A big BROWN bag full of racism!

Fresh off the trial of that “white Hispanic” (with the black grandfather) George Zimmerman, the PC police now advise us that bringing a brown bag lunch to work is racially insensitive.  The folks at Legal Insurrection have all the details here, but the gist of the problem is apparently this:

For a lot of, particularly, African American community members,” he said, “the phrase ‘brown bag’ does bring up associations with the past when a brown bag was actually used, I understand, to determine if people’s skin color was light enough to allow admission to an event or to come into a party that was being held in a private home.”

Now granted, that’s a pretty uncool thing to do.  What kind of racist bastard would even think up such an outrage?

In a 2006 book, Audrey Elisa Kerr, a professor of African-American literature at Southern Connecticut State University, documents reports throughout the 20th century of the use of paper bags by African-American fraternities, sororities, churches and social clubs to determine whether a potential member was light-skinned enough to be socially acceptable.

Oh my, racist black folk discriminating against other people of color!  Who knew?

The Legal Insurrection boys (oops!, I mean privileged white lawyers)  also discuss the recent incidences of reporters who have gone where no one should dare tread when discussing Asians.

We also addressed the idiom Chink in the Armor after a sportscaster was suspended and a copywriter (who happened to be married to an Asian woman) was fired for using the phrase in connection with discussing basketball player Jeremy Lin’s on-court weaknesses.

 

Now “chink in the armor” is back in the news because a CNBC reporter used the phrase in assessing whether Wendi Deng, the Chinese wife of Rubert Murdoch, could overcome trust agreements as part of their divorce. The phrase was not used to refer to Ms. Deng, but to legal arguments Deng’s lawyer would use to allow her to access the Trusts which contained most of Murdock’s vast fortune.

 

“What do you think the chink in the armor here might be, that’s what [the lawyer] is so good at, is finding a chink in the prenupts and all these trusts.”

I do not want to be niggardly in expressing my outrage at the blatant racism that flows so glibly from the lips of those who find racism in common terms of speech.  Perhaps you are thinking, “that’s mighty white of you, John.”  But really, what’s next?  Can a black person still order some crackers with his soup?

Is it racist to say that? Hell, I don’t know. Flip a coin. Or maybe you better not.

I’m reminded of some mandatory diversity training I attended back in my Postal Service days.  The instructor in all seriousness told us that we should not call a flip chart a flip chart because the word “flip” is offensive to Filipinos.  Lord knows I respect and  admire the wonderful people of the Philippines.  But it’s all about context, right?  Who in their right mind would be offended about a flip chart?  Or a coin flip.  This PC madness is really beginning to flip me out.

Maybe if we are all racist in what we say and do, none of us are racist.  Or maybe not.  America scares me lately.  I hope to get back to Korea in the fall.  I love those mornings when there is a little nip in the air.

Don’t flip me the bird you racist bastard!