Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Boy oh boy...

I knew this would happen. I've almost made the same mistake myself...
Rep. Geoff Davis (R-KY) is 49 years old. Barack Obama is 46 years old. When was the last time you called someone three years younger than you a boy?

Davis’s comments offend not because they demeaned Obama’s integrity; they’re offensive because, well, in 2008, for a white person to call a black person “boy,” is generally seen as racist no matter where you are.
Here's the problem. When Hillary Clinton did well in the Texas primary, Bill Maher had one of her campaign guys on the show. Maher said: "You kept your girl in the race." No-one thought that Maher meant to demean the candidate. In the 1970s, feminists might have made that very argument; modern feminists (generally) do not.

If Obama were white, I'd be using the phrase "your boy" all the time while sparring with his supporters.

Surely we can make some allowance for this?

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

Down South, everyone calls everyone who has a schlong "boy."

It shocked me at first, but I got to like it...

Boy, did I get to like that Southern speech.

I'm resisting the urge to make bad puns on the word "niggardly."

Joseph Cannon said...

Oh, don't get me started on "niggardly." I used to use the word because there is no exact equivalent. "Overly thrifty" sounds clumsy, and "cheap" or "miserly" are not exact enough, and I don't

"Niggardly" and "nigger" have completely different etymologies. Yet the word is now banished because it SOUNDS like an obscenity.

Does this mean we have to get rid of words like "rapeseed" or "fox" or "chit"? Are we no longer allowed to speak of a chink in the armor or a nip in the air?

This is ridiculous!

gary said...

I think the Obama campaign did make some allowance. They did not make an accusation of racism, although they did call it a "personal attack" which it was, and the other guy apologized.

gary said...

Oh, and as for your "same mistake" --the mistake you've made, again, is to link to a blogger sign-in page.

Anonymous said...

In fact, some gov't board up in Canada decided to rename (I think the capitalist term is "rebrand") "rapeseed" as "Canola" because of the connotations.

In that case, given that women make the vast majority of buying decisions, I think the decision was smart. Can you see Mrs. Average Homemaker buying rapeseed oil?

(I apologize for using the sexist term "Mrs. Average Homemaker.")

Hillary once used the phrase, "I'm your girl." No one blinked.

It just proves that the black and white races are so uncomfortable around one another that the least littlest thing, or rather, nothing, has become incendiary. Very sad.

Anonymous said...
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Anonymous said...

You 'boys" write like there is no history here.

The man's name is Geoff Davis.

He said :
"That boy's finger does not need to be on the button."
Ok... so let's all pretend that is just fine to say that about Obama. Geoff Davis was completely innocent. Right?

Joseph Cannon said...

Well, if I were running for president, a southern guy might well say it of me. No-one would take offense.

In other words, maybe we should have a slight "structural re-adjustment" in our culture. Maybe we can find a way to make it permissible to say of any ball player (white or black or whatever): "That boy's got a good arm on him." And everyone would understand, from context, that this statement was very different from the stereotypical southern sheriff saying "Ahm talkin' to yew, BOY. Y'hear?"

Anonymous said...

Personally, I find myself curious as to more details of what transpired during the exercise in which Geoff Davis observed Senator Obama's judgment regarding the use of military force (and presumably, weapons of mass destruction) to be less than mature. Which is the implication I drew from his comment.

Stepping back for more perspective, I find it useful to remind myself that we are engaged in a battle for the minds of ... Oh, nevermind.

(To name but two, even Plato and Dante Alighieri were astutely aware of the political uses of language. Both labored to elevate their respective languages. Our enemies seek the opposite effect.)

Gary McGowan

Anonymous said...

J: ""some government board re-branded it""?? really?? I guess it wouldn't have anything to do with the fact that two guys in a lab (Keith and Baldur) cultivated a low erucic acid rapeseed? huh? And that it was basically a CANadian Oil with Low Acid (get it? Can O.L.A??) ...and with the previously higher levels of erucic acid (in rapeseed), it was deemed not for human consumption by the FDA... so if i could find any Mrs. Average Homemaker and she was using Rapeseed oil (for anything buy engine lube-- which is what it was used for in the pre-Canola days) I would have to look at her and say; "Boy! Something's wrong with yo head! Why you frying up my chicken in that engine oil??"

see, back then if someone was eating rapeseed oil they woulda said they're crazy and they're eating engine lube.

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Anonymous said...
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Anonymous said...

I've got an idea: Let's not call black men "boy" until all the black men who were ever racistly demeaned by that word are dead, and all the whites who ever used it in a racistly demeaning way are dead. Or how about we just try to avoid calling black men "boy," particularly when we're white, male, southern Republicans who are trying to convince an audience that there's a big problem with that "boy"?