or maybe they call it “Jungle Fever”
Well its not surprising. These kids eat junk food, drink 10 sodas a day and live on Facebook. Of course their wiring is going to be messed up.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Jul 2 2008 18:48 utc | 3

The white guys have to date the black girls because the black men date all the white women.
Sweet Black Angel

Posted by: gus | Jul 2 2008 21:29 utc | 5

At first glance this seems simple, one can’t condone institutionalised racism in any form for it is the examples set by our societies’ institutions which provide the subtext for each society’s mores. It is appalling that even after the civil rights movement of the 60’s in amerika one of the worst and most oppressive ways that african-americans have been made to feel separate and unequal is by widespread institutionalised opposition to so called miscegenation. On the other hand one can understand the interest that african american groups have in preventing african-american women from being exploited.
I know I have been reprimanded at MoA before for comparing the african-american experience with that of indigenous people in other colonised territories but from this perspective, the similarities in experience of african american people and, for example, the aboriginal people of Australia far outweigh any differences. But that is for another time.
Still we need to acknowledge that virtually every colonisation by europeans of others groups’ territory began with the sexual colonisation of the indigenous women.
In Australia both convicts and screws took aboriginal partners and by doing so created the false paradigm necessary for theft. The same thing happened here in NZ where the earliest settlers (from about 1820 onwards) took Maori wives frequently ‘forgetting’ they had another ‘back home’.
Almost invariably the women were the daughters of local clan chiefs, often high ranking chiefs, so the colonist was able to flit between leadership in the indigenous society to leadership within the colonist society, invariably ending up with control over vast tracts of land. This land was regarded by the indigenous people as being everyone’s, but held as the responsibility of the leader, while the white society regarded it as being the colonists personal property.
No guesses as to which perception won out in the end.
But even more invidious is the blatant sexual exploitation of the colonised group. This frequently became trans-generational exploitation. I live very close to a community which was one of the earliest settled by pakeha (non-Maori) people. The first settlers, if one can call them that, were whalers who, from time to time, would come ashore for ‘provisions’.
Those provisions included Maori women and children of either sex. The position of ‘cabin boy’ on a ship at sea for months even years, was not an enviable one, actually rather similar to being a young male thrown into a prison full of hardened crims. Some local indigenous families around here still struggle with trans-generational sex-abuse and incest, nearly 200 years later.
Studies have shown that a substantial percentage of the most intractable haapu (extended families) those with seemingly unending victim/perpetrator cycles of abuse, originate from those areas first visited by whalers and ‘trading’ vessels.
This is probably the angle which african american leaders from groups such as Black Beauty are coming from. Who can blame them? As well as imagining that all urban poor african american citizens are drug dealers and therefore bailing them up by visiting these communities demanding narcotics from any black citizen who will speak with them, some white amerikans also consider most young african american women to be sex workers.
Young women (many still children) are bailed up by horny old white men as they walk home from school. While that sort of pressure can incite pride and determination to fight the stereotype in those with self-esteem in has the oposite effect on vulnerable young women.
Of course we are speaking in generalisations here and that is the problem. I watched a documentary a few days ago on a young Irsihman who jumped ship in the north of NZ about 1820. He married a chief’s daughter and they were gifted about 40,000 acres of land, for his family (something like 10 or 12 children) was a large one. He advised his iwi (Maori tribe) against signing the Treaty of Waitangi (NZ’s founding document, a treaty between Maori and the pakeha Queen Victoria signed in 1840). By the mid 1850’s the local pakeha were ignoring the strict conditions set out for land acquisition by the treaty and were accusing Maori of various ‘crimes’ then confiscating their land as punishment. This Irish Maori was accused of some made up crime or another and his 40,000 acres were confiscated along with the rest of the iwi’s land. Rather like the Palestinians, they were simply driven off their land, and other Maori from other iwi were expected to take them in.
There are close to 3000 descendants of that early settler living in northern NZ today and a number are leaders in the Maori community. Their Irish heritage means a great deal to them.
In other words, not all of the relationships between pakeha men and Maori women were exploitative. Probably the majority were, but a substantial minority were not, and given that some of those that were not exploitative, were of great assistance to Maori people, this issue is too complex to be resolved with a simplistic stricture.
If Black Beauty’s membership have an interest in preventing the exploitation of african american women, they would be more effective if they educated african american women to all the different motives behind white amerikan males’ interest in them, so that an accurate assessment can be made on a case by case basis.
Yeah, I know that sounds cold, but in practice it wouldn’t be any different that any of the other mental check lists humans run through whilst assessing another person’s viability as a sexual/relationship partner.
Of course that may be exactly what Black Beauty are doing, but the white dominated media has chosen to portray it differently to crank up the old fear and hatred.

Posted by: Debs is dead | Jul 2 2008 22:51 utc | 7

yes he did,
nice post though
There were once “No Irish” signs in this town

Posted by: jcairo | Jul 2 2008 23:08 utc | 9

The Caterpillar event today reminded me of something I meant to write about a while ago. In April I was flying back from a business trip in Seattle. I had this wonderful conversation with the guy sitting next to me, an insurance actuary. We talked about everything, from how bad the economy was to the sorry state of the government, but mostly about our kids. He said he had a few but one had died. We continued to talk about how, even though we each fell into our jobs and plugged away year after year, we could have satisfaction in knowing are kids were strong and headed in the right direction. I made some crack about living vicariously through them. Just before the end of the flight he told me he was going to read his daughter’s book at an event in Berkeley. I had been speaking to Rachel Corrie’s father. Embarrassingly, all I could do was to shake his hand and tell him how proud I was to meet him. Instead of just keeping tally sheets and playing Stratego, we need to see the people whose lives are destroyed by this death spiral.

Posted by: biklett | Jul 3 2008 0:10 utc | 11

the hustlers will find each other regardless of race, gender, religion or culture, And the righteous will find each other regardless of race, gender, religion or culture.
And thats pretty much all we are working with.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Jul 3 2008 1:17 utc | 13

i’m going to just say this: race issues will continue to get played up because race is one of the most effective divide and conquer divides we humans are plagued with.
say, for the sake of argument, you are a member of the “global elite” and therefore see the masses as the scariest threat to maintaining control of your kingdom. you might perceive the flood of immigrants in Europe from the imperial wars you’ve instigated as a beneficial side effect, inflating population centers so you can stoke them later with staged provocations to exacerbate racial or ethnic tensions. not saying it’s a plot, just a nice effect if your goal is to make sure the masses keep fighting amongst each other instead of banding together against the real enemies who can, and will, influence events at a global scale no matter the casualties.
that dangerous line of thinking gets so mucked up with eugenics rhetoric and bloodline/jewish conspiracy voodoo spells it’s virtually impossible to intelligently navigate, and i’m certainly not going to attempt any deep explorations off the cuff here. I’ll just state, for the record, regarding the breeding of dogs, i find mix breeds to be generally healthier, smarter, more attractive dogs, while many pure breds i’ve met are stupid, neurotic, disease prone creatures.

Posted by: Lizard | Jul 3 2008 6:34 utc | 15

Just remember folks: a toy poodle is an inbred wolf, the product of planned inbreeding just like Prince Charles and the little big eared boy playing the banjo in the old Deliverance movie. All my dogs are mixed breed dogs. They are evil and cunning and I can only go to work with their permission. But on a serious side, one of the most beautiful people I know is part black, Chinese, Indian, Native America, Caucasian and Polynesian. That’s the future. How many generations will it take? That’s it for now. If I write anymore the Anti-Assimilation Police will be at my door.

Posted by: Diogenes | Jul 3 2008 12:04 utc | 17

I do not believe this to be true. Such disbelief is caused by the absurdity of it all, coupled with a total absence of reference to any authority in support of the claim. There is not a single individual claimed to be involved with this scheme identified by name.
Assuming it is based on fact, then the hometown I remember as Gary has become as racist in 2008 as the blacks claimed it was prior to 1968. If that be true, it only shows that racism knows no color!

Posted by: D. Yaros | Jul 3 2008 13:47 utc | 19

assuming the truthiness of the original post, what exactly is the connection between the actions of 17th/18th century Britishers in @7 and the motives of kids in present day Gary?

Posted by: jcairo | Jul 3 2008 14:05 utc | 21

b, it’s just a testament to the quality of your satire…

Posted by: Tantalus | Jul 3 2008 17:03 utc | 23

The problem isn’t race, nor gender, the problem is power…

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Jul 4 2008 1:20 utc | 25

What about Michael Jackson, a native of Gary, Indiana? Will he be allowed to date black women from Gary?
But seriously, folks, I grew up in Gary, and since my widowed mother could not afford to follow the white flight to the suburbs in the late 60’s, we remained there as the only white family on the block.
And it did seriously diminish my dating plans…

Posted by: ralphieboy | Jul 4 2008 15:13 utc | 27