Friday, March 13, 2015

Tone deafness speaks louder than words in racist language


Oklahoma state Sen. Joseph Silk (R) said of members of the LGBT community "they don't deserve to be served in every store." 

The fallout from the drunken, racist chanting that got Sigma Alpha Epsilon’s Oklahoma chapter banished from campus Tuesday and its two ringleaders expelled is not the only race-related issue that’s causing consternation.

Univision host Rodner Figueroa was fired Thursday over comments about first lady Michelle Obama.
“Mind you, you know that Michelle Obama looks like she's part of the cast of Planet of the Apes, the film,” Figueroa said.

Taken in isolation, Figueroa’s comment is shameful. Coming so soon after SAE’s expulsion and video showing the fraternity’s house mother Beauton Gilbow gleefully singing the n-word shows how hideously tone deaf Figueroa’s comments really are.

Granted, I’ve noticed that some people are defending Gilbow, including African-Americans, especially Trinidad James , the rapper whose song “All Gold Everything” is blaring in the background in the now-infamous video.

“It’s a rock and a hard place,” said James, whose real name is Nicholas Williams, in an interview with CNN. “I can’t be as upset at that lady. I’m upset at the fraternity because what they’re saying is a chant that’s just completely disrespectful to the black race. As far as that lady goes – man, that’s an old lady, man. Let that lady be.”

The rapper told CNN he doesn’t want people getting up in arms about others using the n-word when it’s frequently used in hip-hop music, likening it to parents telling their children not to curse after hearing their parents curse.

I’m not willing to give her a pass. Not because she’s old and not because she’s using a word she’s hearing in a hip-hop track. If I’m singing a song that has the word in it, I skip it or use another word, whether it’s on YouTube or it’s at karaoke. Or I don’t even pick the song to begin with. Some people equate being old with being able to say whatever they want. Being old doesn’t take away your responsibility to know better or to do better.

One of my Facebook friends, who is black and who is the sister of one of my very closest friends expressed disappointment that the two ringleaders were expelled yesterday, saying that simply kicking out the students does nothing to educate them on just how hurtful the words they used are and does nothing to attack the attitudes that led to the use of those words to begin with.

She also noted the role alcohol played in the chants, saying, “alcohol brings out the truth.” That’s why I can’t subscribe to the notions that one or two bad apples ruined the fraternity or the notion that only the ringleaders and the people participating in the chants should have to face the consequences for their actions. In addition to those reasons, I remind readers of an Edmund Burke quote for why I believe the entire fraternity should have faced the music: “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

In addition, the disgraced SAE chapter hired prominent attorney Stephen Jones, who defended Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh and plans to sue the university over its expulsion from the campus. Perhaps they could argue that Oklahoma University president David Boren overstepped his bounds by expelling the fraternity without anything even resembling due process, but the fact that they’re looking to lawyer up demonstrates a disturbing hubris.

Lost in the furor about the obviously contemptible racist chants and words in the past few days are the attitudes that still lurk beneath the surface. Attitudes that get exposed when alcohol freely flows or are laid bare in hip-hop songs that are sung along to far too enthusiastically are problematic, but so, too are the attitudes of people who try to dismiss #blacklivesmatter, either with a seemingly noble #alllivesmatter hashtag or by claiming that we live in a post-racial society. 

The latter assertion is laughable. Minority groups are still fighting for basic rights in this country. Look no further than Oklahoma, which is now unofficially the most embarrassing state in the country after people such as state Sen. Joseph Silk, a Republican, said of members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community, “They don’t have a right to be served in every single store.”

The state is looking to pass legislation that would allow business owners to refuse LGBT customers because of “sincerely held religious beliefs.” On top of that, the Oklahoma House of Representatives passed legislation that would restrict marriage to people of faith, completely flying in the face of the First Amendment prohibitions against an establishment of religion because it also targets people who don’t believe in any particular religion. Not only that, but it also violates the Fourteenth Amendment’s equal protection clause, as does the legislation which would allow people to refuse to serve others because of religious beliefs.

Clearly, there’s a long way to go before our country can even lay claim to being the land of the free and a place where justice is really for all. It’s a journey that’s made much more arduous by attitudes of people who harbor racist views, either openly or hidden where it takes alcohol or anonymity to expose them. 

Monday, March 09, 2015

Racist video shines harsh glare on racial divide

Photo of University of Oklahoma President David Boren by Phil Konstantin released in the public domain.

If we didn’t need Saturday’s 50th anniversary of “Bloody Sunday,” an observance of the anniversary of the day in 1965 when thousands marched on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in an effort to secure voting rights for African-Americans that Alabama was denying to them as a reminder of how far the symbolic march for equality still lies ahead, racist chants aboard an Oklahoma fraternity’s bus provided yet another example.

Oklahoma University president David Boren very quickly condemned the racist chants, which not only boastfully announced that no [n-word] would be allowed to pledged the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity, but also that many African-Americans would be lynched. He also announced that the university would sever ties with the fraternity and that its members would be forced to vacate their house by midnight Tuesday.

“To those who have misused their free speech in such a reprehensible way, I have a message for you. You are disgraceful," Boren tweeted after the protest. "You have violated all that we stand for. You should not have the privilege of calling yourself 'Sooners.'" The Associated Press also reported that Boren said the university was looking into a range of punishment including expulsion.

“This is not who we are,” Boren said at a midday news conference. “I’d be glad if they left. I might even pay the bus fare for them.”

On top of that, Ben Carson, a would be presidential candidate and tea party darling who, as a neurosurgeon, should know better, claimed that homosexuality is a choice because – get this – of prison sex, a fact which Saturday Night Live rightly lampooned.

Some may be tempted to laud Boren for acting so swiftly and decisively to separate the university from the actions of a few ignorant fools. Some might argue that because Oklahoma is in the middle of the deep south, Boren had to act quickly, for much the same reason that University of Mississippi chancellor Daniel W. Jones had to act swiftly when students including Ole Miss football players heckled a performance of The Laramie Project with anti-gay and other slurs in 2013.

“A lot of students come here with less exposure to social issues than they might at other schools,” Jones said at the time. “Because of our unique history of injustice, we have a larger responsibility and opportunity to deal with intolerance in any form.”

Boren has more to contend with than just history, be it the shameful actions depicted in the movie
Selma or the ever-present stain of bigotry in Mississippi. Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin has made her opposition to gay equality a central aspect of her administration as the state has doggedly fought to serve as a roadblock against same-sex marriage, among other issues. He has to contend with a fraternity that has gone far beyond a sick joke or what could be dismissed as trolling if words used in the video captured on the bus were confined to the Internet.

On top of the mere words chanted by members of Sigma Alpha Epsilon and the threats inherent in the chants, the timing – so soon after the anniversary of Bloody Sunday and after President Barack Obama’s fiery speech Saturday at the site of the massacre – could not have been worse. If anyone continues to argue that America is a post-racial society, merely reading these accounts should prove otherwise.

The Associated Press report on Boren’s response to the fraternity also noted that the brothers were “not totally forthcoming” in response to the reports of the incident, which suggests both tacit approval for the virulently racist stance and the flaws of a culture that expects people to take the fall for others rather than admit to wrongdoing.

Like so many examples in years past and recently, the fraternity’s actions are a reminder that the cover-up is sometimes worse than the crime. More to the point: In this case, the cover-up only serves to exacerbate the crime.

Not only is America far from being post-racial, but the anniversary and these recent examples of bigotry that remain show how far we haven’t come in the symbolic march toward liberty and justice for all Americans.

Boren had to act quickly all right. But his immediate response should be a call to action for all who care about equality.

The university will be “an example to the entire country of how to deal with this issue. There must be zero tolerance for racism everywhere in our nation,” he said.

Boren may have spoken about his university, but his words serve as a challenge for a nation. We all must accept his challenge if we are to truly live our ideals as a nation conceived in liberty and equality for all.