Does anyone else find this offensive?

[RS Davis]

Does anyone else find the second panel in this cartoon more than a little offensive??

- Rick

[outgirl]

There are a lot of African Americans who feel that she has betrayed her race and is nothing more than a token puppet of the administration. Not being black I don't have a strong feeling about her with regards to being a black woman. I feel that gays who support this administration betray the gay community. Of course being gay or black doesn't neccessarily mean that you are a liberal. A million gays voted for Bush last time but I don't get it. While this cartoon may be a little distasteful, it doesn't offend me as much as the Bush administrations policies. Karma is a bitch. That's all it's saying to me. The hair straightener thing kinda misses the point though. I know a lot of beautiful proud black women who straighten their hair who are absolutely not trying to be white.

[RS Davis]

I was more offended by the House Nigga reference than anything else. You know, I wrote something on STLToday that hits a similar theme, and I think I am going to go find it and post it here...

- Rick

[RS Davis]

Okay. We were having a discussion about Juan Williams, and this guy tells me black people don't like him because he doesn't have "street cred." This was my response:

The truth is he is an intelligent and intuitive liberal political pundit, who works for both Fox News and NPR. If I were a minority parent who wanted to show my kids a positive result of hard work and education, Juan Williams, along with Bill Cosby, Thomas Sowell, Walter Williams, Denzel Washington, Colin Powell, Condoleeza Rice, Kweisi Infume, Muhammad Ali, Oprah, Halle Berry, Bob Johnson, Earl Graves, and Alice Houston would be fresh on my mind.

It seems that we have a subtle racism, whereby if you are not a liberal democrat and are a woman, minority, or gay, many people say you don't have "street cred" and that you are "setting back" the entire collective. I think this is appalling. Why is it that only white, heterosexual males have the freedom to disagree? Why is it that when I disagree with a white guy, that's all it is? I am never told that my opinions are setting back white guys.

It's wrong. Success should be celebrated, rather than picking apart those one disagrees with and challenging their "blackness."

- Rick

[outgirl]

Of course success should be celebrated, however when a minority uses their success to push policies that are discriminatory they are seen as someone who has betrayed their race or community. I know I felt have felt that way about Andrew Sullivan many times and he's not even a politician. He has changed his tune about Bush now though. . No one else can tell me how I should feel as a lesbian so I don't presume to tell an African American how they should feel about Powell or Rice. The NAACP has made it no secret that they have been unhappy with Rice. She is viewed as a puppet by many.

[RS Davis]

outgirl said:

Of course success should be celebrated, however when a minority uses their success to push policies that are discriminatory they are seen as someone who has betrayed their race or community. I know I felt have felt that way about Andrew Sullivan many times and he's not even a politician. He has changed his tune about Bush now though. . No one else can tell me how I should feel as a lesbian so I don't presume to tell an African American how they should feel about Powell or Rice. The NAACP has made it no secret that they have been unhappy with Rice. She is viewed as a puppet by many.

And I don't think she is at all. She's always been very hawkish. She's the same as she's always been. She just agrees with Bush. Presumably, that is why he appointed her.

Until minorities can accept differences in opinion between themselves, they won't be truly equal. There is no black way of thinking. There's just thinking. Intelligent people have differences of opinion. It does not have to make them enemies.

I understand the emotion behind this line of thinking, but I think it is misguided. I can celebrate the success of, for instance, Juan Williams, even though I completely disagree with him most of the time. He's an intelligent, well-spoken man who has a different opinion than mine. That's all. No more, no less.

It's not his job to represent black people everywhere, It's his job to represent his ideals and his principles. Now, if he had appointed himself as a "black leader," or was an administrator at the NAACP, I could understand people calling him a sell-out, much in the same way I think Bush sold out conservative values.

But to label someone as "not black" simply because you disagree is really childish and hurtful.

- Rick

[outgirl]

Well I certainly see your point but being a white male you come from a completely different perspective. Personally, I think the outright Libertarians and the log cabin republicans betray the gay community by promoting candidates and policies that I feel are anti gay. It may seem childish to you but to use a quote from one of my favorite songs right now...."you don't know my struggle." You can empathize but you can never really know the things that have shaped me or my views as a lesbian. If a majority of African Americans (and I'm not saying it is a majority) feel that she has betrayed her race, you or I have no right to comment, in my opinion, You can only judge her for yourself.

[RS Davis]

outgirl said:

Well I certainly see your point but being a white male you come from a completely different perspective. Personally, I think the outright Libertarians and the log cabin republicans betray the gay community by promoting candidates and policies that I feel are anti gay. It may seem childish to you but to use a quote from one of my favorite songs right now...."you don't know my struggle." You can empathize but you can never really know the things that have shaped me or my views as a lesbian. If a majority of African Americans (and I'm not saying it is a majority) feel that she has betrayed her race, you or I have no right to comment, in my opinion, You can only judge her for yourself.

I think we definitely have a right to comment. There is nothing about being black that means you are going to think a certain way, act a certain way. Individuals are just that. Individuals. I don't even really identify myself as a white guy because the part of me that is white - or Indian, for that matter - is completely irrelevant to who I am.

The arguments that people like Trall are using boil down to this - politics. That's it. Condi is not a liberal, therefore she must be a House Nigga to Bush. It couldn't be that she is an able, intelligent woman who happens to be a black conservative.

No. Accepting that gives her power.

Her political foes must take away her credibility. It doesn't matter that she is immensely qualified for her position:

Dr. Condoleezza Rice became the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, commonly referred to as the National Security Advisor, on January 22, 2001.

In June 1999, she completed a six year tenure as Stanford University's Provost, during which she was the institution's chief budget and academic officer. As Provost she was responsible for a $1.5 billion annual budget and the academic program involving 1,400 faculty members and 14,000 students.

As professor of political science, Dr. Rice has been on the Stanford faculty since 1981 and has won two of the highest teaching honors -- the 1984 Walter J. Gores Award for Excellence in Teaching and the 1993 School of Humanities and Sciences Dean's Award for Distinguished Teaching.

At Stanford, she has been a member of the Center for International Security and Arms Control, a Senior Fellow of the Institute for International Studies, and a Fellow (by courtesy) of the Hoover Institution. Her books include Germany Unified and Europe Transformed (1995) with Philip Zelikow, The Gorbachev Era (1986) with Alexander Dallin, and Uncertain Allegiance: The Soviet Union and the Czechoslovak Army (1984). She also has written numerous articles on Soviet and East European foreign and defense policy, and has addressed audiences in settings ranging from the U.S. Ambassador's Residence in Moscow to the Commonwealth Club to the 1992 and 2000 Republican National Conventions.

From 1989 through March 1991, the period of German reunification and the final days of the Soviet Union, she served in the Bush Administration as Director, and then Senior Director, of Soviet and East European Affairs in the National Security Council, and a Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs. In 1986, while an international affairs fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations, she served as Special Assistant to the Director of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In 1997, she served on the Federal Advisory Committee on Gender -- Integrated Training in the Military.

She was a member of the boards of directors for the Chevron Corporation, the Charles Schwab Corporation, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the University of Notre Dame, the International Advisory Council of J.P. Morgan and the San Francisco Symphony Board of Governors. She was a Founding Board member of the Center for a New Generation, an educational support fund for schools in East Palo Alto and East Menlo Park, California and was Vice President of the Boys and Girls Club of the Peninsula. In addition, her past board service has encompassed such organizations as Transamerica Corporation, Hewlett Packard, the Carnegie Corporation, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, The Rand Corporation, the National Council for Soviet and East European Studies, the Mid-Peninsula Urban Coalition and KQED, public broadcasting for San Francisco.

Born November 14, 1954 in Birmingham, Alabama, she earned her bachelor's degree in political science, cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa, from the University of Denver in 1974; her master's from the University of Notre Dame in 1975; and her Ph.D. from the Graduate School of International Studies at the University of Denver in 1981. She is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and has been awarded honorary doctorates from Morehouse College in 1991, the University of Alabama in 1994, the University of Notre Dame in 1995, the Mississippi College School of Law in 2003, the University of Louisville and Michigan State University in 2004. She resides in Washington, D.C.
www.whitehouse.gov/nsc/ricebio.html

No, none of that is important. She must be taken down, reduced to the role of a "House Nigga," "Uncle Tom," or token, clearing away accomplishments that are amazing, whether she were white, a man, or born rich.

It is patently unfair. If you are black and not a liberal, it doesn't matter what you accomplish. You're just the white man's shill.

It really pisses me off, to tell you the truth, and I don't even agree with her a lot of the time. I just hate to see someone's hard work and dedication to self-improvement just tossed away. To me, it is no different than the guy who looks at the woman executive and assumes she slept her way to the top.

- Rick

[outgirl]

Maybe your race is completely irrelavant to who you are but my sexual orientation is very much a part of what makes me who I am. I am saying that you can judge Andrew Sullivan for yourself but you certainly DO NOT have the right to comment on whether my feelings as a lesbian are justified. You can not justify or condemn MY feelings. You most certainly DO NOT have that right.

[RS Davis]

outgirl said:

Maybe your race is completely irrelavant to who you are but my sexual orientation is very much a part of what makes me who I am. I am saying that you can judge Andrew Sullivan for yourself but you certainly DO NOT have the right to comment on whether my feelings as a lesbian are justified. You can not justify or condemn MY feelings. You most certainly DO NOT have that right.

Well, I have the right, but as you are my friend, it would be a shitty thing to do.

But my point is, if I were a black libertarian, many black people would pass me off as an "Uncle Tom" and never listen to what I had to say. I find that personally repulsive.

- Rick

[outgirl]

RS said:

Well, I have the right, but as you are my friend, it would be a shitty thing to do.

But my point is, if I were a black libertarian, many black people would pass me off as an "Uncle Tom" and never listen to what I had to say. I find that personally repulsive.

- Rick

I have just shared this thread with a friend of mine who is black and she feels the same as I do. She finds the idea that you feel you can speak on behalf of blacks repulsive. You do not have to share my views or feelings on any subject. You have the right to disagree. That is your right. That is where your rights end. You do not have the right to speak on behalf of the gay or African American communities. You do not have the right to speak on my behalf as a lesbian. If the majority of gays feel that Andrew Sullivan is harmful then that is the majority opinion. Again you may disagree but you can not express the feeling of a gay man on the subject because you are not gay. Whatever opinions you may have about Rice or Sullivan are your own opinions. You do not have to agree with the NAACP. They are not speaking for you so don't presume to speak for them. If you don't wish to consider the feelings of an entire community of people, then don't. But you don't have the right to tell me what I may or may not feel. You may be my friend but you ain't my daddy.

[RS Davis]

outgirl said:

I have just shared this thread with a friend of mine who is black and she feels the same as I do. She finds the idea that you feel you can speak on behalf of blacks repulsive. You do not have to share my views or feelings on any subject. You have the right to disagree. That is your right. That is where your rights end. You do not have the right to speak on behalf of the gay or African American communities. You do not have the right to speak on my behalf as a lesbian.

I can't speak on behalf of anyone but myself. That is what I have been doing. I see a double standard, and it makes me mad. That's all.

outgirl said:

If the majority of gays feel that Andrew Sullivan is harmful then that is the majority opinion. Again you may disagree but you can not express the feeling of a gay man on the subject because you are not gay. Whatever opinions you may have about Rice or Sullivan are your own opinions.

I really don't know anything about Sullivan, which is why I avoided saying anything about him. I am not expressing anyone's feelings or thoughts but my own.

outgirl said:

You do not have to agree with the NAACP. They are not speaking for you so don't presume to speak for them. If you don't wish to consider the feelings of an entire community of people, then don't. But you don't have the right to tell me what I may or may not feel. You may be my friend but you ain't my daddy.

I'm not telling anyone how to feel. Sorry if I gave you that impression. I am just saying that I see an unfair situation. I can't think of a single black conservative that is roundly respected in what the media shows us is "the black community." That means to me that it is purely a political thing. IT doesn't matter how much you accomplish, it means nothing if you are not a liberal.

- Rick

[RS Davis]

Haha...I just sent this to someone too, but I screwed up and sent it to the Freedomphiles. Oops...

- Rick

[outgirl]

And I am not criticizing or making judgements about what you feel on this subject. You make many valid points. I don't totally disagree with you. Now I don't like Rice because I don't like her politics, It has nothing to do with race. I am not calling her a "house nigga" nor have I called her a puppet. I simply stated that she is seen as that by many. A fact. I am also saying that since I am not black I can not make moral judgements about how someone from a different culture may feel. All I'm saying is that if a lot of African Americans feel a certain way about her, I'm not going to discount their feelings either. They may view things from a completely different perspective. Being a lesbian, I understand this. You may not like it but the fact is that she is seen that way. Now for my personal view. The Republican party is anti gay. The evidence is in as far as I am concerned. If you are gay and vote republican, then I do see that as a betrayal to your community. The whole liberal vs conservative thing would be a good arguement if we had equal rights and we were just discussing ideological differences such as the war, the economy or free trade agreements. But this is a party that is trying to deny us the same rights as others. This is a party that wanted to keep sodomy illegal. Actually, I really believe that if you are gay and republican you are an idiot. Now Andrew Sullivan, who is a very conservative gay political pundit who writes for The New Republic, the Washington Times and occasionally The Advocate is not an idiot but I still don't get it. He did finally say though that he would not vote for Bush if he tried to push the constitutional ammendment to ban gay marriage proving that when it is your own rights that are threatened the tune can change. When you speak of rights I think you are often speaking of legal rights. I am speaking of moral rights. Being white give you and I a different perspective. We make our judgements based on who we are and where we've come from but we should also respect that there are cultural differences that shape viewpoints and be respectful of that.

[outgirl]

I can't think of a single black conservative that is roundly respected in what the media shows us is "the black community." That means to me that it is purely a political thing. IT doesn't matter how much you accomplish, it means nothing if you are not a liberal.

I think Powell is widely respected by the black community.