quote:Originally posted by Tresopax: Yes, but under those conditions, people are also far more likely to act in ways that don't reflect their actual beliefs. Since you can't tell whether someone is revealing a true hidden self or whether they are simply not themselves, you shouldn't jump to any conclusions based on that behavior.
Whose beliefs are they? Have they been taken over by aliens? Was there a personality transplant included with their tequila?
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
Poor judgment can easily give an inaccurate portrayal of one's beliefs, when in reality the person may have merely failed to make the correct assessment of the situation he was in.
For example, someone may try to make people laugh and so decides to use a racial joke that he heard some comedian say. That doesn't mean that there is some inner self that is racist, just that he may not have the best judgment.
Posts: 1256 | Registered: May 2005
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quote:Originally posted by rivka: It means there is some inner self that does not find the joke reprehensible.
So because I laugh long and heartily at Chris Rock's routines, I must be a closet racist? Or because I love Futurama's Dr. Zoidberg, I'm an anti-Semite?
quote:It means there is some inner self that does not find the joke reprehensible.
I don't think I believe that.
Laughter can come from many things - shock, juxtaposition, nervousness, sympathetic. Laughter at a horrid joke does not automatically that on some deep level the laugher agrees with the rascist sentiments expressed in the joke. It just means that something made him laugh. It could be a deep agreement, or it could be many other things.
I was thinking about the time I worked at a blue-collar business. I am not around swearing very much, but I sure was that summer. The conversation I listened regularly contained phrases that I'd never want to say, but I didn't have control over my environment. Late in the summer I messed something up, and the phrase that popped into my head and could very easily have come out of my mouth was a phrase that I'd never want to think or say. But I did think it.
That doesn't mean that I secretly approve of swearing. It means our brains soak up what is around us and has an effect on us, whether we want it to or not.
Having said that, I still think Kramer's incident was staged for attention.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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Oh no, I was taking a class about South Africa once and we watched "Master Harold and the boys" and I missed the it's-not-fair joke. Afterward I asked the instructor what the joke was, because I didn't understand it. When she told me...
... I laughed
I know I have racism still deep in me. I'm not proud of it, though. I think most people do on one level or another, against some race or other. If we pretend we don't have it, how can we cure it?
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
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quote:Originally posted by pooka: I think most people do on one level or another, against some race or other. If we pretend we don't have it, how can we cure it?
Agreed. On both counts.
I would also point out that there is a difference between laughing at a joke and retelling it. Regardless of whether it has any racial overtones or not. If you tell me a groan-inducing pun, protesting that it's not original to you is hardly a defense.
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quote:I think most people do on one level or another, against some race or other. If we pretend we don't have it, how can we cure it?
I'm not sure I'd call that racism. I'd be more inclined to describe it as stereotypes, which I don't think is necessarily wrong or bad.
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quote:Regardless of whether it has any racial overtones or not. If you tell me a groan-inducing pun, protesting that it's not original to you is hardly a defense.
Defense? Groan-inducing puns are to be celebrated, not defended! Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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Does laughing at a racist joke make you a racist?
I think that whether or not you find a particular crude joke funny is much less of an indicator of racism than how you actually interact with people. Racist jokes often are jokes about racism, rather than jokes about people of a different race, and in these instances I don't think that telling them is as indicator of personally held racist beliefs.
It's a similar situation with dead baby jokes. You might laugh at a dead baby joke because of its absurdity, but that doesn't make you a bad person if you treat real babies in an loving, caring way.
Posts: 148 | Registered: Jan 2006
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quote:Originally posted by pooka: Oh no, I was taking a class about South Africa once and we watched "Master Harold and the boys" and I missed the it's-not-fair joke. Afterward I asked the instructor what the joke was, because I didn't understand it. When she told me...
... I laughed
I know I have racism still deep in me. I'm not proud of it, though. I think most people do on one level or another, against some race or other. If we pretend we don't have it, how can we cure it?
It's not fair? I laugh at South Park and at some movie that had a line like: "Rap is by black people, they are really angry, but mostly they want to have sex." I have a bizarre sense of humor. I should be offended byt hat, but it was funny.
Posts: 9942 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
I'm somewhat of the opinion expressed by Baron on the first page of this thread. I think you have an inexperienced comic who as others have pointed out, doesn't like to 'break his stride' to put it mildly.
I also think in the heat of the moment he made a desperate attempt at turning the exchange back on the person who started it, but did a miserable job of it. Again, to some extent that is inexperience.
In know comedians hate it when the audience talks back to them or talks to them in any way. I've been to comedy club where over enthusiastic fans have ruined the evening unintentionally, because they couldn't shut up and enjoy the show. Comedy is very much about timing, about setting up a joke, pulling it off, and given the audience time to respond. When people in the audience continually talk back it throws everything off.
I was in a comedy club in Florida once when the host came out and specifically and emphatically told the audience NOT to talk to the comedians. When one of the comedians was on stage doing his act, some drunk girl in the audience kept making wise cracks to the comedian. I'm sure she didn't mean any harm, but it was messing everything up from the comedians perspective. Finally, he moved the microphone off to the side, away from his mouth, and very angrily told this girl to SHUT UP!
The room was tense and uncomfortable for a few seconds, but he went on with his act, and soon everyone was laughing again. Everyone except the girl he told to shut up.
Again, that is certainly a milder response than Kramer, but it none the less shows that these people who inadvertantly interupt the act, can instill a lot of anger in the comedians.
As other have implied, I don't put this in the same catagory as Mel Gibson's drunken rant. I think in his mind Michael Richards was trying to regain control of the situation, but given his pesonal demeanor and his inexperience failed in the grandest and most miserable way possible.
I don't think from this one incident that Michael is a racist. As I said, I think in his own mind, in that moment, he was simply trying to regain control while make a social comment, and was failing miserably at it.
As others have implied, I think his apology was sincere and genuine. I think he was simply trapped in a situation he didn't know how to handle, and made the worst possible choices.
posted
Honestly, when I lose control of my temper I say very, very honest, incredibly cruel things. Like the worst things a person had ever thought about themselves repeated back to them. I would say that what I say while angry is absolutely a reflection of the unflattering and unkind ideas and conclusions I ALREADY have. Nothing new is created when I'm mad. Eg., I'm not racist, so I wouldn't yell at someone for being black (it would never occur to me that this would hurt them) but I might attack someone for stupid choices they made which they were mad at themselves about or being overly shy and not meeting people or something. I would probably go after a heckler in the audience for never getting laid or something.
Now, I personally don't think it's at all productive to push people's buttons on purpose or to be unkind, ever. I have never had an experience in life where my saying something mean and hurtful led to anything positive. It totally shuts down communication.
Anyway, my whole point is that if you're getting heckled onstage and freaking out and the first thing that occurs to you as something to attack is the color of the heckler's skin - then yeah, you're racist. This is not a new special thing that is happening just because you're panicked onstage - this is something you already think. And you think that calling someone a nigger is the worst thing you could say, because in your head, being black is bad.
I totally think the guy's racist.
Posts: 471 | Registered: Jul 2005
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posted
I can see being under a lot of stress and very upset making people say crazy stuff. It's fight of flight reflex. You feel like someone's attacking you, and you attack back.
I think rational, day to day behavior is the yardstick by which we need to measure a person's integrity. If their day to day behavior involves a lot of anger and lashing out, then that needs to be considered. If someone flips out in the heat of the moment, we might want to give them a break.
Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
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posted
If you're brought up to be racist (or homophobic, or whatever), and you realize when you grow up that that's not right, and you don't want to be that way, so you spend your life thinking bad thoughts about a certain group of people without being able to help it, but you never put yourself in a situation where you do or say anything against them, and in fact go out of your way to defend them or give preference to them, but you still know deep inside that you're uncomfortable with those people, are you more or less racist than the guy who might think exactly the same way but happened to lose control of himself for a moment on national TV?
Just a thought.
Racism's so hard to define.
Posts: 624 | Registered: Mar 2005
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posted
I cannot believe that the men that Michael Richards insulted want money from him. What did he do to them that money is going to fix? If anything, Richards threatened them with violence and deserves to go to jail, do community service, or pay a fine to the state.
Posts: 781 | Registered: Apr 2005
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posted
Actually, they're the ones that threatened him with violence, along with using racial epithets of their own. And that's not to mention the fact that they started it all with their heckling. In fact, it could be argued that they were more in the wrong, because of the two examples of verbal abuse that took place: 1) the heckling was unprovoked and not done under any emotional distress, and 2) it directly interfered with Richards' livelihood, which seems like it would make a more compelling case for punitive damages.
That's not to say that what Richards did was anything approaching acceptable. But we live in a free country, and there are still a plethora of ways a person can be a complete a-hole without technically breaking any laws.
If those guys really are going to sue, I hope they can get Jackie Chiles to represent them.
Posts: 563 | Registered: Feb 2006
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quote:Originally posted by Astaril: If you're brought up to be racist (or homophobic, or whatever), and you realize when you grow up that that's not right, and you don't want to be that way, so you spend your life thinking bad thoughts about a certain group of people without being able to help it, but you never put yourself in a situation where you do or say anything against them, and in fact go out of your way to defend them or give preference to them, but you still know deep inside that you're uncomfortable with those people, are you more or less racist than the guy who might think exactly the same way but happened to lose control of himself for a moment on national TV?
Just a thought.
Racism's so hard to define.
i have to agree with you. is the root of racism actually hating another race, or is racism just makeing differenciation between races? is yelling 'n*****' racist, or do you just have to think it?
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