Revisiting the Deen Issue

Truth be told, The Angry White Mom has to admit that I bit down a little hard on the Paula Deen thing,
before I had all the facts, and before I had considered much of the evidence not tainted  by social hysteria.
So I am stepping back a bit from my earlier conclusions, and would like to take another chew if  you don't mind. Since the additional information released by the plaintiff in the civil lawsuit pending against Deen and her brother, I have realized that I need to explain further.  What I was trying to say actually mirrors closely
the statement the plaintiff released in that the case -- and the social issues it exposes -- is soooo much
more than Paula Deen's casual racism.  What I was trying to stress is that all of us are casual racists
simply because we are products of a racist culture.  That does not mean we should stand down on
racial equality, but it does mean that we need to focus our awareness more on the institutionalized racism that still exists in our country.  We need to dismiss and ignore the older, entrenched remnants of  a generation that has seen its demise and turn our hot glares in the direction of those still in power who seek to dismantle any progress bloodily gained since the Emancipation Proclamation. We need to tackle the bigger, harder issues with as much vigor as we do the petty Paula Deens. Do I need to list these things here?  Nah.  Because we all know we can find racist elements at the core of our voting policies, our law enforcement practices, educational opportunities, you get the drift.  As I said in an earlier post -- the Supreme Court's decision to gut the Voter Rights Act reflects the same attitude as a father who thinks his child is potty trained simply because he has not personally changed a diaper in a whilte.

If they bothered to open the tidy little package, they would find a real mess.

But I have to push back against some ultra-liberals with whom I usually find comraderie. Words are just words.  As a writer, I can easily trace the evolution of our modern American parlance that has seen the very  meaning of the words themselves change.  The word "gay" comes to mind. Back in my day, calling a woman a "bitch" was seriously insulting. Calling her a "cunt" was unheard of.  The word "faggot" used to mean a match, or a small burning stick used to light a pipe or stove before it became a derogatory term for homosexual men.  Now I hear my sons and their friends, none of whom are gay, call each other that as a matter of common everyday banter. South Park did an entire episode on this, by the way, that was absolutely hysterically funny. I could go on. "Paddy" was an insulting term to mean the Irish. Now it means
a police vehicle.  Go figure.  But count on this. American English is always changing, adapting, and
not recognizing this, and understanding that this fact is incidental to our culture, not driving it, seems rather anti-progressive to my perspective.

I certainly do not think I am a bigot.  You are free to disagree.  But I will put up my life's work in contradiction to that characterization. I am quite positive I have used racial and sexist epithets, and if I have offended anyone, I am sorry but I would hope you would tell me, -- and tell me exactly -- how  a word can  cause you personal pain. I used to repeatedly tell my young sons that old saw "sticks and stones can break my bones, but words can never harm me." They had this down pretty much by third grade. What happened to the rest of  you?

The truth hurts. Now go put a bandage on it. I did.