Sister Toldja, I did read your article, and I've got to agree with some of the previous posters here. Your piece did not come across as satire to me - it came across as someone simply talking in their blog about what was important to them. And I don't really believe that you WERE entirely joking, based on the whole "jokes are 90% funny and 10% truth" adage, as well as your responses in this thread.

I think the reason that people are bringing "A Modest Proposal" up is that Swift is a really good example of how to do it... I think that one of the hallmarks of good satire is that the idea has to be so absurd that your readers have no doubt in their minds that you ARE making fun of the concept.

Unfortunately, I know many people who DO feel that way. You might have meant it in a mostly-joking manner, but I assure you, there are people out there who mean it 100%. Whitey, stay home, you have NO business celebrating this president.

I've read your responses and ideas, and I will be checking out the books you recommended. I acknowledge that, as a white person, I can never truly understand what a black American goes through - but I can, and am completely willing, to try.

Please let me explain something. I cannot speak for everyone, but I've seen this type of point alluded to here by others, and I know many of my friends feel this way as well. This is being extended as an olive branch, if you will - so that you can maybe understand a little better where some of us white folks are coming from while we make an effort to understand where you are coming from.

I have heard my whole life about the horrible things that white people have done. This absolutely should be taught - to forget our history dooms us to repeat it, and I don't think ANYONE out there (well, anyone who deserves to stay in the gene pool) wants that.

So, yes, we do get it. We get that the whites have done horrible, inexcusable things. We understand, I think, that these things have created situations for nonwhites that make it much, much harder for them than it is for us. Do we totally understand this? No. We can't; we can't step in to your shoes, because it's impossible for us to wear them. They're not ours.

I live in Atlanta. ("The City Too Busy To Hate"? Total bullshit.) Race is always here; it's pretty much in your face all the time. And what kills me is the separatism that I see going on here.

A day doesn't pass that I am not reminded, usually verbally, that my ancestors were assholes. And it does become personal, because of the way I get treated. When someone talks about "white people" doing this or that to someone, I can't help but take it at least at little personally... Not only because I am white, but because this is usually said while looking straight at me.

I am treated differently here in this city due to the color of my skin. Black people don't want to talk to me, no matter how I try to reach out in friendship. I understand that there are real jerks out there, and that there might be a very real reason for their reticence to talk to me... but it's frustrating and disheartening.

It hurts, sometimes, that no matter how good I am, no matter how kind I am, no matter how hard I try to actively fight racism (and I do), I'm not given the chance to be seen as anything other than the descendant of a possible slave owner. I am Whitey. I am evil. I am actively keeping minorities down. And all that couldn't be farther from the truth.

I think some of what you're seeing here is that frustration. White people today have grown up with the ideas that racism is a terrible, terrible thing, and that treating ANYONE differently simply because of their skin color is a thing that is incredibly wrong. And to see it applied to us when so many of us try like hell to keep it from happening to others... Honestly, it hurts.

LIke I said before, this is offered in nothing but the kindest of spirits, in the hope that dialogue can improve things.

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Unfortunately, many white liberals have the attitude of "Thanks for bringing this problem to our attention, we've got it from here," about oppression of all peoples, (if you don't think that is true think about that irritating male "feminist" in your women's studies class who thought he knew all the f'n answers). That is what I believe the original post was alluding to. Did I particularly care for the humor? Not so much, I thought it was a slightly more high brow version of the "black people dance like this, and white people dance like that" routine.

Having said that your reaction, Anna, is ultimately far more racist than the post by Sista Toldja. To see anything frightening about that photo is the kind of deep seated and invisible racism that keeps people from evaluating each other on a personal level. I don't know you, you could be black for all I know, what I do know is that you find images of black men scary and to see that on a website that I consider liberal is infuriating.

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i do agree that it will be like All Star Weekend, which depending on what day you ask me can be off the chain in a good or bad way

i know i wont be there :(

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ok im done

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Bingo.

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Why do people still think that "if you switch White and Black, it would be racist!" is a valid arguement?

I'd be willing to bet that if Barack and I were Jewish, none of you guys would have had such an indignant reaction.

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