Pandagon
Speak Of The Devil
No sooner do we start talking about mentioners of racism being the real racists than the shit starts flying in the presidential race.
Is Barack Obama a zombie? No, just a Muslim.
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Brains
For those of you not familiar with the series, Resident Evil is a game that's about the purest of pastimes - fucking up zombies and other nasties with an ever-expanding lineup of weapons.
Resident Evil 5 takes the series to Africa...and then there's controversy.
On Your Black Writers today, Tolu Olorunda takes exception to the RE5 trailer:
What I witnessed [in the RE5 trailer] was nerve-wrecking, painful, mind-numbing and heart-racing... It wasted no time in capitalizing upon the long history of blatant depictions of Africans as savages and helpless imbeciles. The trailer featured a Caucasian male mutilating African villages, along with Africans. With the not-so ancient history of colonialism and neo-colonialism in Africa, the issue of racial insensitivity and indifference must be brought to the centerfold...
My opinion? The trailer above shows a disturbing insensitivity to the rather loaded images of a heavily armed white guy mowing down rabid Africans. But I don't think the game is intentionally racist, simply totally tone deaf to what's implied by the previous sentence.
But there's something more disturbing than the trailer. It's the dumbasses who watched it and couldn't see anything even potentially wrong with it.
Re: Resident Evil 5 Race Controversy ResurfacesSubmitted by JimK - June 20, 2008 at 1:09 pm -0500
I am SO sick of race-baiting jerks who claim everyone else is racist when it's THEM who can't see past skin color.
I wonder if these idiots know how much damage they do to race relations in America.
Re: Resident Evil 5 Race Controversy Resurfaces
Submitted by JC - June 20, 2008 at 1:48 pm -0500
Same, they them selves keep racism alive instead of letting it die a quiet death. These people just want attention, thinking they'll be given some recognition intead of gaining infamousy.
Kotaku has done a few posts on RE5 and race, and going through the comments, you keep finding the same creeping line popping back up - people who remark that things are or potentially could be racist are in fact themselves perpetuating racism and even causing people to be racist themselves.
It's not new to any of us who have seen your average conservative ranter bloviate about race pimps ad nauseum, but it's rather telling that this has gone from black people exploiting racism to black people causing racism.
From later on:
I am nerve-wrecked, pained, mind-numbed and my heart is racing that this person is trying to perpetuate hate and race-mongering by writing the article.
I can understand a certian amount of outrage on this honestly, though it would be nice if these people would bother to read in a little on these sort of things than just see "WHITE MAN SHOOTING A BLACK MAN! IT'S RACISM!!!!!". For goodness sake, the game is in africa and about "zombies" it's not portraying all african amercians as being zombies. It's a game about killing ZOMBIES which are trying to eat your face off. It has nothing to do with the color of their damn skin. And I agree with JimK, some of these 'activists' are so pronouncedly towards their side that they are indeed being racist towards white people. I'm not saying white people didn't do bad things in the past mind you but for god sake but just continuing the cycle of hate and hurt doesn't solve a damn thing.
Does anybody know the episode of South Park when there was a debate about changing the South Park flag? The flag was racist because it's a bunch of white stick people watching a black stick figure being hanged. Many kids were so not racist that they didn't see that it was a black stick person being hang, all they see is just a person being hanged.
The message of the episode was that many people became so anti-racist that themselves are racist by making a image look racist. That's how I fell about this topic.
We've finally arrived at the point where racism is dead. Unless, of course, you say it isn't. Which, of course, makes you the racist. I understand that this is a few random people on the internet, but it's not nearly as random as one might think - the same attitude is oddly prevalent among a number of the younger conservative people I know, the belief that if racism exists, it's the justified reaction to the whining, victimhood-reveling targets.
What the hell happened?
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A Compromise
I will accept Obama's cave-in on FISA if, the next time I commit several major felonies all in a row towards no discernible productive result, I can just say he asked me to do it and get off scott free. Deal?
Blackazoid: The Blackening
David Brooks has done yeoman's work and given us the origin story of dear Blackazoid.
God, Republicans are saps. They think that they’re running against some academic liberal who wouldn’t wear flag pins on his lapel, whose wife isn’t proud of America and who went to some liberationist church where the pastor damned his own country. They think they’re running against some naïve university-town dreamer, the second coming of Adlai Stevenson.
But as recent weeks have made clear, Barack Obama is the most split-personality politician in the country today. On the one hand, there is Dr. Barack, the high-minded, Niebuhr-quoting speechifier who spent this past winter thrilling the Scarlett Johansson set and feeling the fierce urgency of now. But then on the other side, there’s Fast Eddie Obama, the promise-breaking, tough-minded Chicago pol who’d throw you under the truck for votes.
This guy is the whole Chicago package: an idealistic, lakefront liberal fronting a sharp-elbowed machine operator. He’s the only politician of our lifetime who is underestimated because he’s too intelligent. He speaks so calmly and polysyllabically that people fail to appreciate the Machiavellian ambition inside.
That Blackazoid - always foolin' us by not screaming simple words. It's the secret to his power, not talking loudly and scaring white people. Damn Brooks' Luthoresque mind!
But he’s been giving us an education, for anybody who cares to pay attention. Just try to imagine Mister Rogers playing the agent Ari in “Entourage” and it all falls into place.
No. I actually flat out fucking refuse to do that. Brooks then goes on to talk about all the Hydeian ways that Fast Eddie Obama threw various things "under the truck", sort of like how Goofus always convinced Gallant to ditch school and go do some chicks on the mat in the back of his El Camino, except without the chicks, the mat or the El Camino and Goofus never convinced Gallant to do any of that.
It's your laundry list of attacks on Obama, except, you know, put together in a way that makes absolutely no sense whatsoever and uses the same phrases over and over again, much like a five year old reviewing Balto. He then wraps up with this utterly devastating attack:
But Thursday, at the first breath of political inconvenience, Fast Eddie Obama threw public financing under the truck. In so doing, he probably dealt a death-blow to the cause of campaign-finance reform. And the only thing that changed between Thursday and when he lauded the system is that Obama’s got more money now.
And Fast Eddie Obama didn’t just sell out the primary cause of his life. He did it with style. He did it with a video so risibly insincere that somewhere down in the shadow world, Lee Atwater is gaping and applauding. Obama blamed the (so far marginal) Republican 527s. He claimed that private donations are really public financing. He made a cut-throat political calculation seem like Mother Teresa’s final steps to sainthood.
The media and the activists won’t care (they were only interested in campaign-finance reform only when the Republicans had more money). Meanwhile, Obama’s money is forever. He’s got an army of small donors and a phalanx of big money bundlers, including, according to The Washington Post, Kenneth Griffin of the Citadel Investment Group; Kirk Wager, a Florida trial lawyer; James Crown, a director of General Dynamics; and Neil Bluhm, a hotel, office and casino developer.
Sweet Christmas! Is Blackazoid really...a villain? We were wrong about him? Is David Brooks J. Jonah Jameson with a penchant for biscotti over cigars?
All this and more...in the next issue!
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"Don't let them assassinate Hugo Chavez; Don't let them assassinate Evo Morales"
It's not very IMS for me to enthusiastically recommend an act as...earnest as Flobots, but I really like the single:
so I bought the album on iTunes, and I have to say I'm very pleased with it. Another highlight, in my mind, is "Same Thing" (not a video):
We say yes to grassroots organization
No to neo-liberal globalization
Bring the troops back to the USA
and shut down Guantanamo Bay
Who let 'em overthrow Jacobo Arbenz?
Who let 'em overthrow Mohammed Mosaddeq?
Who let 'em assassinate Salvador Allende?
I didn't let them but they did it anyway
Earnest as hell.
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Funny how perceptions vary, isn't it?
Here's one way to look at something:
Obama’s first general election commercial—released on Juneteenth
It’s healthy at this time in the campaign to remind people out there being bombarded with slime efforts to evoke images of an “Afro-Leninist,” a Muslim terrorist, or a Black Radical Trojan Horse, when the real Barack Obama is part of a growing, vibrant mosaic in America. Not a post-racial America, but one with a population that is becoming harder to racially or ethnically categorize—and thus harder to politically divide.
And here's another way to look at a similar theme:
Is there such a thing as overexposure? Barack Obama ads are everywhere on the internet. They'll be coming to tv in 18 states and who knows how many radio stations.
Now, Obama is considering taking out ads on NBC for the Olympic Games...
I'm getting angry that every time I click on a news site, his face is staring at me from the top banner ad or some other prominent space on the site.
He doesn't need to do this. We all know who he is and that he stands for hope and change and bringing a new kind of politics to Washington.
There are plenty of reasons to criticize Obama (and TalkLeft is on top of it, believe me). Charges of overexposure, in an American political campaign, and one which is subject to an amazingly high rate of misconception, feel bizarre.
I imagine part of the reason for the overexposure perception is that bloggers spend more time on the internet, and in locales likely to host political ads, than many Americans. Still, it'd be interesting to know whether other candidates have been accused of overexposure just after releasing their first television ad of the general election.
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MI: Lesbian couple's doctor visit turns into a lecture on morality
Why can't these fundies just do their flipping jobs? Ashleigh Haberman and Erica Schaub were married in Canada. They went to Spectrum Health South Pavilion Urgent Care Center in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where Schaub, accompanied by Haberman, sought care for a nagging cold.
They went into the exam room and instead of a diagnosis and advice, once Haberman identified herself as Schaub's partner, the couple got an earful about same-sex marriage.
But instead of her symptoms, they say the doctor was more interested in the couple's relationship and how they felt about the recent California ruling allowing same-sex marriage."And he proceeded to give his opinion on how he felt that marriage, gay marriage, shouldn't be called a marriage because it's a religious based word, and he's a Christian, and there's no way that marriage could be considered legal in the gay sense," said Haberman.
While the couple's marriage is not legally recognized in Michigan, they say that's not the point, rather, the doctor's office is not the time nor place for a debate. They were there for an exam - not a lecture on lifestyle.
WOOD-TV News has the video. As a result of the brouhaha, Spectrum Health put out this public statement:
"Spectrum Health takes the care and treatment of its patients very seriously. We expect our physicians and staff to provide high quality care in a professional manner. We received an e-mail concerning a patient visit this morning and we have begun a thorough investigation of this matter. We will review all aspects of this issue. Once this is complete, we will take appropriate action. We are just beginning this review of this matter and must follow the laws protecting patient confidentiality and the rights of employees. Therefore, we will not comment further at this time."
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The Homosexual Agenda KO's the Christian Civic League of Maine
In my capacity as "a leading source of radical homosexual propaganda, anti-Christian bigotry, and radical transgender advocacy" and "wicked and sinful promoter of homosexual behavior", I am pleased to announce that we have strengthened our grip on New England. The Christian Civic League of Maine has given up the ghost on its efforts to repeal the state's LGBT rights laws, as well as and the campaign work to stop marriage equality and the ability of LGBTs to adopt.
"We’re pulling the plug," said Michael Heath, executive director of the Christian Civic League of Maine. Heath said the evangelical group failed to attract voter, volunteer and financial support it needed to continue its campaign.The group collected only a third of the 15,000 voters’ signatures it had set as a goal for primary election day June 10, said Heath. He added said that potential volunteers "don’t want to be aligned with bigotry and homophobia and hatred," tags their opponents had applied to the initiative backers.
..."This was a really broad attack on gays and lesbians and their families," said Betsy Smith, executive director of EqualityMaine. "Mainers are generally fair-minded and I think they sent a strong message on primary day."
Muhahahaha...Bonus checks are in the mail for all members of the Homosexual Agenda. Good work, team.
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Out Today
I'll be finishing up moving out of my old apartment today, but I did want to leave you with my new favorite road trip game. It's called Phil Collins Ruined Genesis: The Game.
The rules:
You must be taking a trip by car longer of at least 90 minutes or longer. You must listen to the radio the entire time.
You must start scanning stations from the beginning of your trip. If you find a song you'd like to listen to, you may at most listen through to the end of that song and the end of the next song, should you so desire. After that, you must resume scanning. If the song is followed by a commercial break, you must resume scanning. If you hear a talk program you'd like to listen to, you may listen until either a topic change or a commercial break.
The game:
In order to free yourself from the scanning, you must (and most likely will) find a Genesis song some time during your travel. If you hear one, you must immediately stop and listen through to the end of said song, and the end of the next one, because you just happened on a quality radio station. After that, you're freed of your Genesis-defined confines.
Yeah, I hate road trips.
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The shape of things to come
No time for the Friday Random Ten today, but I wanted to draw everyone's attention to this article about the whisper campaigns against Barack Obama that exploit Americans' xenophobia and other forms of ignorance. More than any other factor, these whisper campaigns are going to be damaging to Obama's chances. Mark my words---the vast majority of redonkulous smears that are floated by the wingnut and mainstream media against him will be, in one form or another, feeding the idea that Obama is somehow fundamentally different from "real" Americans and not to be trusted.
It looks like most of the smears are going to be variations on a theme: Looking over what Barack and Michelle Obama wear or do to find "secret" evidence that they're imposters with a tin ear for how "real" Americans do things. There's obvious examples of this, like the fuss over Obama and the flag pin. But even stuff that initially doesn't make a lick of sense to thinking people, like all the fussing over Michelle Obama's taste for cap sleeves and sleeveless dresses, is a way of communicating the idea that the Obamas just don't know how we do things in America.
What's weird is that the response to all this smearing that people are giving is standardized and rehearsed---"I worry about his allegiance to the country." Outside of calling him a terrorist, you hear this the most. There's something fishy about how everyone knows exactly what to say and in what words.
The campaign has put up a website you can reference when debunking rumors.
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Obama's first general election commercial -- released on Juneteenth
The Obama campaign has tapped North Carolina as one of the states to air this ad; it's been Red at the presidential level, but NC's in play this time around. It will also run in Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Virginia.
I'm Barack Obama.
America is a country of strong families and strong values. My life's been blessed by both.
I was raised by a single mom and my grandparents. We didn't have much money, but they taught me values straight from the Kansas heartland where they grew up. Accountability and self-reliance. Love of country. Working hard without making excuses. Treating your neighbor as you'd like to be treated. It's what guided me as I worked my way up – taking jobs and loans to make it through college.
It's what led me to pass up Wall Street jobs and go to Chicago instead, helping neighborhoods devastated when steel plants closed.
That's why I passed laws moving people from welfare to work, cut taxes for working families and extended health care for wounded troops who'd been neglected.
I approved this message because I'll never forget those values, and if I have the honor of taking the oath of office as President, it will be with a deep and abiding faith in the country I love.
The interesting thing about this particular ad is that it emphasizes Senator Obama's upbringing in Kansas and the Midwestern values of his family -- illustrated by using photos of him with his white grandparents, relatives who have not been as prominently featured, for instance, as his wife and children.
It's healthy at this time in the campaign to remind people out there being bombarded with slime efforts to evoke images of an "Afro-Leninist," a Muslim terrorist, or a Black Radical Trojan Horse, when the real Barack Obama is part of a growing, vibrant mosaic in America. Not a post-racial America, but one with a population that is becoming harder to racially or ethnically categorize -- and thus harder to politically divide.
We cling to the human need to place people in identity cubbyholes for our own comfort and defense, and I think it's safe to say we've seen a lot of poisonous political strategy that preys on that, particularly regarding race this year. The images in the ad are satisfying because they are so self-correcting -- or perhaps a better word might be recalibrating -- by reminding us about the whole picture of Obama's heritage.
That picture is what others would rather ignore or play down because it doesn't fit their demonization playbook.
***
Obama also took time to recognize that today is Juneteenth, the day commemorating the actual end of slavery in this country (June 19, 1865).
"On this day, one hundred and forty-three years ago, Union soldiers reached the final outposts of the Southwest with news that the Civil War had ended; that the words of Lincoln's proclamation would be made real; that the very ideals of liberty, justice, and equal citizenship under the law embedded in the Constitution were closer to being fully realized. On Juneteenth, hundreds of thousands of Americans were delivered from bondage as America finally reclaimed her dignity."We pause to remember Juneteenth because it is a poignant reminder that words on a parchment are not always enough; that we the people must always be willing to do our part to ensure that all citizens, regardless of race, gender, religion, ethnicity or sexual orientation are equal heirs to the boundless opportunity America has to offer.
"We pause to remember that our nation has made tremendous progress, but has many miles to go on the long march toward finally fulfilling the ideals of this country. When too many Americans go without affordable healthcare or a quality education; when neighborhoods unravel due to a housing market in crisis; when special interests hold their thumbs on the scale of opportunity; we have more work to do.
"Juneteenth is a day for celebration of freedom and family, but also a day that calls us all to rededicate ourselves to the convictions at the heart of our American experiment. It reminds us that with the work of each successive generation, we come closer to the realization of that more perfect union."
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