4 posts tagged “why i'm a misanthrope”

Honestly, the cover didn't even upset me.  I saw it pretty much as a sad attempt to sell a magazine, as well as a pathetic attempt to be "edgy," "controversial," and/or show how "forward thinking" the editors are.

But then, the backlash got its own backlash, and now, I'm too through.

So, let me make sure I have this straight. If I find the illustration offensive, it must be because I don't "get it."  I must be incapable of detecting or appreciating satire.  I lack a sense of humor.  And I must see the presentation as a support of verifiable facts and/or perceptions.

Here's an idea.  Maybe it's just ... offensive.  Maybe the "attempt" at satire failed miserably and the magazine deserved to be called on its massive failure just like any other medium who has made such a blunder. And maybe Jon Stewart is just another white liberal jackass who believes that nothing that's not intended to be insulting or degrading can ever truly be insulting or degrading.

Hold on.  Let me write that down.

• Intending to be offensive and insulting and succeeding = bad
  
• Not intending to be offensive and insulting, but failing miserably = okay/no big deal/nothing to see here/why are black people so angry?

Jon Stewart, and the liberals who march in lockstep behind him and everything his team spews forth from their den of pretention, are severely lacking if they believe that labeling any media as "just a ...." somehow absolves it from taking responsibility for its actions and removes its ability to significantly damage others.  It is these individuals (and based on last night's interview, I'm sad to include Mr. Colbert in this group as well) that don't. get. it. 

NB: And claiming that it's satire is not now, nor will it ever be a get-out-of-jail-free card.

The reality here is that the (real) liberal media screwed up royally and they can't take the very criticism that they so willingly dole out to their right-of-center counterparts.  But have no fear, The Daily Show will jump in to rescue their friends and admonish those who would dare call "bullshit" on such a masterpiece.  Thank you, Jon.  You've pretty much captured why I've grown increasingly dissatisfied with your show for the last 3 years.  Now, you don't have to worry about me being dissatisfied anymore.

Which popular slang expression drives you nuts?

Some people may not consider it a slang expression, but I do, especially in this context.  The term I loathe to hear as often as I do is: "ghetto."  Particularly out of the mouths of white people.  I'm sorry (or to be frank, I'm really not sorry at all), but there is no way this term escapes a white person's lips without bearing the weight of racist overtones.

I bounced this idea off of someone else recently to see if I'm just being nitpicky/persnickety/overly sensitive/[insert dismissive phrase here].  Granted, I could've cast a wider net and talked to more people about it before posting, but since this Vox QOTD came up yesterday, I figured I might as well get this off my chest and onto the chest of my inferiors.  Simpsons reference.  And no, I'm not being touchy about this, so if you're not ready for some tough love, just click on that Back icon in the upper left-hand corner of your screen.  It's about to get all racial up in this piece. 

White people.  Please, pull up a chair.  ::pats cushion::  I know I count some of you as friends, buddies, acquaintances, cronies, etc.  So I say this with as much patience as I can possibly muster.  Your use of the term "ghetto" is 99.5% of the time completely f#!ked up and offensive. 

Why, you ask.  Allow me to break it down for you.

Let's set aside the fact that most of you wouldn't know a real ghetto if it fell out of the sky and started to wiggle on your lap.  The most salient issue concerning your use of the slang term involves your egregious application to anything remotely associated with African-American (and to a lesser extent, Latino-American) culture.  Cadillac Escalades are ghetto.  Tyler Perry movies are ghetto.  Kool-aid is ghetto.  Bad credit is ghetto.  And so on, ad nauseam.

And none of these are in any way an expression of anything truly "ghetto."  This leaves me to conclude that the majority of you who enjoy throwing the term into your everyday speech so haphazardly have no clue as to what it truly refers to.  Yes, the term was borne from the strictly segregated Jewish enclaves of Eastern Europe that were little better than a concentration camp, but we all know that in the modern U.S., this connotation no longer dominates our cultural psyche.  No, instead, it's the image of the predominantly African-American neighborhoods populated with more liquor stores and 7-11s than banks, parks, and supermarkets.  It's identified as sections of any major city overrun by gang bangers, prostitutes, and corner drug dealers; the places were you rush to lock your car doors as you drive through because you're certain that if you don't, you'll be yanked from your Ford Taurus, thrown to the ground, bludgeoned within an inch of your life, and left for dead.

And guess what?  That is a ghetto.  But that is NOT North Hollywood, Van Nuys, Reseda, West Adams, Panorama City, Northridge, Inglewood, etc.  When I first moved to L.A., I slept on my uncle's couch for a month while searching for a room to rent.  I quickly found this new condo-owner in Reseda on Craigslist, and she invited me to stop by and take a look.  When I mentioned it to my uncle, he told me that a lot of people say that Reseda's the ghetto.  Well, after driving around the area for a bit, let's just say that if Reseda's a ghetto, L.A. residents need to keep their asses in California because they have severely lost perspective with the rest of America. 

Ghetto =/= working class neighborhood.  Ghettos are severely economically depressed areas often inhabited by members of a specific ethnic group.  And believe it or not, those ethnic groups can be and are Latino, White, Asian-American, Arab-American, and Native American, as often as they're Black.  Never seen an Asian-American ghetto?  I have a buddy in Houston who would be happy to point them out to you anytime you want to stop by for a visit.  Check the U.S. map for any major cities in Western Kansas known for their slaughterhouses.  They're certain to have quite a few.  Hey, they may not be American, but feel free to venture up to Vancouver.  There are plenty of CBCs* living in ghetto neighborhoods up north.

Personally, I view ghettos as areas hit extremely hard by the economy in a country where the government doesn't give a shit about anyone living there who isn't white and middle-class to help rectify the situation.  These areas deserve our help, not our disdain.  But hey, that's just my conscience talking.  Please feel free to continue the elitist wankery.  I wouldn't want you to feel any less enlightened than you've already convinced yourself that you are.

***

Okay, so let's set aside that reality for a moment.  I know how uncomfortable it makes some of you.  The most important fact I want to make clear with this slang term is this: Ghetto =/= anything that isn't middle-class Anglo-American approved.  It is when this usage creeps into polite conversation it conjures racist overtones.  I had a particularly interesting weekend where I found myself in a number of conversations with people I either didn't know or only knew as an acquaintance.  And in 3 of these conversations, I heard a white person use the term "ghetto" in a derogatory and/or slanderous manner.  I'll only address 2 of those instances here because I'm still deconstructing the third.

The first semi-pleasant conversation came to a brief halt while I was speaking to a young, white, Jewish male at my favorite coffee stand in NoHo.  We'll call him Ben.  Ben and I were talking about, among other things, the lack of clubs in the NoHo area.  I said that I'm kinda glad there aren't that many because the last thing I want to see is NoHo turned into a wannabe-Silverlake/Los Feliz.  Goodness knows they're trying to do just that.  ::shudder::  But then I asked young Ben:

Me: What ever happened to the Bank Heist around the corner?  That club that was open for a minute.
Ben: I heard it attracted the wrong kind of crowd.
Me (bracing myself): What do you mean? 
Ben: I heard that a lot of ghetto people started showing up.
Me (mentally counting to 10): That's odd.  This doesn't seem the kind of area that would attract a crowd like that.
Ben: I know, but maybe it's because there's so few good clubs in the Valley.

Did I stop and correct Ben about the number of clubs in the Valley, particularly how there are considerably more than he thinks?  No.  Did I stop and tell him that there's plenty of places that truly ghetto folks would love to hang and it isn't anywhere near the NoHo Arts District?  No.  Did I explain to Ben that my interpretation of the slang term was clearly different from his because no one who would ever describe themselves as ghetto would be caught dead at the Bank Heist?  No.

Why?  One: I'm a coward. And I try to avoid conflicts, especially face-to-face ones.  Two: I'm too nice.  Believe it or not, my contrary nature is often offset by my desire to not hurt people's feelings, even when they need to put their egos aside and be schooled on their possibly unintentional asshat behavior.  Three: Educating privileged white folks about their racism is a full time job foist upon people of color (POC) that tires us to the point of exhaustion on a daily basis.  We have to pick and choose our battles every time we engage anyone who is not a member of our own ethnic community.  And the higher POC move up the social ladder, the more often we are saddled with the imposition of #3.

Listen.  I sincerely doubt the folks partying at the Bank Heist were ghetto at all.  He or his friends or [insert white hipster/yuppie/jackass] probably walked into the club, saw that the white folks chilling there did not significantly outnumber the POC -- it seems that anything less than 8 to 1 causes alarm -- and labeled the venue as GHETTO.  I'd wager good money that this person or persons didn't observe any ghetto behavior, slang, style, etc.  And here's the tricky part: "ghetto" is ALL about behavior.  It's the only way you can label anyone as such.  If you would label both Lil Kim and Ashanti as ghetto, you don't know what the hell you're talking about.  If you think both Jay-Z and Kanye West grew up in similarly ghetto nieghborhoods, you don't know what the hell it is.  If your white male neighbor blasts music at 2 am on a late Saturday night and you label him "an asshole," but when your black male neighbor on the other side blasts music at 2 am on a late Saturday night and you label him as "ghetto," you not only don't know what you're talking about, you're a racist dipshit who needs to check him/herself.

No, I won't sit here and delineate everything that deserves to be labeled "ghetto" and "not ghetto" because I haven't the time and Marlon and Shawn Wayans already did that.  But let me say this, when POC, particularly African-Americans label someone as ghetto, it is by and large a reference to that person's behavior.  I like to call it, "Now, you know your Mama raised you better than that" behavior.  It's roughly the same POV that most white folks have of, dare I say it, rednecks, shitkickers, good ole boys, and poor white trash.  (And no, those groups are not the same thing.)  It's a term used to refer to people who are thought to have no class.  Please note, I didn't say lower class or low class, I said no class.  Toby Keith is as redneck as the day is long, but Toby Keith is richer than anyone reading this blog right now.  Jay-Z was born and raised in New York's Marcy Projects, but Jay-Z can buy and sell everything you own fifty times over.  Your income does not determine whether or not you're ghetto, your behavior does.

And I'm not sure if white people who use the term with abandon to describe anything related to working class people and African-Americans know this.  I once heard Amy Sedaris refer to using a teaspoon to curl your eyelashes as "kinda ghetto."  What?  Seriously?  Okay, I adore Amy, but someone needed to hip check her on that one.  Again, working class is not the same as abject poverty, and having the common sense not to blow money on an unnecessary beauty device when you have a reasonable, convenient alternative is not ghetto.  I'll take frugal or cheap, but not ghetto.

***

The second instance where the slang term "ghetto" made me bristle as it spewed from the mouth of a white person occurred on Sunday.  Briefly, during a friendly conversation, I was asked which dance classes I'm currently taking during the week.  I replied one Hip Hop class on Saturday and 2 Jazz classes on Wednesday.  This somehow prompted the question of whether I ever have to do a move or step often referred to as poppin' (not to be confused with the breakdance move) in my Hip Hop class.  I said yes, if the number calls for it.  Then, in a moment of confusion that I'm still trying to decipher, I hear in a derogatory tone that that move is "ghetto."

Pause.  Scratch head.

Um, wasn't Hip Hop borne from the streets of New York ghettos in the late 1970s?  Wasn't Hip Hop used as a way for people raised in the slums and ghettos of New York and New Jersey to express themselves about their environment?  Isn't it continually used all over the world as a means to communicate the same frustrated and passionate experiences shared by those who live or lived in similar environments?  Thus my confusion.  Why is a dance form created by those who live in the ghetto, set to music created by those who were raised in the ghetto (some of them, not all obviously), somehow derided for being "ghetto."  That's like saying, "I can't stand the Polka.  It's just so Slavic."

Then, in the next breath, the same person expressed an appreciation for Krumping.  ::long sigh::  Why do white people who seem cool always have to harsh your squee with such ass-backward-ness? 

Did I tell him that the poppin' move is one of the first steps you learn in Clown Hip Hop and Krumping?  No.  Did I ask him how he could have contempt for a "ghetto" dance move, but appreciate Krumping, another dance form created in the ghettos of South Central Los Angeles?  No.  So what did I do?  I mentioned that I was interested in Krumping as well, but I felt that I better start off on something a little more generic.  I also pointed out that Miss Prissy from the Rize documentary teaches classes at my dance studio in NoHo on Thursday and Sundays.  Then the subject was changed.

See my previous mentions of cowardice, kindness, and battle strategy.

Yes, poppin' is a ghetto move.  And when executed well, it can light up a Hip Hop routine.  It can also be worked seamlessly into a Jazz, African, Tap, Afro-Fusion, Burlesque, and Latin Ballroom performance.  It's not inherently bad or vulgar.  I understand the incessant appearance in booty shakin' rap videos may lead you to believe otherwise, but again, I think that interpretation carries the same racist overtones reminiscent of a time when Rock 'n Roll was called "jungle music" and Jazz music was banned from radio programs because it led to the "corruption of youth."

If you've never seen poppin' done right, check out this dude on YouTube.  I don't know many women who can move that well, even at DR's dance studio.

ETA: Damn.  Sugar Britches removed his video from YouTube.  For anyone who didn't get to see it, he was really something else.  Oh well.  I'll leave the video code embedded just in case he decides to make a comeback.  In its place, I'll use this example from one of the gazillion contest entries for the "Pop, Lock and Drop It" online video competition that Huey ran a year ago.  If you don't know what I'm talking about, consider yourself blessed. 

Anyway, here's one of the better entries.  This sister really put her thing down.  I'm going to play the envy card and say it's the sneakers on the carpet floor that helped her out.  In an alternate universe, I'm just as good.  Anyway, for a proper example of poppin' (or booty poppin', as it is sometimes called in its unabbreviated form), pay close attention to the vid between the 13-15 second mark.

So take that move and watch it go from poppin to krumping to poppin around the 44 second mark in this vid:

Again, I'm just a little confused how you can find the first vid dance unseemly, but the second vid dance makes you want to take lessons.

In the end, I know I can't stop anybody from saying anything they want to say.  But by the same token, no one should be allowed to silence my protest as I'm subjected to ignorance and prejudice.  I think what it boils down to is this: Are these people bringing enough positives to offset the negatives?  In other words, do I really want to have a relationship with someone who maligns my culture, while in the same breath claims to be my friend.  My 31 years of experience tells me the answer will be "no."  I have to put up with family and work colleagues who let their bigotry show when you least expect it, but I shouldn't have to put up with friends who do the same.  In that area of life, you have more of a choice.

I guess we'll see what comes of it.

* Canadian-Born Chinese

Now, I’m not a betting woman, but if I were, I’d wager good money that most people don’t see me as very militant.  Perhaps loud-mouthed, annoying, and maybe a little brazen.  But not necessarily militant.  So I think whenever I go into a tizzy fit about something surreptitiously offensive, bigoted and just plain wrong, it catches most folks off guard.  Those nearby often become blind-sided by my anger and defensive about my accusations.  

As a matter of fact, this happened recently with my best friend while we were discussing a particular member of that vapid, soulless pit called The View.  (In short, she loves it.  I don’t.)  And you have to admit, after 15+ years of friendship, if I’m still catching my best buddy off guard with my passionate invectives against the complacent and small-minded, then this here woman must have quite of bit of fire brewing below the surface.

Which brings me to this special [this is good] post commended back in early May.  I admit that when I initially read this post, I became seriously pissed.  Maybe it was just the wrong entry in a long line of f#@$!ed-up blog tales that made me stand up and shout, “WTF!”  But now that I look back on it with a cool head, I realize it still bothers me like a rash that just won’t go away.  The rage has subsided, but the resonance bears weight.  Can you pick out what’s wrong with this written piece?  I’ll give you a few seconds.

All this hot enthusiasm for healing the planet and eating whole foods and avoiding chemicals and working with nature and developing the self?  Came from the hippies.  Alternative health?  Hippies.  Green cotton?  Hippies.  Reclaimed wood?  Recycling?  Humane treatment of animals?  Medical pot?  Alternative energy?  Natural childbirth?  Non-GMA seeds?  …  It’s about time the media, the politicians, the culture as a whole sent out a big, hemp-covered apology.

Did you guess that it’s the entitlement of the self-obsessed clueless troglodytes who’ve appropriated the beliefs and culture of others and passed if off as their own?  If yes, then I would like to give you a cookie and a hug.  You just made my day a little brighter.  If no, well, I’ll chock that up to you’re still learnin’.  

Allow me:  Living with respect for nature and the earth.  Came from the hippies Asians, Africans, and the Indigenous inhabitants of North and South America, and the Pacific Rim.  Developing the self?  Asia, Native Americans.  Reclaimed materials?  Africans, Indigena.  Recycling?  Almost everyone except “civilized” white people.  Alternative health?  Asians, Africans, Native Americans, Aborigine, Polynesians, Melanesians.  Again, almost everyone but “civilized” white people.  Natural childbirth?  Existed for centuries the world over before the word “hippie” ever appeared in the English lexicon.  Do you see a pattern here?

No one owes hippies an apology.  Europeans and Americans of European-descent owe all of the above-mentioned people and their respective cultures an apology.  The hippie invented nothing.  Not a single idea regarding the “greening of America” came from the “hippies.”  As a matter of fact, that entire entry reminds me of a line in Smoke Signals where Thomas Builds-the-Fire tells a story about how all the white hippies loved his father because all them were trying to be Indian in the first place.  Of course, that’s “trying to be Indian” without losing any of their white privilege and carrying none of the Indigena burden.

It amazes me that such a small clique of pasty biscuit-dough faced wannabes can sit around and claim reparations for something that was never their own.  You didn’t invent yoga, and your 6 years riding the trend superhighway to find your center does not make you an advocate for change.  Yoga managed to not only exist, but thrive for thousands of years before designer yoga mat carriers, special ass-masking yoga pants, and Yoga Booty Ballet.  You’re not appreciating “alternative cultures,” you’re appropriating whatever you can bastardize and sell for a profit.  And that’s all I’ve seen from you and your ancestors for over 500 years.  

And now you’re appropriating the apology.  That level of entitlement deserves a medal of some sort.  Let me get this straight.  People with power, who caused the critical level of pollution and contamination that plagues our lives today, are now deciding to do something about it, and it’s THE HIPPIES who get to say, “I told you so?” That post (and the original article it quotes) filled me with a disgust that would drive a person of a far weaker constitution to die from asphyxiation.  Your ass took the red pill, and now you’re the visionary.  Wow.

Over the last few weeks (read: 3 or 4 months), I’ve had a number of run-ins in the virtual world and the OMG!-These-people-exist-in-real-life-too world that I could have easily blogged and blagged about, but didn’t.  Part of the reason was because I simply didn’t have the time or inclination to pound on the keys.  Another reason was because I didn’t want to give jackanapes the satisfaction of getting to me.  And I’m sure there’s a slew of other reasons that I can’t think of right now.

Well, apparently that apprehension has past, because there are a lot of things I want to get off my chest and onto the chests of my inferiors.  For today, these are just the transgressions that have crossed my path in real life.  I’ll save the online asshattery I’ve been subjected to for another post.

All of the instances below beg one question:  Why do people who were clearly born with a silver spoon in their mouths and wouldn’t know the meaning of “going without” if it snuck up behind them and smacked ‘em in the back of their coconut-size heads feel compelled to try to make you feel bad for not having something you don’t need and don’t really want anytime soon?  Of course, I’m thinking of specific incidences here, but I’ve born witness to multiple cases of this throughout my life.  It’s like I’m a human magnet for stuck-up snobs with more time and money than anyone with common sense has the energy to worry about going in debt over.

Case in point:

1. I was made to feel foolish (I didn’t really) because 2 months ago, I did not have internet access from home, I don’t have any true desire to own a Tivo or DVR, and I don’t bother to download TV shows onto my iPod, which, btw, I don’t have.  Upon learning this info about me, I was told, “OMG Kelleah!  Move into the 21st century already!”  [insert derisive cackling here]
   
   
2. I’m trying to build up my clips portfolio in order to jumpstart some freelance writing on the side.  I mentioned to an acquaintance, who just graduated from UCLA and wouldn’t know how to spell “middle class,” let alone “working class” with an OED, that I’ve seen a couple small rags post listings for freelancers.  They don’t pay much, but their selling point was that it’ll help to build a portfolio for budding writers.  Sounds right up my alley, yes?  No.  Apparently, the $25-30 offer for each freelance piece is an insult and they can’t possibly expect reasonably talented writers to accept such a lowly wage.
   
   
3. I met with a certain Rufus Xavier Sarsaparilla this Saturday for coffee (or in my case, tea).  When he asked me what’s been going on with me these last few weeks, I said, “Nothing much.  Nothing really interesting.”  He replies with a dejected expression, “I’m sorry to hear that.”  He seemed disappointed that I didn’t have any life altering adventures in the past fortnight, and somehow considered my life less worthy because of it.  Allow me to note that on a previous occasion, I mentioned that my life has been pretty ordinary and boring compared to some folks my age.  And at that time, he hits me with an “Oh, poor you” face and consoles me with the following: “You shouldn’t feel bad about that.  You really have nothing to be ashamed of.”

And my response to these incidents?

1. In public:  Silence coupled with frustrating embarrassment.
   
   In private, and later a phone conversation with my best friend:  Why do I attract people like this?  Let me get this straight.  Instead of spending my hard-earned cash, that I stretch like a rubber band as it is, on things like paying off credit card debt and saving up for repairs on my car, I’m supposed to purchase things I don’t need to impress people who don’t matter.
   
   Newsflash – Millions of Americans don’t have iPods.  Millions of people don’t have home computers, let alone internet access outside of work or school.  Stop being a stereotypical sheltered consumer culture-obsessed airhead like everyone labels 99% of Los Angeles!  My VCR does me just fine.  I don’t have cable television, nor do I want it.  So paying $10 a month to tape 6 network TV stations seems a bit wasteful, doncha think? 
   
   Sure, I’d like an iPod, and as soon as they start selling them for $50 a pop, I fully intend to purchase one.  I now have internet access.  And guess what?  I spend roughly 3 to 5 hours a week on it at home.  Why?  Because for 5 days a week, I’m on it for 6 to 8 hours a day at work!  The last thing I want to do on most given nights of the week, is go home and jump on the computer.  My home comp sees more action on the weekend, and even then, most of it involves work offline.  Imagine that.
   
   
2. In public:  Slightly stunned WTFness coupled with frustrated silence.
   
   In private:  Dude, what the hell is your problem?  I made it clear that I’m just trying to build up some more recent clips to delve back into freelance writing.  Most of my clips are from my university newspaper days, with a few scattered here and there over the past 8 years.  I told you this and you’re still hung up on the cost.  Um, I have a full-time job, sweetheart.  I’m not doing these side gigs for the money.  I’m just happy to find a few publications that still use the “You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours” philosophy.  They need freelancers; I need clips.  What’s the prob?  Oh yeah, you only see life in various grades of monetary value.  I forgot.
   
   
3. In public:  Deadpan silence coupled with more silence.
   
   In private:  Dude.  Seriously, dude.  Leaving work before 7:30pm for 3 weeks in a row is a good thing.  Staying in, reading books and mags, cleaning my house, recouping my finances after my vacation are good things.  There’s nothing to feel sorry for.  I’m not embarrassed or ashamed.  Have I done things?  Yes.  I saw Spider-man 3, I started taking a Jazz dance class, I bought a new top and blue jeans with a coupon I had to Old Navy.  Is this what you want to hear?  It’s not all that fascinating, and I like it like that.  My life’s not about being Party Central everyday of the week, especially when I’m pleading poverty.  My life is about balance.  That’s always been my goal.  I like going from a hectic, frenzied schedule for 2 or 3 weeks to a more calm and lackadaisical one for the next 2 or 3 weeks.  It works for me.  I’m sorry you can’t appreciate that.  It’s just reason #43 why you and I weren’t a good match.

Here endeth the rant.