Paula Deen?

[TCPeppyTc]

Hey y'all! Did you hear about Paula's little racial slip up?

 

I dont know all the facts myself yet. But do you think she deserved to be kicked off the food network?

[Deploy]

In my old school, around town, and on the internet, I hear that word at least 20 times a day. I think this is overkill.

[LoneWolf]

Paula Dean riding things will be the only reason I'm ever concerned with her

 

 

If she's racist I couldn't care less. She's a believer in butter. Butter makes it better.

[Snys93]

   I'm tired with the "thats our word" and "you can't say our word" sh*t. People need to grow up and realize its just a word and a word is not gonna break any bones, is it? I have no sympathy for people who use race as a crutch to hobble on and make excuses for why the sky is blue.

 

   I do understand that there is a problem from time to time and the issues are real. But damn, its a word! If someone called me a 'racist H word sh*t', I'd let it go because other than the racist part, they're right. I'm a white man of Irish decent. Its not gonna hurt because I've seen passed the color of people's skin.

 

   Come to think of it, if typo'd N word is a black word then sh*t and H word is mine. You can't say those words! Those are OUR words! LOL

Edited June 28, 2013 by Vydrach
Political Correctness Police

[Drasiana]

   I'm tired with the "thats our word" and "you can't say our word" sh*t. People need to grow up and realize its just a word and a word is not gonna break any bones, is it? I have no sympathy for people who use race as a crutch to hobble on and make excuses for why the sky is blue.

 

It's a word with a history of racial oppression that resulted in far worse than broken bones and contributed to a system that nowadays results in white boys getting butthurt all over the internet because a black person doesn't want to be fucking degraded by public personalities because of their skin tone. If you feel personally attacked because someone would prefer white people not use a word that has a history with white supremacy used in a massively derogatory context, get your fucking priorities straight.

 

The part of the Paula Deen fiasco here you're also missing is that she wanted to host a slavery-themed dinner party where all the waiters were black slaves. Also part to the accusations is her brother, who has a long history of employee abuse, including sexual harassment. Considering she enabled his behaviour on top of being a racist piece of dickcheese, yeah, she deserved getting kicked off the Food Network and probably then some. [x]

 

Holy shit know what the hell you're talking about before crying about how your white feelings are hurt because black employees had the gall to not want to be threatened by their own goddamn employers.

 

edit: Also "I see past the colour of skin lol~" is just a smokescreen for "I never have to acknowledge that racism exists because I'll just pretend that it doesn't" and it's lazy and contributes to even more racism by dismissing racial issues that you'd rather not see just because it means facing small facts of privilege like the fact that "H word" is nowhere near "N word" in terms of history and connotation.

 

edit 2: I really don't know if the headline "Old white Southern woman turns out to be pretty racist" or "Paula Deen discovered to literally be a blob of sentient butter" would be more surprising.

 

edit 3: If this, much like the Chick-fil-A incident, results in thousands of American bigots stuffing their face with butter to "prove a point", I am personally giving the go-ahead for alien warlords to suction the US right off the planet.

Edited June 28, 2013 by Vydrach
Political Correctness Police

[Vy'drach]

Euuuuggghhhh. Don't make me do stuff, people. I don't like doing stuff and I need to conserve my energy for an upcoming move. But I reckon I have no choice.

 

First up, editing people's posts to the level of political correctness that society has attempted to teach me is appropriate.

 

Secondly, gonna ask, much as I'm loathe to, that people tread as lightly around racial slurs as possible since people tend to get touchy feely about those and I'd like for drama to be avoided before it starts.

 

Third, no one's in trouble, yet,  just a preemptive measure, in case anyone was worried.

 

As for the topic, the whole plantation based wedding idea was bad and she got what was coming with that, but if the only offense was the use of a word, and this goes for anyone anywhere with any "bad word," I honestly wouldn't care and would be annoyed at the attention it was getting.

[ballisticwaffles]

She also kinda said it many many years ago.

[Drasiana]

I don't know where people are getting "she only said it once!" from, by everything I can figure she says it habitually, but the only recording of her saying it is dated. Her brother definitely said it habitually in a derogatory manner towards his employees at her restaurant and she never did anything, so her enabling behaviour is just as bad.

 

Further, I'm a little amazed that none of you see the problem with somebody's employer using a racial slur in reference to them. You would all cry delicious buttery tears if a black person was your boss and constantly referred to you as a cracker, which already has the benefit of not even really meaning anything and not being associated with oppression at all, yet you're daring to tell another group of people that they aren't allowed to be offended by their bosses belittling them for their race with a word that does carry the connotations of all those nasty things like "slavery" and "murder"? Seriously?

 

Slurs towards oppressed groups and "swear words" are not the same fucking thing. Get that through your white-ass skulls.

 

e: One thing I want to make note of here, too, is that we aren't like, quoting a rap song that happens to have the n-word in it. You are literally complaining because you want to be able to use a racial slur in the context of it being a racial slur. What in the actual fuck, guys?

[Faisul]

She got fired because, not only is she a racist, she is also an abusive employer, and supports the abusive behavior of her brother, Bubba. That is literally what he is called. Not just because she said the N-word once. That is some dogwhistle shit right from Fox News. She has said it many times. She is a bigot. The slave-waiter shit is only a part of her monumental insensitivity. She is also a terrible employer whose employees have complained about her behavior. She got fired because she is a bad person and is giving the Food Network a bad rap, because most people nowadays don't tolerate that good ol' boy shit. Also, employees appreciate being treated as persons.

 

This is not 'political correctness gone mad.' This is people doing the right thing.

E: About the N-word. Like Dras says, there is real power, real bad mojo in that word. It represents centuries of racial oppression, and was used as a tool of control. Is still used as a tool of control, by some people. South Africa has kaffer, for example, and apartheid lives on to some degree there. 

 

African-Americans using it as they do is an attempt to make it their word, to take the bad mojo away, in which they have succeeded to some degree. White people can't use it because in that way it becomes a word of racial hate and bigotry and signals that you are a bad person, and that's good. They have taken a loaded gun away from you. When they use it, it's kind of like a word of brotherhood and common experience, separate from that of those who used to dominate them. Just leave it, they don't need to be told that 'uh, we should be able to use that word' because no, we really shouldn't.

[Harlow]

I admit I hardly knew about this other than it happening.

If it was only the word usage (that apparently the incriminating evidence wasn't recent), I'd forgive her. Given her background, that was probably common and widespread back in the day (not that it's not justifiable by any means). It's just that, I think it's useless to try to change those people, whether is as tame as Paula or as assy as her brother. Focus on the newer generations instead and make them see that the world is diverse and that color and sexuality is something extremely measly nowadays.

 

Now, if what FaiDras (or you prefer Drassul? o3o) rings true, it's pretty reasonable to get her punished because of crap working conditions. That's just unacceptable.

 

And Faisul, I disagree about the n-word usage by black people. As much as they attempt to make them their word, they're still using derogatories, which strikes as self-deprecation. Plus, the context it's normally used doesn't strike me as the new "Dude" and people of other races will use it if they hear it because of the same "Dude" principle

 

Kinda on-off-topic. For the lolz:

[Faisul]

I mean, it's kind of immaterial what we think, we're white, or at least, not black. We don't get to dictate how some African-Americans use the N-word, that ball is in their park. We should back off and stop talking about it, is what I think. They're sick of it, I'm sick of it.

[myu]

I've been debating whether or not to post in this topic because I'm not familiar the Food Network happenings, however, I am of the black and I can say that I don't approve of ANYONE using the word, whether they're trying to take it back or not. Let it die. I don't give a fuck whose word it is, I think it should just be phased out. Yes, it's a word that's a part of our history, but why can't it be left as that? I've been called it in a derogatory sense before. I don't want people walking up to me, giving me hug and then saying, "What's up, my ******." No matter how you try to twist its meaning, it will always, always still be there, lurking between the letters.

 

Even if you forgive her for using the word, she'd still be taken off the air. No one wants to have someone like that associated with their company because it shines a bad light on them. Just out of curiosity, does anyone know the context she used it in? I mean from the sounds of it she isn't just some old lady who's hip with the rap music of today's wifebeater-pants-around-the-knees youth idk, it wasn't on the air, right?

[Harlow]

 I don't approve of ANYONE using the word, whether they're trying to take it back or not. Let it die. I don't give a fuck whose word it is, I think it should just be phased out.

 

I was about to write something similar. You don't see white people saying "salty-cookie" to each otehr ot Asians joking about their eyes between them. They let their "word" die. Everyoen should do the same, even if used in the same group, because if you use in in an amicable way, even between peers of the same race, other people will think of it as amicable and it won't really die. I never use "sudaca" (offensive european/white word to Hispanics) even on a fun way nor any English variant, even though they aren't important to me at all and I won't use them in hate speech.

 

She was apparently a bigot back in the day and it surfaced now. I'm not as informed, but that's what I got.

[Fana McCloud]

I mean, it's kind of immaterial what we think, we're white, or at least, not black. We don't get to dictate how some African-Americans use the N-word, that ball is in their park. We should back off and stop talking about it, is what I think. They're sick of it, I'm sick of it.

 

Well I don't like double standards either. I think all people - black, white, or anything in between - should either let the accursed word die or stop segregating the use of words along racial lines to begin with, because THAT is racist too. I'd prefer the first option myself just to avoid confusion since nobody really understands how to judge a word based on the context it's used in anyway, especially when that word has perhaps been irrevocably tainted by it's racist origins. Just pleeeeeeeeease let the arguments over words end soon so that we can shift focus on more concrete issues of racism, dear god. At this rate we'll never eliminate racism if all we do is focus on correcting the language of TV celebrities and do nothing else. I honestly think they focus on crap like that so that nobody has to REALLY combat the core of racism. X_x

 

Though it sounds like Paula went from "saying a no-no word" to being horrifically insensitive if what I read here is true. Dear god how does anyone get off on doing a "plantation" themed dinner party without any sense of irony or shame...? Or using that kind of language with one's employees?

 

 

I was about to write something similar. You don't see white people saying "salty-cookie" to each otehr ot Asians joking about their eyes between them. They let their "word" die. 

 

Actually I have used the term "cracker" in jest, but only in privacy with my family because we're just THAT politically incorrect. XD

[unoservix]

mayhaps we should stop treating black people like one giant monolithic hive mind. some believe that taking these slurs and making them their own removes the historical power of the word; some believe that it's just perpetuating the slurs and the hate that underlies them. and there's probably like a bajillion permutations in between.

 

the important thing, though, is that it's not white people who get to decide what that word means today and whether it's okay to use it and who gets to use it. white people spent hundreds of years using that word as part of a massive system of brutal oppression that still hasn't fully left us. we, the white folks, are not, generally speaking, the aggrieved party; we don't get a say in this. if, through the vast and inscrutable forces of social convention and consensus, black people in general decide that they should use that word to change its meaning and take away its historically oppressive and hateful power, then so be it. if black people in general decide that they should not use that word because it will always be a weapon against black people and to use it is to perpetuate the hatred that underlies it, then so be it.

 

either way, it is black people who are the historical victims of that word. they are the ones who get to decide what it means today.

 

which means, if you're white, the only course to take is to not use that word. is it fair? well, living in a society that dragged your ancestors to this continent in chains as part of a vast system of institutionalized prejudice and brutality of which that word is part and parcel and that persists in various insidious and subtle forms to this very day isn't very fair. so you tell me.

[Drasiana]

Just pleeeeeeeeease let the arguments over words end soon so that we can shift focus on more concrete issues of racism, dear god. At this rate we'll never eliminate racism if all we do is focus on correcting the language of TV celebrities and do nothing else. I honestly think they focus on crap like that so that nobody has to REALLY combat the core of racism. X_x

 

I don't know, this entire incident has drawn out a hoard of white people crying about how they should be able to use the word in a derogatory context just, well, because, the people dismissing the accusations against Deen because "well, the South is just like that", the people like our pal Snes up there that thinks not wanting to be discriminated against in the workplace counts as "pulling the race card"...it looks to me like this has a sheer metric fuckton to do with the "concrete" and "core" issues of racism, and I don't see the people trying to brush it under the carpet doing anything to combat or even explain what the other "concrete, core" issues of racism even are, it's just a bunch of white people trying to shut everyone up because it makes the poor babies uncomfortable.

 

You know what white people can do to help combat racism? Stop telling oppressed people how to react to their own discrimination.

[Fana McCloud]

I don't know, this entire incident has drawn out a hoard of white people crying about how they should be able to use the word in a derogatory context just, well, because, the people dismissing the accusations against Deen because "well, the South is just like that", the people like our pal Snes up there that thinks not wanting to be discriminated against in the workplace counts as "pulling the race card"...it looks to me like this has a sheer metric fuckton to do with the "concrete" and "core" issues of racism, and I don't see the people trying to brush it under the carpet doing anything to combat or even explain what the other "concrete, core" issues of racism even are, it's just a bunch of white people trying to shut everyone up because it makes the poor babies uncomfortable.

 

You know what white people can do to help combat racism? Stop telling oppressed people how to react to their own discrimination.

 

Well I personally am not telling anyone they shouldn't react a certain way - I'm saying I wish people would hurry up and figure out that using words to disparage an ENTIRE race goes beyond "a really stupid idea" straight into "being a despicable human being" so that things LIKE discrimination in the workplace can actually be focused on and, yanno, resolved. I think people's abilities to get and keep a job are higher on the totem pole of issues that need to get resolved, and the fact that the debate is still at a "they used mean words" level in many instances (in Paula's case it was far worse than simply that) frustrates me.

 

Yes, often the people using these words do it in precisely the wrong ways and they ARE racist, but we're focusing way too much on the WORD, and less on the RACISM in many instances, I feel. Why else would people be so focused on "well, the south is just like that" if they didn't think the debate was only over a word and not the fact that those words in Paula's case were backed by racist beliefs. (Or possibly, as I suspect in some cases are true, they use that as a smokescreen to NOT talk about racism.)

 

Does that make the true intent of my words any clearer? I'm really NOT trying to brush ANYTHING under the rug - if anything I wish white people would get a clue much faster.

[Drasiana]

Does that make the true intent of my words any clearer?

 

Not really, because you don't seem to be grasping the fact that using a racial epithet is indeed part of racism and it's really just a taproot into the rest of their shitty beliefs.

 

The word is a symptom of an entire institution based on racism. Pretending it doesn't exist--as opposed to acknowledging and choosing not to use it, because you aren't a horrible person--doesn't do anything to combat that system aside from ignoring a part of it, and white people are really good at ignoring things that make us uncomfortable. Its usage is an extension of the underlying problems that allow this system to perpetuate and those issues are easy to identify through instances like this. If you're using the word, or fighting to let white people use it within this context, you're probably racist in many, many other ways, too.

 

When you use the word, you aren't calling someone a dumb doodoohead. You're saying "You are ugly because of your skin colour. I do not approve of your appearance or culture to the extent that I think you are subhuman. You have a history of genocide, slavery and brutal oppression at the hands of people like me and I will gleefully remind you of that. I do not care if I hurt you. I want you to be subservient to me. We are not and never will be equal".

 

No one is deriding the word because it has an unpleasant number of syllables. They're deriding it because of what it means.

[Fana McCloud]

Not really, because you don't seem to be grasping the fact that using a racial epithet is indeed part of racism and it's really just a taproot into the rest of their shitty beliefs.

 

The word is a symptom of an entire institution based on racism. Pretending it doesn't exist--as opposed to acknowledging and choosing not to use it, because you aren't a horrible person--doesn't do anything to combat that system aside from ignoring a part of it, and white people are really good at ignoring things that make us uncomfortable. Its usage is an extension of the underlying problems that allow this system to perpetuate and those issues are easy to identify through instances like this. If you're using the word, or fighting to let white people use it within this context, you're probably racist in many, many other ways, too.

 

When you use the word, you aren't calling someone a dumb doodoohead. You're saying "You are ugly because of your skin colour. I do not approve of your appearance or culture to the extent that I think you are subhuman. You have a history of genocide, slavery and brutal oppression at the hands of people like me and I will gleefully remind you of that. I do not care if I hurt you. I want you to be subservient to me. We are not and never will be equal".

 

No one is deriding the word because it has an unpleasant number of syllables. They're deriding it because of what it means.

 

Except that what it actually meant when it was first conceived was "black person". It comes from Latin for black, and by way of a few different languages in between for some of the variants. It just also happened to be used by people who thought black people were subhuman. Black people still call each other by the word not to disparage each other but because that's the meaning of the word to them from my understanding - yet they'll deride anyone of a different race for using it in a similar manner. I'd rather nobody use it at all and just use white/black to refer to races but I'm examining reality as it is, and as it is words continue to survive in their current meaning the more you focus on them and say "that word is racist" rather than "that person is racist". The word "gipped" came from gypsy but we don't use it to disparage Roma people, not anymore. There are so many words we use commonly that have racist origins that it's rather futile to focus on the origins and instead should focus on how they're ACTUALLY being used.

 

And where did I ever say that we should pretend that the word doesn't exist? I'm saying the exact OPPOSITE is true. We could all magically stop using that word yet still be racist. That's why I say focusing on the word is absurd. We should use the use of said word as a clue and investigate whether the person is racist, which sadly in many cases they are. But context is kinda important and a single word doesn't make a person racist. Instead what ends up happening is we go "oh my god, another racist celebrity because of... THAT WORD!"... aaaaand insert white knights who rush in and go "but saying the word doesn't make you racist!" without understanding that all the other words around THAT WORD are what made the person racist, because the context never gets reported. Hence why race relations have devolved into "they said the bad word" and doesn't progress beyond that.

[Drasiana]

Except that what it actually meant when it was first conceived was "black person".

 

No one cares. That's not how it's used, under any circumstance, ever, and is completely irrelevant now. If someone uses the word and starts giving me some bullshit about how "oh, it's just Latin, I'm just being etymologically accurate", I'm going to live up to my mafia name Alice Slapnuts on them.

 

 

it is words continue to survive in their current meaning the more you focus on them and say "that word is racist" rather than "that person is racist".

 

...no, it's "that person is racist because they keep using that word". Why are you trying to separate these concepts?

 

 

The word "gipped" came from gypsy but we don't use it to disparage Roma people, not anymore.

 

Lots of people still consider "gipped" to be a racial slur, actually, as well as the word "gypsy" itself, so...

 

But context is kinda important and a single word doesn't make a person racist. Instead what ends up happening is we go "oh my god, another racist celebrity because of... THAT WORD!"... aaaaand insert white knights who rush in and go "but saying the word doesn't make you racist!" without understanding that all the other words around THAT WORD are what made the person racist, because the context never gets reported.

 

 

In what possible context outside of "white person quoting a rap song or old book about racist people", which has never been involved in the issue here, is the word ever not-racist? You don't need "context" for that! It's racist! Why is this so hard!

 

 

Hence why race relations have devolved into "they said the bad word" and doesn't progress beyond that.

 

I'm sorry but you're extremely ignorant if you believe this is true. If anything, the only thing impeding progress is all the white people sitting around whining about how race relations are apparently only centered on "bad words" now, or white people that think the issue of the word is something as simple as an issue of "bad words". If you paid attention to anything other than white people's opinions on racism--which are the least important opinions on racism--maybe this wouldn't be so difficult to understand. White people love to pretend that the only racism happening is a bunch of black people complaining about the word, and harp on about real racism, and then never have any idea what that is.

 

When white people use it, the word is fucking racist! The context of usage is racist, because the word and its context are not separate entities! Everything about it is racist! The only reason that this is still a debate, as you so apparently hate, is because it's 2013 and people still don't understand that! And if you're white, you have absolutely no right to dictate what issues of racism not-white people want to address! Whodathunk, sometimes those issues are "I don't want a famous public personality and business owner disparaging me for my race by using racial slurs against me"!

 

This is a really fucking stupid argument and I'm pretty tired of having it. Can we just leave it at "stop having opinions about other people's oppression, let them speak about it, and never use the word no matter how much you, for whatever reason, want to" as the baseline standard to meet as decent human beings?

[Fana McCloud]

Uh, words and their context are separate but also dependent. A word can have multiple meanings - which meaning applies is dependent on context, usually determined by the words around them.

 

And you're right, in most instances today white people use it in racist ways. I am not denying that. But to assume that a white person using a particular word somehow imparts a different meaning on it than when a black person does SIMPLY because they are white I do have issue with.

 

And again, people can address whatever aspect of racism they want, I'm just saying certain tactics are very ineffective and confuse the white audience more than educate them.

 

Overall though, I think this has reached a point where neither of us is really going to get anywhere.

[Drasiana]

Uh, words and their context are separate but also dependent. A word can have multiple meanings - which meaning applies is dependent on context, usually determined by the words around them.

 

Yes, thank you for the Baby's First Grammar Lesson. It doesn't fucking apply to racial slurs.

 

And you're right, in all instances always, white people use it in racist ways. I am not denying that. But to assume that a white person using a particular word somehow imparts a different meaning on it than when a black person does SIMPLY because they are white I do have issue with.

 

Fixed. The only instance in which it (arguably) isn't racist is when some black people try to reclaim it. If you are not black, you cannot reclaim it, you're just being racist. The fact that you "take issue with" something that you apparently aren't even close to understanding is irrelevant because it isn't your word. Yes, not everything belongs to white people, wow. For someone so apparently obsessed with "the context" of why it's bad, you seem to be missing "you are a white person" as the biggest context of all. It's an amazing willing kind of ignorance to be so completely inable, or unwilling, to see why white people using a racial slur is not the same as a black person trying to reclaim it.

 

But because this is straying from the topic, let's semi-rerail it by coming back to the whole "white people whining about the word and pretending it's the only issue here". It's not. Thanks for perpetuating that, but it's not. Here are some other accusations faced by Deen and her brother:

• Forcing black employees to use a different entrance and bathroom from white employees
• Ignoring or contributing to sexist and racist behaviours by other employees
• Denying a manager a bonus upon discovery that she was getting a divorce
• Paid the manager less specifically because she was a woman
• Facilitating Bubba's behaviour of forcing employees to look at porn, physically threatening employees, spitting on employees, using sexist and racist language to refer to employees, and drinking and using cocaine at work.

You can read it all here, folks. But please, continue to talk to me about how this issue is just a matter of "mean words". The only people making it that are white people rushing to defend the use of a racial slur, and that is fucking pathetic at best.

[Fana McCloud]

The only people making it that are white people rushing to defend the use of a racial slur, and that is fucking pathetic at best.

 

I'm not defending it's use - I'm wondering why anyone, black or white, can use it at all if that's indeed what it is.

[DoctorAllosaurus]

Alright, that's enough. I'm closing this before it turns into the colossal shitstorm I see coming.