Racist post on online vendor's FB page really bothers me

[CaprineSun]

Thank you Distracts, Dreamer, and Circe, among others. Said it way better than I could have and more level-headed.
I'm sick of people blatantly being racist and thinking "subtly" doing it can excuse it or make us think we live in a 'post-racial' world and it couldn't possibly be true & that people are too 'race-sensitive"...etc It's even more insulting than the actual racism to think people are so dense on top of it.

It's racist, and it seems, lately people are showing their true racist beliefs. I'm more than happy to discover whom I should avoid. I want to know the name of the vendor.

ETA: I will even post my email address here to get the name, please.

 

[kenny]

ETA: I will even post my email address here to get the name, please.

Reminder: Posting our email addresses on PS is against PS rules.

 

[AGBF]

And you're free to disagree with me. I am not arguing that point. Nor does there need to be a mention about anything ad nauseum. But the disagreement does not make me racist for not finding it racist. I don't even find it racially insensitive.

I could be wrong, be it seems to me unlikely that anywhere in this thread I called any poster, "racist". Please tell me if you found a place where I did so.

Deb

 

[Skippy123]

Lula, doesn't doing that also block the people from seeing what is on your timeline? I thought you couldn't specifically block everyone from seeing "likes", but I will be absolutely thrilled if I can block just that!

I just did it and all it does is allow me to block past likes. It doesn't let me block future ones.

thanks Diamondseeker and Lula!!! FB is so confusing, they are always changing settings, for one bit I had my whole profile open and didn't know it. grrrrr.

 

[ame]

And you're free to disagree with me. I am not arguing that point. Nor does there need to be a mention about anything ad nauseum. But the disagreement does not make me racist for not finding it racist. I don't even find it racially insensitive.

I could be wrong, be it seems to me unlikely that anywhere in this thread I called any poster, "racist". Please tell me if you found a place where I did so.

Deb

I didn't accuse you of that, nor did I even imply it. You have your cockles raised for no reason, thinking every single word I posted is directly worded towards you, when it's a general statement about this discussion at the "attendees at large."

 

[ame]

Lula, doesn't doing that also block the people from seeing what is on your timeline? I thought you couldn't specifically block everyone from seeing "likes", but I will be absolutely thrilled if I can block just that!

I just did it and all it does is allow me to block past likes. It doesn't let me block future ones.

thanks Diamondseeker and Lula!!! FB is so confusing, they are always changing settings, for one bit I had my whole profile open and didn't know it. grrrrr.

They do anything they can to make everything public and accessible, which is infuriating. I seriously check my settings daily, as I want it locked down. I personally think it's crap that they allow anyone to message you now, that it just goes into this "other" folder. I want it how it was: no one knows i exist on fb if they're not on my list, so they cannot message me.

 

[Dancing Fire]

Any non black American whom doesn't agree with Obama's policies are labeled as a "racist". If our President was white we wouldn't even be having this discussion.

 

[Circe]

Nonsense.

 

[AGBF]

Nonsense.

An excellent answer. May I give mine? If he were white, no one would have bothered to PUT him up on a poster next to Paula Deen.
There's no drama with two white faces side by side.

AGBF

 

[iheartscience]

It frightens me even more that people who I deem intelligent and who say they are not racist, and don't support racism, are unable to look at this image without taking it in a racist context.....I suppose if it had been an image of Bush then that means it wouldn't be racist.

Dude, if it had been an image of Bush, the juxtaposition wouldn't have been employed, because there would be no coherent narrative. The only narrative that makes sense in comparing these two is, sadly, Deen's use of a word all too many people still apply to our president. Otherwise, a disgraced cook and the leader of the free world? Not really so comparable ....

I dunno. I guess I just make myself take a step back. I don't look at is as some racist white woman who said a racist word and is thus disgusting, vs. a black man who is "evil" (I have to at that interpretation). I look at it as a WOMAN who, yes, said a racist word... 20 years ago and a MAN who is doing a pretty deplorable job at his job. That is what it pointed out to me. That those are the things that happened and the media is more worried about the woman who said a racist word, than the man who is doing a deplorable job at running our country. I don't see why his race has to be injected at all. Nor her's. That is what is done by those who cannot see past the race. One is black and is running our country, and the other is white and said a racist remark decades ago. But most people can only see that he's black and she's white and racist. God forbid they just look at them as two people. Two human beings. Period.

This is just willfully ignorant. Please reread Dreamer's post explaining this photo fully. I've copied and pasted it below:

"Exactly. And the only reason the juxtaposition works at all is because if the President's race. If George Bush was substituted for Obama, then the "joke" would make no sense. That makes it a racial "joke" indeed. In fact, it begs readers to link the N-word with the president in even reading and understanding the "joke". The very fact that many people will deny that it is racist is the genius of the "joke" from a persuasion and manipulation perspective. It is what is called "modern racism": indirect or passive aggressive racism that has come to replace explicit hostile racism. From Wikipedia, modern or symbolic racism: "The theory of symbolic racism proposes that, in response to public abhorrence of overt racism, prejudice has gone underground, finding its expression in more subtle forms, which may sometimes manifest through socialization and therefore transpire without elements of conscious awareness. According to the symbolic racism model, bigots of the current era will cloak their racist sentiments under the guise of statements or actions supposedly in defence of noble and important values."

So in this case, the racism is cloaked in a conservative criticism of liberal media. Other cloaks include: jobs ("darn imigrants stealing our jobs!" or quality of education ("I need to live in X neighbourhood because it has a great school district," and of course, great school districts happen to also be rich and white).

It's all about plausible deniability these days! "Who me? I am not being racist, I am commenting on the liberal media! You are clearly too sensitive." But as I said, the "joke" would not work if the president was a white man. In fact, I don't think anyone would ever in a million years equate Paula Dean and the president if race was not the issue at stake, and not only race but the most derogatory and inflammatory racial word that exists in North American culture. And, indeed, the "joke" downplays the history and meaning of the word as well, calling it simply a "bad word" uttered 27 years ago. I am going to use this image as an exemplar in my classes about modern racism.

I know you didn't want opinions on this, but I thought this was such a fascinating example of modern racism I could not resist commenting."

 

[iheartscience]

[snip]

That said, I am very picky about where I spend my money. I do not shop at Walmart, for example, because of their business practices. I do not shop at Hobby Lobby, because they deny their employees birth control coverage. My buying power as a consumer is the only power I have in the marketplace. I do not share this vendor's positions on a variety of issues. So I won't spend my money there. Period. This is the risk vendors take when they mix their personal and professional lives. Of course, the argument can be made that the vendor may receive additional business from people who support his/her views, but, heck, that's the free market at work.

Exactly. There are a lot of businesses to choose from, and customers can easily decide not to buy from the place with the conservative/liberal/etc. owner. And they do!

I used to be a buyer at a clothing store. Most people who shopped the store probably assumed a liberal person owned it based on the location, merchandise, and employees. However, the owner wasn't willing to display his support for President Obama and potentially alienate half of his customer base. And I don't blame him! The point of owning a business is presumably to make money-why would you deliberately put things out there to prevent you from doing that?

I actually emailed the vendor in question the last time he posted something offensive (the fetus picture), and told him that he was welcome to his beliefs, but he should probably separate his personal Facebook page from his business Facebook page because he was going to lose customers. I guess he doesn't care? But hey, good for him-I'm sure most business owners would love to have so many customers that they don't care about losing some.

 

[dragonfly411]

It frightens me even more that people who I deem intelligent and who say they are not racist, and don't support racism, are unable to look at this image without taking it in a racist context.....I suppose if it had been an image of Bush then that means it wouldn't be racist.

Dude, if it had been an image of Bush, the juxtaposition wouldn't have been employed, because there would be no coherent narrative. The only narrative that makes sense in comparing these two is, sadly, Deen's use of a word all too many people still apply to our president. Otherwise, a disgraced cook and the leader of the free world? Not really so comparable ....

I dunno. I guess I just make myself take a step back. I don't look at is as some racist white woman who said a racist word and is thus disgusting, vs. a black man who is "evil" (I have to at that interpretation). I look at it as a WOMAN who, yes, said a racist word... 20 years ago and a MAN who is doing a pretty deplorable job at his job. That is what it pointed out to me. That those are the things that happened and the media is more worried about the woman who said a racist word, than the man who is doing a deplorable job at running our country. I don't see why his race has to be injected at all. Nor her's. That is what is done by those who cannot see past the race. One is black and is running our country, and the other is white and said a racist remark decades ago. But most people can only see that he's black and she's white and racist. God forbid they just look at them as two people. Two human beings. Period.

This is just willfully ignorant. Please reread Dreamer's post explaining this photo fully. I've copied and pasted it below:

"Exactly. And the only reason the juxtaposition works at all is because if the President's race. If George Bush was substituted for Obama, then the "joke" would make no sense. That makes it a racial "joke" indeed. In fact, it begs readers to link the N-word with the president in even reading and understanding the "joke". The very fact that many people will deny that it is racist is the genius of the "joke" from a persuasion and manipulation perspective. It is what is called "modern racism": indirect or passive aggressive racism that has come to replace explicit hostile racism. From Wikipedia, modern or symbolic racism: "The theory of symbolic racism proposes that, in response to public abhorrence of overt racism, prejudice has gone underground, finding its expression in more subtle forms, which may sometimes manifest through socialization and therefore transpire without elements of conscious awareness. According to the symbolic racism model, bigots of the current era will cloak their racist sentiments under the guise of statements or actions supposedly in defence of noble and important values."

So in this case, the racism is cloaked in a conservative criticism of liberal media. Other cloaks include: jobs ("darn imigrants stealing our jobs!" or quality of education ("I need to live in X neighbourhood because it has a great school district," and of course, great school districts happen to also be rich and white).

It's all about plausible deniability these days! "Who me? I am not being racist, I am commenting on the liberal media! You are clearly too sensitive." But as I said, the "joke" would not work if the president was a white man. In fact, I don't think anyone would ever in a million years equate Paula Dean and the president if race was not the issue at stake, and not only race but the most derogatory and inflammatory racial word that exists in North American culture. And, indeed, the "joke" downplays the history and meaning of the word as well, calling it simply a "bad word" uttered 27 years ago. I am going to use this image as an exemplar in my classes about modern racism.

I know you didn't want opinions on this, but I thought this was such a fascinating example of modern racism I could not resist commenting."

And now you have called me racist for comparing them as two people. THAT is amazing. The joke works if you don't like him as president, and you look at how the media has reacted to the things the two PEOPLE do. I'm racist for looking at them as two people who have done wrong things? WOW.

 

[Circe]

Dragonfly, I don't think she did ... she was quoting a post of Dreamer's from pages and pages ago, before you came onto the thread.

 

[diamondseeker2006]

I just have to say, I extremely disagree that looking for the best schools for your children as being racist. It is called being a parent who desires the best education possible for their children. And this comes from a parent who has children of two different races, by the way.

 

[movie zombie]

[quote="thing2of2|1373117300|3478024.................I actually emailed the vendor in question the last time he posted something offensive (the fetus picture), and told him that he was welcome to his beliefs, but he should probably separate his personal Facebook page from his business Facebook page because he was going to lose customers. I guess he doesn't care? But hey, good for him-I'm sure most business owners would love to have so many customers that they don't care about losing some.[/quote]


I don't think its out of line to post the identity of this vendor. given said vendor has posted such items as described in this thread at his FB page, he is comfortable for being "known" and identified already. I don't do FB and would appreciate being let in on the secret as to who this is.......in that way I can make an informed decision when I make a purchase.

 

[diamondseeker2006]

I am going to say this one more time. Just because someone is conservative and disagrees with some of the policies of the current president does not make them a racist. And I am absolutely appalled at the responses here that are basically out to lynch someone over a simple "like" on POLITICAL picture when they are absolutely did not see the picture racist, just as many of us did not!

I would suggest that those who need all their FB "friends" to have the same political beliefs that they do just "unfriend" people with differing views so as not to be offended. It would be hard for a vendor to try and figure out who to remove!

 

[Ella]

In the interest of civility and our policies, this thread is starting to evolve into topics which we do not technically allow on PS. We allowed the thread to remain to foster good conversation and learning that everyone loves. But we think it is now time to close it to avoid going down the path of previous similar threads.

A warning to all, be careful what you "like" on Facebook without understanding where the item came from or if it is even true.