend hadn't. When he told the officer that the friend was refusing to admit that, the officer suggested holding his mouth so no one could hear him scream.
25--
the part from leblanc's link in 23 about how he left the show and flew to africa *without telling his wife* that he was quitting certainly suggests that there were other issues than his concerns about racial responsibility.
i mean, i'm not saying he was doing something wrong to her or with her or whatever, just that, if the issue for him was racial images, i don't quite see why it would play itself out that way in the marriage. sounds more complicated.
#28: In what way does a guy like that qualify as a "friend"?
Man, the video linked in the post is so great. Chris Rock really has it. There are so many layers, too, ways in which it's interesting social commentary. I mean, first, it's playing off of white people's exceptionalism for middle-class black people. Second, his "I don't hate black people, I hate niggers" calls up black self-hatred, and black people trying to be more "white", rejecting black culture. Third, he discusses very real ways in which black communities are self-destructive. Fourth, he criticizes the young, gangsta attitude of purposefully flouting the law and being determinedly ignorant, all in some kind of I'm-more-of-a-criminal machismo.
All this while being fucking hilarious. Brilliant.
One time in midtown Manhattan, I saw two well-dressed, professional-looking black women on the sidewalk talking to each other, when a black dude in a blingmobile rolled by, blasting rap for all to hear. BW 1 rolled her eyes and said to BW2, "He's keepin' it real."
30: Gaijin do not understand stoner ways.
It is interesting to wonder what their reaction would have been if you had laughed at this.
I was thinking the other day about phrases like "keepin' it real" and "that's how I roll." They are brilliantly economical defenses; do white people have anything like that? I'm sure we do, but I'm probably blind to it.
do white people have anything like that?
"You have the right to remain silent."
White people say "that's how I roll" too.
#36: Yes we do, of course. We say "keepin' it real" and "that's how I roll."
Hmm. "Nothing personal?" "Business is business?" "A man's gotta do what a man's gotta do?"
None of those is quite right.
Even laconic Israelis say "that's how I roll".
36: I thought the point was that you don't need such defenses if you're white.
"You'll be hearing from my attorney."
45: why not? That stipulation is capricious and arbitrary!
48: In this case, mostly because it's almost impossible to not sound like an idiot uttering appropriations.
Hmm. "Nothing personal?" "Business is business?" "A man's gotta do what a man's gotta do?"
All the ones I thought of had reference to some kind of ideology or power structure, and thus didn't seem analogous: "It's just business"; "It's a dog-eat-dog world"; "God works in mysterious ways."
So I'm sitting on a bench on the main street near my house, talking on the phone to my mom, when this big gangsta-looking guy drives up playing deafeningly loud hip-hop. Seeing me on the phone, he raises his hand, gives me a sheepish "Oh shit, sorry" look, and turns it way down. In Portland, that's how we roll.
gives me a sheepish "Oh shit, sorry" look, and turns it way down
That's hilarious. Does he think it's not disturbing anyone as long as he can't see them?
He's providing a service, ogged. How else are people in the neighborhood supposed to keep up with the latest Hyphy mixtapes?
52: I lived in a changing SE Portland neighborhood for a long time. One day I saw a black guy moving in down the street and blasting hip hop. At the moment I walked past his house he unloaded his lace curtains from the car, and I decided he was no worse than a 3 on the badass scale.
55 eerily captures the spirit of a dream I had last night, in which a gangsta-kid was driving down the street in a really nice car, which was also a kind-of parade float that had other nice cars on display and (it was implicit) on sale.
I think I'm going to write my thesis on that dream.
I assumed he was just asserting his right to the public airspace but drew the line at stepping on someone's phone call. Or maybe he somehow sensed that it was my mom I was talking to.
Your mom being a coroner might have intimidated him too. Every time she looks at someone, she thinks about where she'd make the first cut.
I live in an area that is being gentrified, so it's a mix of new condos and old row-houses, but with a definite north->south drift. I've more than once watched young white people blasting rap out of a mercedes SUV or something turn it down as we enter the `rough' part of the ward.
White people say "that's how I roll" too.
White people say all the things black people were saying 10-15 years ago. Suburban wigger types are a valuable force encouraging innovation in black culture. Especially as they get older, move into middle management, and everything they say becomes totally unhip.
54: Well, yeah. I had a horrifying realization the other day. I often play music very loud in the morning because it helps me wake up and get pumped up for the day (yes, I need pumping up). I play it especially loud 'cause I want to be able to hear it all through my apartment as I'm running around getting ready, taking a shower etc. Last week, I was doing an emergency load of laundry in the morning, so I left Kanye on (for those who haven't heard Graduation, it's fucking GREAT) while going down to the basement to switch it out. This is at about 8:30 am, and you could hear the music fucking loud in the hall. Like, 50 feet down the hall loud. I was so mortified. These people next door to me have a baby! And I'm blasting music at all hours. Although, given that no one has complained, I think it's the case that you can hear it in the hall but not in adjacent apartments. At least I hope so. I feel awful.
I'm always much more concerned about music volume than I need to be. I realized this when I had a (horrible) roommate move in who would crank my stereo at all hours and nobody (but me) ever complained.
I like Chris Rock better than Chapelle.
61: so what you're saying is that suburban wigger types : black culture :: H&M : high fashion?
You know, my fondness for loud music really annoys me. It's like, music that I like I have to have it loud to enjoy it. This is problem because i want to listen to music in my office, but I have to either have it quite soft, or listen to my iPod which means I can't hear the phone/my coworkers talking to me over the dividers. Sigh.
You know, my fondness for loud music really annoys me.
Not nearly as much as it annoys the neighbors, sounds like.
One of the reasons I like driving is that the car is the one place I can play music loudly.
Ogged admires The Scorpions, IIRC.
Not a single Scorpions song in my music collection, you calumniator.
LeBlanc is right that a big part of what's good about the Chris Rock routine--which is funny but in a pointed, ouch that's hilarious kind of way, imho--is the self-hatred/internalized racism part that he's pointing straight to. Woe be to the white person who doesn't get that.
Also, I hear that Portland--which has many, many charms--is pretty grossly racist.
I was playing Chopin nocturnes one night at a moderate volume and the people directly below me complained. The apartment managers kind of laughed it off.
Also, I hear that Portland--which has many, many charms--is pretty grossly racist.
What in Portland is racist? The mayor? The cops? The average person? Is it particularly segregated? What kind of thing to say is that?
Historically (1850--1960) Portland was the most racist of the West Coast cities. It's also in a class with Minneapolis and Seattle as one of the whitest cities. (On the other hand, a lot of cities are as non-white as they are because of white flight -- not exactly something to brag about). I wouldn't say that Portland is grossly racist compared to the rest of the US, though.
How could Portland be racist? Are spindly indie rock guys and irritable lesbians known for their extramusical bigotry?
The police department has had some scandals in recent years. Also, long-time black residents aren't so happy about the gentrification and displacement.
Generally, I notice fewer problems with race there than in most cities I'm familiar with.
It is complicated. Rock has a serious point, and I think he's really sincere. Not to make this about me, but I come from poor white trash, and look at the patterns that get repeated endlessly, and, well, kinda hate the rubes for being fucking stupid. I think Rock is talking about the same thing - socially encouraged downward facing strategies, I guess.
It is just all shocking and shit to hear it from a successful black man.
I wouldn't say that Portland is grossly racist compared to the rest of the US, though.
More segregated and whiter, yes, but I wouldn't say more racist. I wouldn't say less, either.
"is the self-hatred/internalized racism part that he's pointing straight to. Woe be to the white person who doesn't get that."
Does anyone else buy that?
Is it more segregated? There are barely any exclusively black areas, and there's a scattering of blacks in most other places. Isn't it just that the black population is so small?
Does anyone else buy that?
No.
He is of course sort of trying to play on both sides of the line between mocking self-hatred and practising it, but ultimately what he winds up with is a slightly slicker variation of the Pound Cake speech. Like that speech, the routine has a certain Foxworthy-esque appeal about it -- and unlike it was at least meant to be comedy -- but like that speech it also has all kinds of class snobbery and caricature wrapped up in it, which unsurprisingly is the age-old story of the whole Black People vs. Niggas dynamic to begin with. (So too with the "how not to get your ass kicked" video, but that at least has a funnier setup and tongue a little more firmly in cheek -- the "get a white friend" advice still makes me smile.) Rock's talking about some genuine forms of self-destructiveness in his community, but he's missing one important form: him. It kinda spoils the effect.
Not to say this bit doesn't have its moments ("niggas always want credit for some shit they supposed to do"), but even when I first heard it, it wasn't much more than chuckleworthy. These days it's Exhhibit A in why Chris Rock sucks.
82: No, I don't buy it either. He uses that as a framing device - black people are more racist than white people because they're racist against themselves - but once the audience starts laughing that vanishes.
More segregated and whiter, yes, but I wouldn't say more racist. I wouldn't say less, either.
It's a pretty consistent feature everywhere, but manifests differently I think. Still, I can't think of anywhere I've been in the US (or Canada) that I wouldn't characterize as racist.
Does anyone else buy that?
I'm not about to admit to it!
Is it more segregated?
I think so, though it's considerably less so than it was, say, 15 years ago. I've heard Portland Public Schools decribed as the 'the biggest de facto segregated school system in the north,' and I think that may be true.
I dunno, DS, can't you take all your points and use them to defend Rock? He's prising apart race and class and race and behavior. The bit isn't about skin color, which seems like a good thing. And yes, there's caricature, but he's a comedian, and I wonder if the "pull ourselves up by the bootstraps" message can ever come across if it's properly qualified; it might be one of those things that always needs to be a polemical grenade.
88. The stats are here. Oddly, Marshall and Roosevelt are not listed.
Wilson, Lincoln, Cleveland, and Franklin are 5-7% black and 62-83% white. The first two are the elite schools, and Cleveland is well thought of.
Grant, Benson, and Madison are 23--25% black and 34-64% white. The first two are well thought of.
Jefferson is 68% black and 13% white. Not well thought of by most.
Roosevelt and Marshall don't list stats and are not well thought of.
"is the self-hatred/internalized racism part that he's pointing straight to. Woe be to the white person who doesn't get that."
Does anyone else buy that?
I don't buy it either. Rock strikes me as basically entirely sincere in that bit. More proof that you don't have to be ironic to be funnyy.
DS is right to point to Cosby's "Pound Cake" speech as analogy. Cosby was sincere too.
Rock's talking about some genuine forms of self-destructiveness in his community, but he's missing one important form: him. It kinda spoils the effect..... These days it's Exhhibit A in why Chris Rock sucks.
He's not missing, and he doesn't suck. Chris Rock isn't Richard Pryor, he's a kind of modern-day George Jefferson. A bantam rooster who pulled himself up from real poverty and has a contempt for the underclass behaviors that could have held him back. He knows he never would have been a "nigger"...too proud for that. But he keeps the chip on his shoulder about white people and the sharp eye for the ways the system is stacked against people like his family who genuinely have bourgeois values but are stuck in the ghetto. He still understands he was lucky, and as long as he doesn't lose that he'll keep his edge.
Did he grow up in real poverty? I thought he was basically middle-class.
89: He's prising apart race and class and race and behavior.
Except... not really. Ultimately, he's using stereotypes of down-and-out blacks to win cheap laughs (lightly garnished with just a hint of guilt) from the more mainstream society outside that group. Of course, it's easy to tell yourself when doing this that you're "prising apart" race from other factors, and maybe Rock himself believes that, but I think that's a pretty thin rationalization in a context where "mainstream society" still mostly means "white society."
I wonder if the "pull ourselves up by the bootstraps" message can ever come across if it's properly qualified; it might be one of those things that always needs to be a polemical grenade.
I'm all for polemical grenades, but I can't think of an example of a minority successfully pulling itself up by its bootstraps by ridiculing its poorest members. Whatever gains black America has made, it's usually made them in periods when this sort of divisiveness went out of fashion.
Of course you're completely right that stand-up is the wrong setting to go looking for nuance. Maybe another way to put it is that stand-up shouldn't need nuance. The more an audience is left saying, "well, okay, but..." after each joke, the more one has to wonder if there isn't something wrong with the whole approach.
96: on the other hand, there is a rich comedic tradition of jokes designed to make people feel uncomfortable for laughing at them. Still, that's a fine line, and it's certainly not one you can ride to superstardom without some moral compromise.
Actually, although he definitely wasn't middle class, "real poverty" might be an exaggeration. He was basically right on the margin between poverty and the working class -- ghetto neighborhood but bussed to a nearby white school, two-parent family, Mom I think some kind of human services assistant and father either a janitor or a truck driver or something like that. His comedy reflects aspirational lower-middle class striver values pretty exactly. (I remember this stuff from his old book "Rock This", which is quite funny and very exact about the way his parents drilled stuff into him, and the way the fear of falling back into the underclass was always there). But his edge comes because he also understands the way the system is fundamentally unfair.
For evidence, check out this bit on affirmative action, which summarizes many 500-post Unfogged threads in one minute of comedy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YrF6mG6Mx_8
#61: Suburban wigger types are a valuable force encouraging innovation in black culture. Especially as they get older, move into middle management, and everything they say becomes totally unhip.
Did you see the episode of The Office where Steve Carrell does the Chris Rock N-word routine in the middle of a diversity training seminar?
Here is the clip from The Office. Note that it starts out with the Chris Rock routine, and follows it up with The Office at 1:03 into the video. IT IS THE MOST AWESOME THING EVER. You go watch now.
I can't think of an example of a minority successfully pulling itself up by its bootstraps by ridiculing its poorest members.
The lace-curtain Irish. Although I suppose there is still a bit of affection in the stereotype of the drunken Irishman.
White Victorian bourgeois culture in general had a huge element of the white middle class looking down on the white poor. But they were not a racial minority.
I suppose when a minority truly pulls itself up by its bootstraps it is no longer a "minority".
Wow, The Office was really funny once.
By the way, how f$%&$n great is YouTube that we can instantly refer people to specific moments in shows and standup routines? Such a wonderful thing.
"He's prising apart race and class and race and behavior."
But not class and behavior.
Class tells, baby.
That Office clip is hilarious.
Class tells, baby.
Yup. As Marcus notes above, the notes sounded by Rock are fairly typical complaints of the aspiring lower classes against the underclass.
God forfend that the aspirational lower class might complain about criminal behavior or just people who help make their day-to-day lives unpleasant. No, they've got to have class solidarity with people they don't like because otherwise... whitey wins?
I think it's possible to accept DS's entire critique of the routine, and still not come to the conclusion that Chris Rock sucks.
One thing that's clear in the book is that the "black man vs. nigger" routine is Rock channeling his dad, who would sit at the dinner table alternately complaining about racist whites and shiftless poor blacks. His father was also a total miser who was obsessive about saving money at every opportunity and wouldn't let the kids throw anything out. Big family, lots of kids, lots of embarassing hand me downs. You can imagine that the father would have been driven crazy by ghetto culture.
Most real achievement is multi-generational. Nothing like a blocked, pissed-off, underachiever of a father to provide artistic motivation for the son. Perhaps I'll have kids and perform that role someday.
I think this youtube clipp is an example of something that echoes Rock's stance but is divested of his redeeming virtues (up for debate). At any rate, the problem is the same: I saw this first being laughed at by a room full of white college kids.
I'm all for polemical grenades, but I can't think of an example of a minority successfully pulling itself up by its bootstraps by ridiculing its poorest members.
It's not exactly the same thing, because it's not embedded in a stand-up routine meant for wide consumption, but there's certainly a strand of 'don't be the stereotype, dummy' in almost all minority or less powerful groups. (ogged had a post about that once, about how Iranians shouldn't drive flashy cars or some such.) Don't get drunk and start fights, Sully, you make us look bad.
That's not what made the minority group successful, of course, but it's not an uncommon sentiment, or one incompatible with eventual success by that minority group.
110 makes sense. But that sentiment is often unfair because living out the stereotype may seem like the only realistic life for people without opportunities.
(ogged had a post about that once, about how Iranians shouldn't drive flashy cars or some such.)
That's an Iranian stereotype? The only ones I've ever been aware of are girls getting nose jobs and boys taking hostages.
there's certainly a strand of 'don't be the stereotype, dummy' in almost all minority or less powerful groups.
Don't tell me how to make my matza.
111: I didn't mean to suggest that it was fair, just that alone, it hasn't held back other minority groups. The problem with Rock's routine is all the white frat-boys pointing to it as proof that their prejudices are justified. I'm not sure whom to blame for that.
As far as Iranian stereotypes, god if I know. ogged represents 50% of all the Iranians I know, and he's a pretend internet friend. I think I'd have to live somewhere where there was a significant Iranian population to know about stereotypes. I mean, other than the jihadi thing.
Don't bring Bulgarians into this, John.
Actually, Iranians take some pride in the fact that they're not terrorists; that's what the crazy Arabs do.
Oh, right. "We're white, like you! (uh) Stop shooting!"
Isn't the point of stereotypes that you don't know them well, or uniquely? Not that knowing somebody personally necessarily changes the stereotype (my girlfriend's father thinks that every Mexican besides his personal friends are shiftless, diseased illegals), but "the whole jihadi thing" is sufficient, right?
Then again, there is a type of sheltered kid who doesn't know what ethnic slurs are, and has to be taught. So some familiarity is necessary.
Iranians take some pride in the fact that they're not terrorists; that's what the crazy Arabs do.
Sounds like an Iranian Chris Rock but could be pretty funny.
Actually, Iranians take some pride in the fact that they're not terrorists
...they just fund them.
118: Not necessarily sheltered. Stereotypes I think are more regional than we think, and there's several that I've only heard because of TV and movies, never encountered in the wild.
Horrendously racist Iranians making fun of Arabs.
121: Does the comment regard me or Iranians vis a vis Arab terrorists? Because it seems sort of unbecoming to be making fun of those Arab terrorists who didn't grow with access to petro-wealth.
Does the comment regard me or Iranians vis a vis Arab terrorists?
Can't it be both?
123: That guy totally looks like Jeff Goldblum.
SCMT: relentlessly optimistic blue state jihadi.
I thought I was supposed to be too cynical by half, no?
Another stereotype: cologne covering up poor hygiene.
122: I was using sheltered ironically, a little bit, but I see your distinction.
For me, certainly, coming to the East Coast from the Midwest/California was an education - a whole world of racist humor predicated on a densely populated urban underclass!
Also, probably as a consequence of growing up in a largely Dutch Reformed town (leavened with Episcopalians), I was wholly ignorant of Jewish stereotypes. A classmate of mine said that in her freshman year her Southern roommate asked her seriously whether, as a Jew, she 'had small hands for stealing.'
Your point about TV and media is taken too - to what extent does disclosing stereotypes perpetuate them? I used "sheltered," because to understand these taboo subjects (to laugh at racist jokes, say, even out of 'shock') is a form of cultural literacy, and people look at you funny if you don't have it.
For me, coming to the East Coast from California made it clear that there was a lot of racism in California, but because the "bad neighborhoods" were inconveniently located, nobody in my neighborhood ever had to really think about it.
whether, as a Jew, she 'had small hands for stealing.'
That's so great. I can't even make sense of that. Why would small hands be useful?
whether, as a Jew, she 'had small hands for stealing.'
Holy shit. What's really disturbing about that is that it's the kind of thing you'd teach a kid. At least half the kids I went to school with from about fourth grade until college were Jewish, so it's totally ok if I make Jewish jokes.
96: Maybe another way to put it is that stand-up shouldn't need nuance.
This seems odd, but in the context of the Chris Rock discussion, may make sense. I don't know, not having seen the stuff. Certainly I've seen Whoopi Goldberg lately do some stuff that openly acknowledges that she wants to answer the "okay, but ..." from her audience. It was funny, difficult, funny.
Growing up I didn't know any Jewish stereotypes.
136: What was the average hand size like?
What was the average hand size like?
I wasn't popular enough to know.
Growing up I didn't know any Jewish stereotypes.
Yet more proof that the American educational system leaves students unprepared for the real world.
It's just such a bizarre stereotype. It would be like saying each Irishman has a third nipple, and that's where he keeps the gold he stole from the leprechaun. What?
Why would small hands be useful?
Pickpocket.
133,35: Michigan. Good guess.
As for California racism vs. East Coast, California does have the entire border hysteria thing going on, but something about the East's urban centers and love of ethnic slurs struck me as shocking when I moved.
Also, East Coast college kids are shocked! shocked! to discover their enlightened coast can be racist, which is totally irritating.
and that's where he keeps the gold he stole from the leprechaun
Leprechaun's gold comes in the form of rings?
What's really disturbing about that is that it's the kind of thing you'd teach a kid. At least half the kids I went to school with from about fourth grade until college were Jewish, so it's totally ok if I make Jewish jokes.
I don't understand this at all. Regardless of who I grew up with, I don't make stereotyped jokes at all.
I do laugh at some of them offered by others, usually to do with gender or class stereotypes. Not race or sexual preference.
86:
I can't think of anywhere I've been in the US (or Canada) that I wouldn't characterize as racist.
Wins the thread.
Any sentence that begins "East Coast college kids are" and ends with "totally irritating" is redundant. But I know what you're talking about.
147: I was actually thinking of some sort of wallet pocket formed by the skin, with the nipple as the top cover.
The West Coast/East Coast thing is definitely real, but I tend to think of it as an example of a more hierarchical, ossified culture that generally obtains in the East.
By "East Coast", everyone means "New York and Boston", or what?
They don't mean Pittsburgh. The Midwest doesn't want us either.
Dead/dying industry? No, nobody wants it. Michigan knows.
Then again, I hear good things about Pittsburgh from artsy people moving to abandoned factory districts that you never hear about say, Detroit.
The steel industry's dead, but the town's doing decently enough without it.
Then again, I hear good things about Pittsburgh from artsy people moving to abandoned factory districts that you never hear about say, Detroit.
Glad to hear this from somebody who doesn't have any personal connection with Pittsburgh. I'm always presuming that it's just happy talk perpetrated by the city fathers and Richard Florida.
I'm guessing PA doesn't have a Cool Cities Initiative.
Right - I just never would have thought of Pittsburgh until about a year ago when some graduating friends of mine started talking about moving there. And otherwise, all I really pictured was the dying industry bit, with the addendum "not as bad as Detroit/swathes of my home state".
There does seem to be about eight times as many bicyclists around here as there were when I moved here 7 (!) years ago. That's always a good sign.
And we have TWO streets with bike lanes! Both of which are just lines painted on a street that happened to have a really wide lane! But still.
I hear good things about Pittsburgh too, but it can't be "the East" because all that "Alabama in the middle" leaves it an isolated island.
It's part of the Rust Belt. Just because that isn't a very big area doesn't mean it isn't a distinct area.
That is to say, it isn't an isolated island, it's close to Cleveland and Buffalo, and similar to them. But better!!!11
As a kid my friends and I had some bizzare theories about Protestants.
"They don't eat the Messiah!"
"Then what do they eat?"
"Um...um...they must eat Satan then!"
just lines painted on a street that happened to have a really wide lane
Wait, what other kinds of bike lanes are there?
Examples?
Hard to remember exactly. I think as far as we could tell they were allowed to believe in God but not Jesus or Mary, they hated saints, they were not allowed to look at pictures, and of course they were land-stealing sons of bitches. You know, on reflection, this actually all sounds pretty accurate.
Pretty accurate about Protestants in the 17th century, anyway.
165 -- The deleted second sentence of 163 was about Cleveland. Islands, with Youngstown and Akron, and other such places in the archipelago. Thing is, even taken together -- which is fair to do -- this region isn't as nationally, culturally significant as the East, the West Coast, the Midwest (Chicago, St. Louis, Minneapolis etc), the South, Texas. Kind of like the Casper-Albuquerque axis, maybe.
There's a zillion ways to slice it all, as we all know. The East, though, ends at the Fall Line, and at the Potomac.
136: But there's nothing funny about Jews.
Based on some reliable anecdotes, Buffalo is the most orphaned city of all. My son's Buffalonian friends a decade or so ago concluded that they must be Canadians, because they weren't New Yorkers, Easterners, Midwesterners, or anything else.
Buffalo belongs with Cleveland and Pittsburgh. This is a club no one wants to be in, or even acknowledge, not that there's really anything wrong with these places.
The Buffalonians believed that they had been kicked out of even that club.
Chicago, St. Louis, and Milwaukee don't want to be seen with those guys. Detroit is even worse than they are, but prefers to hang with Oakland, D.C., and the other bigtime disaster areas.
Actually, Buffalo is the Tijuana of Toronto.
Buffalo/Cleveland/Pittsburgh:
Pittsburgh is the best of those cities
Then comes Cleveland
Last comes Buffalo, which has only the proximity to Toronto going for it. On everything else -- weather, culture, sports -- it's worse.
178 -- An association you couldn't get anyone in DC to buy.
180 -- The delusion that baseball should be played in Florida in the summer ought to be abandoned, and one of the teams moved to Buffalo. Which one, depends on whether you want Cleveland and Toronto as rivals, or Pittsburgh and the Mets. Maybe the latter, since the current minor league team in is the Indians' system.
182 -- That's down from where it was 20 years ago, I think. I've recently driven through some parts of town off my normal route, and have been impressed how 'Hispanic' certain neighborhoods seem to have become.
Of course, the percentage of black residents isn't what would drive such a thing. People in DC look at NYC with their heads held up (unlike, ime, people in Philly) -- the idea that Detroit would be a peer is, in my estimation, off the radar.
Wow, the N***s vs. Black People routine has its own Wikipedia entry.
Which also contains this piece of information:
In a 60 Minutes interview, Rock said, "By the way, I've never done that joke again, ever, and I probably never will. 'Cause some people that were racist thought they had license to say nigger. So, I'm done with that routine."
Very Chappellesque, non?
My views on this subject should be ignored, I think. Look at this table. I live 100 feet from Ward 3, and drive through it -- and then the downtown business district -- on the way to and from work.
I can't think of an example of a minority successfully pulling itself up by its bootstraps by ridiculing its poorest members.
The most successful bootstrapping American minority group of all, the Jews, used to be deeply divided between the more assimilated middle class Jews and the recent immigrant shetl Jews. A certain humorous sensibility grew out of this, but was generally not intended for consumption by a "mainstream" audience. By the time Catskills Jewish humor hit the bigtime, it was largely deracinated.
there's certainly a strand of 'don't be the stereotype, dummy' in almost all minority or less powerful groups
The difference between this impulse and Chris Rock's schtick is that shande fur die goyim was always spoken in hushed tones, lest it draw unwanted attention to the scandal in question.
This got me to looking up the stats for Ward 2 which includes downtown -- more diverse than Ward 3, to be sure, but 60% non-Hispanic white isn't exactly 'normal.'
Up to a certain point, a lot of Jewish comedians (Marx brothers) did a "German act". (As far as that goes, Chico seemed to be doing an Italian act. ) I believe that WWI put an end to the German acts.
I believe that WWI put an end to the German acts.
With certain notable exceptions.
191: on second thought, scratch that: I just looked it up, and Charlie Chaplin apparently was baptized anglican. For some reason I always assumed he was Jewish.
The Nazis thought he was Jewish. He never said yes or no. There's no apparent evidence that he was.
The Katzenjammer Kids still do survive, as I understand.
cartoon for Emerson:
http://www.salon.com/comics/tomo/2007/11/12/tomo/
107: No, they've got to have class solidarity with people they don't like because otherwise... whitey wins?
And we can't have that!
Yes, sometimes it is in fact desirable to have solidarity with people you otherwise don't like. I think that's a totally unremarkable point.
110: there's certainly a strand of 'don't be the stereotype, dummy' in almost all minority or less powerful groups.
Absolutely. It's just there's a world of difference between "don't do the stereotype" and "I've decided to buy into the stereotype because some of you are doing it," the latter sentiment often coming packaged with "I've decided to let the authorities off the hook for abusing you trash, because you deserve it." Most minority or disadvantaged groups often have a strong dislike of what black Americans would call the "Uncle Tom" dynamic, usually identified with the latter tendency, and for good reason.
It's interesting that Rock figured out that something was wrong with the routine and pulled it, as GB notes in 186. I did not know that. I guess he sucks a little bit less than I thought he did.
(Incidentally: I'm not totally serious about the whole "Chris Rock sucks" refrain. I don't think he sucks to anywhere near the same degree as, say, Carlos Mencia. I just find him overrated and often unfunny.)
137: Certainly I've seen Whoopi Goldberg lately do some stuff that openly acknowledges that she wants to answer the "okay, but ..." from her audience.
You know, I haven't seen her do stand-up since the old "Comic Relief" days. Always thought her stand-up was much funnier than her films.
I can't find a cite but I remember reading an essay by Hannah Arendt, written on the assumption Chaplin was Jewish, that in later collections required an author's note that he wasn't, which she admitted she couldn't quite believe.
I think a distinction could be made between people widely believed to be Jewish by Jews, and people widely believed to be Jewish by non-Jews.
Lenin and Maurice Ravel are examples of the latter.
I think a distinction could be made between people widely believed to be Jewish by Jews, and people widely believed to be Jewish by non-Jews.
...and people widely believed to be non-Jewish by non-Jews, e.g. Heinrich Heine.
Actually, Iranians take some pride in the fact that they're not terrorists
Give it time, ogged. A year or so into the Iran War and that joke will be sadly dated.
166/171: In my part of the old country, Gonerill, we had way more detailed stereotypes/prejudices about Protestants.
a. generally identifiable by their names, especially first names. Will be called William, Andrew, Daphne, Iris, etc.. not Sean, Paddy, Maeve or Concepta.
b. houses bigger/nicer than Catholics of same ostensible class and much neater/better kept/ regularly whitewashed
c. pay bills on time, hard workers. Women great housekeepers, always baking and making jam
d. will always patronise the Protestant plumber/butcher etc.
e. shrewd in many ways but not bright in school context
This is all border county stuff so those digging with the other foot would generally be Presbyterians. Elsewhere - my flatmate from Laois used to refer to his Protestant neighbours as "the round balers" as accto him they all had sufficiently big farms of land to justify that then-rare type of machinery.
Lenin and Maurice Ravel are examples of the latter
Lenin was either 1/8th or 1/4th Jewish, I forget which.
Warner Brothers is a total dick. Go Union!