October 13, 2014
Budapest, Hungary
Source: Shutterstock
A “DEADLY SERIOUS” FILM PROJECT ABOUT “WHITENESS”
At first glance, filmmaker Whitney Dow’s “Whiteness Project“ appears to be utterly sincere in its objectives, which is nearly always a mistake in the current climate of savage partisan hysteria where open-minded sincerity is a hanging offense.
According to Dow’s mission statement:
I recognize that the idea of whiteness, or white privilege, is an uncomfortable one. The term “white privilege” itself feels pejorative and like something whose very recognition demands an admission of some kind of guilt. As a white person, I reject this.
He even rejects the popular notion that America is a fundamentally bigoted country:
…it is hard to imagine any other white-majority country embracing and celebrating the wide range of ethnicities and cultures that make up the nation and electing a biracial president to govern them all.
Dow tells the social-justice Daleks at the Daily Dot that he is “deadly serious” about the project, which surprisingly has financial backing from PBS. He says he intends to interview 1,000 white people about what it means to be white in a nation where it is decidedly uncool to be white. He muddies the waters a tad by asserting that American whites are “going to have to deal with their own shit first” before they can engage in a meaningful dialogue about race. Still, this appears to be the most nonjudgmental publicly funded approach to the very topic of whiteness in eons, so the chances are very good that it will end in disaster and ritual public shaming for Mr. Dow.
RUGBY TEAM BANNED FOR ACTING LIKE A RUGBY TEAM
The London School of Economics” rugby club has been disbanded for a year in the wake of a “sexist, homophobic, racist and classist“ leaflet they handed out to freshmen at a recent student-orientation event. The document allegedly referred to female athletes as “beast-like women,” depicted females as “trollops,” “slags,” and “mingers,” and cast aspersions upon “outright homosexual debauchery.” It spoke of “hedonism and misogyny” as part of “everything the club holds dear.”
Oops.
It was further publicized that the club “had a history of racism and misogyny“ that included such naughty hijinks as wearing blackface and “imitating Islamic prayers while Muslim students left Friday worship” as well as “playing Nazi-themed drinking games on tour which led to a Jewish student’s nose being broken.”
In a statement published in the London School of Economics Student Union’s newspaper The Beaver (ahem), the club offered “a full and unreserved apology” and unconvincingly claimed that the leaflet’s “inexcusably offensive and stigmatising language…absolutely does not reflect the views and values of our club.”
As any modern thought criminal who’s coughed up a groveling apology already knows, the apology had zero effect. The club was banned by the student union’s president Nona Buckley-Irvine, who claimed that her group had “tried to rehabilitate the club” but failed. She added that banning the club’s very existence for a year was “not intended as a negative, punitive measure,” as if she believed that for a nanosecond.
Writing in the Huffington Post, a self-identified “member of LSE’s Professional Services Staff…and…proud gay man” piled on the club, triumphantly claiming that “we stopped asking for tolerance years ago. That battle is won. We demand inclusivity, not your tolerance.”
OK, then. You won”t tolerate those who don”t tolerate you. Even more, you”ll exclude those who don”t include you. And doublespeak held illimitable dominion over all.
ATTACK OF THE PURPLE PENGUINS
After having conquered the coasts, the rabidly insatiable forces of gender denial are now infesting the heartland like so many boll weevils. Middle-school teachers in Lincoln, NE were recently handed a collaborative document by two groups”one called Gender Spectrum and another that has the gall to dub itself the Center for Gender Sanity”instructing educators to avoid “gendered expressions” such as “boys and girls” when referring to the…boys and girls…in their classrooms:
Don’t use phrases such as “boys & girls,” “you guys,” “ladies and gentlemen,” and similarly gendered expressions to get kids” attention. Instead say things like “calling all readers,” or “hey campers” or “could all of the athletes come here.” Create classroom names and then ask all of the “purple penguins” to meet at the rug. … Avoid using “normal” to define any behaviors.
Lincoln Superintendent Steve Joel reportedly told a local radio show that he is “happy” with the offending handout.
Someday a real rain will come and wash all the purple penguins away. Boys will be boys and girls will be girls again. And all of the deviants who warped children’s minds by insisting they call themselves purple penguins will be unemployed.
