Wednesday

Quit Frontin': Stop Pullin' Out the Race Card For No Damn Reason


"Ty, since when is being black an excuse for extreme antisocial behavior. Do you realize that by using that excuse you are not doing people of color any favors."

- @Danny
@Danny's comments on the last post got me to a-thinkin' about things. Serious things. Things like how people can't really point out how mediocre the present administration is without being labeled a racist. Not that I would have voted for the crazy old dude and the crazy VP lady but, seriously, I'm not feeling the Hope and Change. I'm feeling a little bit gypped. The party of power has a congressional majority, nearly filibusterer-proof, and with the mandate-of-the-people via a legitimate vote, and they can't get legislation through? What do they have to do, promise health coverage for our pets too? Anyway...the race card is on my mind.

Ahhh how people throw out that race card. Just because some mope cashier at the LL Bean store or Barnes & Noble or the Apple store asks to see your ID with a credit card purchase (and clearly didn't do it for the white lady who just bought like $4,000 worth of shit) doesn't mean they're doing it because you're black and they're racist. They're doing it because that's what they're supposed to do and they are supposed to do it with everybody (but only remember with black people). It's part of the same script where they offer you the frequent buyer discount membership card too. I know the ID call " for your protection" only demonstrates that the cashier knows ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about consumer protection or credit card fraud, but it doesn't demonstrate racism. It demonstrates that these mopes do what their told. Racism would be if they said, "we don't serve blacks" or called the cops because you even had a credit card.

Likewise TSA isn't insinuating that your boushie, nattily-dressed black ass is some sort of terrorist by "inviting" you for "additional screening", they are doing the job they get paid for: to be assholes to everybody. Look, see that old white woman in a wheelchair getting wanded? And the blond baby in the Plexiglas cube? Doy! Quit upping the ante in race card poker with your bad attitude.

You need to check yourself whenever you feel the urge to vocalize the following words, "Oh, it's because I'm black, huh?" Shit, ask Skip Gates. You can't take that shit back. In 99% of cases you're going to look like an asshole with a chip on your shoulder with low education and bad (racist) movie theater behaviors. You'll just appear to be some weak ass remnant of a civil rights legacy you don't even know about because that curriculum got yanked with Bush's No Child Left Behind. Basically you don't know what the fuck you're talking about and you're making it bad for the next black person in line (like me). When you whip that race card out, you are placing a chip on the cashier's shoulders. Not even Jay-Z can brush that shit off. And it starts the whole thing over because then they're going to ask me for fucking ID with my credit card purchase (and I'm going to explain to them why that's not going to happen).

For the most part the race card (the Ace of Spades, of course) needs stay in the sleeve only to be used for serious and dire emergencies. It is true that there are opportune times to whip that bitch out like when you're trying to get into Yale (improbable) or if it could somehow miraculously keep you from going to jail (which is impossible), or get you laid (more probable), or get you paid (again probably impossible).

Wouldn't it be balls for the Starbucks manager you insist intervene come over and say, "No. It's not because you're black, sir. It's because you're an asshole. We do discriminate against jerks all the time." I know. I've worked retail.

When they ask me ID, I ask to see theirs.