Racism and Gasoline

We watch House on DVD. My favorite character was Kutner. Great character, great actor, REALLY not happy with his exit from the show. Naturally, I checked the web this morning to see what that was all about. The actor, Kal Penn, was offered a job in the White House and had to be written out of the show. This post isn't about that.

Reading about Kalpen Mobi on Wikipedia, I learned he changed his name to Kal Penn as a lark because friends said he'd get more callbacks if he Anglicized his name. Sure enough, they went up 50%. He apparently had a role as a terrorist in 24 he almost didn't accept because of the evil of racial stereotyping... but he got blow things up and hold a family hostage and who can pass up that? Then a big deal was made out of Harold and Kumar as the first non-white/non-black led movie in history.

While I knew the Kutner character was Indian, it was purely on a characteristic basis, like Taub has a big nose, or 13 has weird-but-cool eyes. I liked who he was. He seemed like a person it would be cool to be friends with.

And that's all race should be. A characteristic. Okay, if 99% of terrorist are Middle Eastern, "characteristic" profiling makes sense. It's not racism unless you assume all ME's are terrorist.

Today, most of what is considered racism, isn't. It's behaviorism and culturalism and mostly because we're uncomfortable with what people DO not what the ARE. I'm not going to hire someone who slouches, grumps, speaks poorly, and looks angry. That's true of white, black, brown, whatever.

Bill Cosby said racism won't be over until we stop talking about it. I believe racism is fomented in part because people trying to "stop" racism. I believe it's one of the few society ills that can die a slow, quiet death. Stop pouring gas on the flames.

And I guess Taub is now my favorite character.

And They Thought Republicans Were Bad

Remember how the left accused the right of labeling any dissenters as "traitors" when they were just calling out policies they disagreed with?

Now the right is being called racist whenever they disagree with Obama. Sure, dimwits like Janine Garggle-Rofo have been saying it since before he got elected (on a wave of "reverse" racism -- would he be president right now if he wasn't black? Face it, he wouldn't have even been nominated)... now presidential dimwit Jimmy Carter hops on the bandwagon claiming Joe Wilson's outburst was motivated by racism.

I'm curious; while Joe was technically incorrect that Obama was lying about illegal aliens receiving single-payer benefits when it passes, will anyone look back and say, "whoa, Joe was right!" when they do end up with benefits, because really, does anyone doubt they will? As soon as the government gets their sticky hands on some of the health care, they'll grab for more like mold taking over a bathtub.

Wilson was out of line. And premature. But is it really any different from democrats booing GWB? What a mighty shield Obama has to hide behind. Disagree with my dumb comments, denounce my naive dealings with heads of other states, see my socialistic policies for what they are? Racist!

Hey, is Obama calling West a jackass racism? Food for thought....

Institutionalized racism can be very subtle.

I received a map of the rezoned high schools in my area which showed the old zone and the new zone for each high school AND a breakdown of race in each school. It looked like this: (numbers fictitious)

W: 54%
B: 41 %
H: 5%

W=White, B=Black, H=Hispanic. Why the racial breakdown was necessary, I don't know, but is not, in itself, racist - it's just information (though poor information; how are students of mixed heritage represented? Is the son of a white mom and black dad white or black? I'm thinking he would be considered black, but why? Because any other color is considered a dilution of white? Maybe it is racist - especially since Adam and Eve were most likely black.)

It's the ORDER that's racist. The mapmaker could say it's in order of majority to minority, except that Edgewater High School has a majority of black students, then white, and finally Hispanic. Was the order changed? No. The mapmaker could say that would be confusing; you don't change the order for a single listing.

No, you use a different classification for your order. Alphabetical, not majority, which would make it consistent for each list.

B: 41%
H: 3%
W: 54%

One has to wonder why the list was there to begin with. Does knowing the racial mix serve a purpose? Too many of one "kind" and you'll yank your kid from that school?