Sarah's Thoughts
Barack Obama is Lurking in Your Bushes!
It must be exhausting to spend every waking hour looking for the underlying racism that exists in every photo taken, word spoken and action made. What an all-consuming (and ridiculous) way to spend your time! “Racism spotting” is exactly the career path chosen by Orlando Patterson, a professor of Sociology (of course) at Harvard.
Dr. Patterson has an editorial in The New York Times today titled, “The Red Phone in Black and White”. You already knew that Senator Clinton’s 3:00am phone call was a play on our fears as well as completely unoriginal. But, did you also know that it is racist? I didn’t, either! Read this excerpt from Dr. Patterson and be enlightened:
I have spent my life studying the pictures and symbols of racism and slavery and when I saw the Clinton ad’s central image … it brought to my mind scenes from the past. The danger implicit in the phone ad — as I see it — is that the person answering the phone might be a black man, someone who could not be trusted to protect us from this threat.
Patterson also compares this ad to “Birth of a Nation” and believes that Clinton meant to imply that black men are “lurking in the bushes around white society”. The white mother is protecting her white children from the scary dangers just outside her door. How can a black man protect us when he is … one of them? That is what Patterson believes the racist voters of Texas were thinking when they viewed this ad.
Let me go ahead and make this clear. If there is a black man in my shrubbery (or a man of any color, for that matter), my first instinct will not be to make a late-night call to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. I do not expect my president to protect me from home intruders. I think that 911, combined with my husband’s gun, will be a much more effective remedy to diffusing the danger.
And, concerning the larger scale problem that Patterson implies, I trust a black man as much as a white man … or woman … to protect our country. I just don’t trust the specific black man and white woman running for president this year.
Walter Mondale did not mean to imply that Gary Hart was secretly a black man and therefore could not be trusted with our nation’s security. And, Hillary Clinton did not have racist intentions when she aired her version of the “phone call” ad in Texas. She just wanted to remind you that she has a lot of experience answering phone calls in the White House at 3:00am. Of course, she doesn’t remind us that the person on the other end was usually a girl who giggled, whispered “Oops, sorry!” and then quickly hung up.
Can we please focus on real issues of racism in our country instead of fabricating problems where they don’t exist? Crying racism in this instance is just plain silly.
March 11th, 2008 at 10:05 am
I’m not disagreeing with your basic stance, sister, but your post does a raise a question for me (I only saw clips of the Clinton ad, not the entire ad): are all the kids pictured sleeping in their beds white kids?
And p.s.: I will NEVER agree with you that having a gun in one’s home is a way to diffuse danger. But you know that. I’ll just keep saying it, though.
March 11th, 2008 at 12:54 pm
If there is an intruder in the home at night a gun may well be the only thing that can protect you. As many cases have shown, the police often will not arrive in time, even assuming the the homeowner can make that 911 call.
High quality training and regular practice in using the gun and keeping it away from children are critically important though.
March 11th, 2008 at 1:19 pm
Catherine, may I presume, then, that you have large “Gun-Free Zone” signs on and around your house? Wouldn’t want anyone to get the wrong idea would we? (And if a gun is too much, may I keep a baseball bat and/or a length of lead pipe next to my bed?)
March 11th, 2008 at 1:30 pm
This is the thinnest of thin gruel. Perhaps the kids and the housewife were white because Hillary was targeting her core constituency? Mr. Patterson apparently sees racial boogeymen wherever he goes: one has to wonder what goes through his mental prism when he sees a white cat on the cover of “Cat Fancy” Magazine.
March 11th, 2008 at 1:33 pm
I think we need to say what Sarah’s sister is really saying.
First, I don’t think she’s stating that guns in general don’t “diffuse danger”. If that was the case, it would make absolutely no sense for folks like policemen and the military to carry guns.
What Sarah’s sister is saying is that neither Sarah nor her husband are competent enough to be trusted with a gun — or at least a gun in their own home.
I would be curious is she thinks that policemen and military members should be allowed to have guns in their own homes, or does she feel that in those circumstances they still would not be sufficient to “diffuse danger”.
Or how about an armed security guard? Should a private citizen who fears for his life be allowed to have an off-duty policeman stand guard at their house? Would a gun work to “diffuse danger” under those circumstances?
March 11th, 2008 at 1:38 pm
OK, let’s pretend that the “3 a.m.” ad was referencing D.W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation. Why? Has anyone alive today actually seen Birth of a Nation? Anyone, that is, except:
(1) film-school geeks;
(2) anyone who saw Nickelodeon (1976), which included brief clips from Birth of a Nation in a theater scene; or,
(3) racial-grievance-studies majors.
What’s the point of a cultural reference so obscure that nobody in your target audience gets it?
March 11th, 2008 at 2:04 pm
What Patterson’s article says to me is that–surprise surprise–if you spend your time looking for racism everywhere, then that’s exactly what you’re going to find, whether or not it actually exists.
March 11th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
Speaking of “Black men lurking in the bushes,” does anybody here know why all the burglars in security company commercials are white guys? Is it because in real life, burglars are overwhelmingly white?
March 11th, 2008 at 2:31 pm
#8: True, but they are all ** dressed ** in black. Racist!
March 11th, 2008 at 2:53 pm
Well, let’s see, some 75% of American are white, they have 2 kids in the video…
One of them should have been partially ethnic?
Hilary’s message IS asinine. I fail to see how here sleeping with Bill on his slow days makes her qualified to be the leader of the USA!
If sleeping with Bill was a prereq for office, Monica could be Secretary of State!
Governorships, mayoralties: those can be seen as qualifications to run a country - not boinking (maybe) the Chief a few years back!
March 11th, 2008 at 4:15 pm
And where have all the White Male judges gone on TV shows and in movies? They’re now always a mix of female/multi-ethnic actors and actresses. What a visual cliche’!
March 11th, 2008 at 4:15 pm
Catherine, please listen to this 911 call of a woman under attack in her house:
http://xavierselfdefense.blogspot.com/2008/01/911-call.html
Do you think you would be better off without a gun in her position?
Please read this short article:
http://xavierselfdefense.blogspot.com/2008/03/encounter-at-wal-mart.html
Again, would you be better off without a gun?
Peace.
March 11th, 2008 at 4:23 pm
JorgXMcKie, I don’t live in a house. I live in an apartment.
Do most of the readers here live in the Tennessee or Nashville area? Do most of the readers here live in a house?
Maybe we just live in different realities. I have lived in New York City, in various apartments in the borough of Brooklyn, for almost nine years. Having lived in the city this long, I have quite a few friends whose homes have been broken into, and even a couple friends who have been held up at gunpoint. None of these friends owns a gun, and none has incurred any bodily harm.
In my years as a bartender in various bars and restaurants, I was acquaintances with a couple of young co-workers who were gang members.
I do not deny that there are guns in the world, and that many of them are in the hands of less-than-savory characters.
But, you know what, there are also plenty of cops I see walking the street, guns swinging from their hips, and I don’t feel better knowing that their fingers are so close to a loaded trigger.
One of my friends a couple years ago was held up at gunpoint by a young kid who was trembling and obviously nervous. The kid ended up running away without my friend’s wallet when a car pulled around the corner looking for a parking spot. If my friend had a gun on him, and had taken it out, I’m not sure I would have trusted his attacker not to freak out and shoot.
None of you are going to convince me that guns diffuse danger.
(And to open another can of worms…) Just like Sarah could not convince me several years ago that our country was safer since Bush was our president (I was aghast that she had voted to re-elect him). “Don’t you feel safer with him in office?” she asked. No, I didn’t. And I don’t. Maybe it’s easier to feel that way when you live MILES away from one of the biggest terrorist targets in the world. And I don’t.
Just tell me - how many first-hand or second-hand accounts do you guys have of people warding off attackers of their homes by brandishing a gun?
March 11th, 2008 at 4:43 pm
Catherine writes:
“are all the kids pictured sleeping in their beds white kids?”
Well, no. I honestly can’t remember the add too well but the good Dr. Patterson mentioned in his article some of them appear to be vaguely hispanic. I’m sure we will be hearing from the Hispanics Studies chair at Harvard any day now.
The larger point your sister is making here resonates with me. It’s something I’ve been saying since Bill got slimed with the racist bucket in South Carolina. Obama’s sense of racial outrage has a hair trigger. It’s a nice dodge if you think about it. All criticism is essentially racial. That kind of protective coating comes in handy. Especially if you’re running on a thin resume and lot of hope.
March 11th, 2008 at 4:46 pm
The Clinton administration estimated 1.5 million defensive gun uses per year. The number is likely higher.
According to the IP addresses, the commentors are from across the country. Sarah got linked by a blog that gets about 250,000 unique hits per day.
The question is not whether anyone should have guns - that doesn’t take into account reality. The real world question is whether good people should have guns, too.
March 11th, 2008 at 5:13 pm
Nathan, thank you for the IP information - I did think you guys had a pretty wide readership. That’s great.
But you’ve shared those gun statistics with me before…what I am interested in knowing is why those of you who advocate gun ownership are so passionate in your beliefs. Because of statistics? I am asking if anyone has personal experience that makes him/her believe that having a gun diffuses danger. I am curious how one’s environment plays a role in one’s beliefs, because most everyone I know in New York (yes, that is certainly only a small part of the population) has such a different stance than you.
March 11th, 2008 at 5:19 pm
Hi Catherine,
One should not draw their own gun unless they believe that they or another innocent person will be killed or severely injured. If that does not appear to be the case you should probably hand over your stuff and get away, whether you are armed or not.
There is no credible evidence (that I have come across yet) that shows that keeping guns out of the hands of non-criminals reduces crime. There is some evidence for the opposite however. John Lott and various others have summarized much of the research on this.
The number of self-defensive uses of guns is huge as Nathan mentioned above. It often does not get into the news however. Did you know that a large number of the most publicized mass murderers were stopped by armed private citizens?
That said I would not want everyone running around with guns either. I want only very mature and responsible people doing so. That seems to be the case since pistol permit holders have a much, much lower rate of crime than the general populace. When more states passed legal carry laws for non-criminal, non-mentally-ill adults, murder rates did not increase as some had feared.
Keith
March 11th, 2008 at 5:51 pm
Catherine said: what I am interested in knowing is why those of you who advocate gun ownership are so passionate in your beliefs. Because of statistics? I am asking if anyone has personal experience that makes him/her believe that having a gun diffuses danger. I am curious how one’s environment plays a role in one’s beliefs, because most everyone I know in New York (yes, that is certainly only a small part of the population) has such a different stance than you.
A fun little quote: “I don’t know how Richard Nixon could have won. I don’t know anybody who voted for him.” - The late film critic Pauline Kael’s reaction to Richard Nixon’s landslide victory over George McGovern (I believe she was an NYC resident).
Why do I have a concealed carry permit and sometimes carry?
1) A sense of personal responsibility for my own safety and that of my family.
2) The knowledge that sometimes bad things happen to good people and the desire to have some ability to cope if and when they happen. This is why I have smoke and CO monitors and a fire extinguisher in my house. Also why I have life insurance, don’t play in lightning storms, avoid known dangerous areas and behaviours, etc.
3) Knowing that the police are rarely present when a crime is being committed so one is truly on ones own.
4) As a general rule, I do not feel that I need to experience bad things, say, cancer or a car accident, personally, to want to protect myself from them if possible. I try to learn from others experiences, and, as a scientist I like evidence, including statistics. Those stats indicate that complying with a violent assailant or defending oneself without a pistol lead to greater chance of serious injury than defending oneself with a gun. That said, I was assaulted many years ago and I witnessed an even more brutal assault that permanently disfigured the victim, so there is some specific personal experience that figures into my decision.
Regarding urban vs. rural. My urban friends tend to be far less self-reliant in just about every aspect as compared to my rural friends. My urban friends for the most part have never even held a gun and are generally terrified of them. My rural friends are very familiar with guns and are very respectful but not terrified.
The passionate feelings are in part due to disagreeing with those who want to control everything we do, primarily based on their feelings rather than solid evidence. I think that adults should mostly be left alone to live their lives unless they harm others.
Keith
March 11th, 2008 at 5:52 pm
As a matter of fact, BJ Brown, who used to live here and ran for state representative in 2002 (and a valid permit holder), was able to defend himself from an armed carjacker. Usually one just has to show the weapon and crime is averted. In that case, BJ actually had to use it.
Of course, there is one less armed carjacker around today than there was eight years ago. But BJ is around, too.
March 11th, 2008 at 6:29 pm
On the issue of familiarity vs. fear: One of my kids was terrified of learning to drive. She was afraid that she would cause an accident. One of the things we discussed during that period was that even though cars are extremely dangerous as she correctly perceived, perhaps the most dangerous thing she will ever encounter, she had the ability to learn how to handle them in a safe manner. In the end it took familiarity with driving and confidence in her own ability to convert my daughter’s fear of cars into respect.
As much research has shown, people’s assessment of the actual risk of various things is way off. The number of accidental deaths in the US due to cars is between 30 and 40 thousand a year. If I recall correctly, the number of accidental deaths due to guns is very far down the list of causes of accidental death. For young children its fewer than the number of bath tub drownings I believe. The vast majority of gun related deaths are intentional (that is, occur during crimes), not accidental, and associated with drug-related crime. As the English have discovered, enacting draconian gun laws that remove most guns from private hands does not make anyone safer, except criminals, something they very much appreciate of course. Its interesting that the rate of violent crime in UK is now the highest in the developed world, higher than in US. Criminals when interviewed say that guns in the hands of civilians is a very substantial fear. This keeps the number of hot burglaries in the US far below the rate in UK. Hot burglaries you will recall are when the homeowner is at home - a very dangerous situation for the homeowner. Its also interesting to note that the rate of non-gun murders in some countries, Taiwan (at least during the 90’s) for example, is higher than the total murder rate in the US. One of the problems with disarming ordinary citizens is that criminals, with or without guns tend to be very tough. A gun is typically the only thing that gives an ordinary citizen half a chance.
Keith
March 11th, 2008 at 7:15 pm
About the issue of guns. I can see both sides of it because I grew up in Nevada where guns were part of the culture. Everyone I knew had a gun by the time we were about 10. Mostly we hunted ducks with shotguns but as we got older we all hunted deer and elk and owned more powerful rifles. Safety was stressed by the adults who taught us to hunt. If you were unsafe in any way while out hunting the adults would take your gun which was emasculating. You would be seen as a baby who couldn’t keep up with your peers. Not a pleasant experience for teenage boys trying to become men. That usually worked. Now, I live in NYC and the culture of the gun means something a whole lot different here. Guns in the hands of young men who do not have meaningful adult male role models are a recipe for violence. Young males are wild and adventurous and need to have older men around them who enforce some basic code of conduct. Sadly, that’s not just not how things are in some places. Guns are not the cause of violence but the do allow some people to cause enormous amounts of damage that they would not otherwise be able to do. I’m not sure what the answer is. I know that the two sides of this issue are way to simplistic in their positions. We shouldn’t think we can control what a responsible person does with his right to bear arms but we also shouldn’t think that the guns that end up being used by teenagers in drive bys ended up there by magic. There is a supply chain that runs from manufacturer to end user and in there somewhere is an unscrupulous seller. Not always, but more often than not.
March 11th, 2008 at 8:23 pm
hey Maybe this proffesors right and everyone in the united states is a closet racist. That’s why we have a black man who seriously looks like he could be president.
March 11th, 2008 at 9:14 pm
Catherine, guns are things that you never need until you do. Kind of like insurance.
I have lived all over the world. I have carried guns, I own guns, but I have never had to use one, other than on the range. I hope never to have to. But if the day, or night, comes when I need one, I have it.
March 11th, 2008 at 9:33 pm
Thank you, ny nick, I thought your post was very thoughtful and informative.
March 11th, 2008 at 10:23 pm
This reminds me of an article that suggested every time a man had sex with a woman was another example of male oppression. While it was invisible to most of us, the learned Women’s Studies PhDs were able to spot it and decry it for what it was. Every baby born was another indication of man’s tyranny over women. Oh! The humanity…
Great work if you can find it. Instead of doing actual work, I think I’d have a better life doing the “raising social consciousness” gig.
March 11th, 2008 at 10:39 pm
Hi Nick,
Good post. I’m also in NYC area and also came from the midwest, though from a relatively anti-gun family. I began doing some skeet and target shooting in my 20’s, but never hunted until my 40’s. I think you are very right about the culture and perception of guns in cities and about young men who do not have older men in their lives. On one point I disagree in part. While guns obviously make it easier to kill than having no weapon at all, I think its pretty clear that hardened criminals do rather well even without guns, especially when they are stronger or outnumber the victim. And as I noted above, the non-gun murder rate in Taiwan is higher than the total murder rate in the US. The other thing that occurs to me is that people who really want to do a lot of killing quickly often use bombs rather than guns, though guns are quite effective too, especially in gun-free zones where little or no resistance is possible. I have often wondered what proportion of criminals’ guns come from what sources. I’ll post if I can find any info on this.
Keith
March 11th, 2008 at 10:45 pm
Hi Catherine,
You said: “But, you know what, there are also plenty of cops I see walking the street, guns swinging from their hips, and I don’t feel better knowing that their fingers are so close to a loaded trigger.”
I’m not sure what you mean here. Can you explain a bit?
Thanks,
Keith
March 11th, 2008 at 11:12 pm
Hi Keith,
(note: the link below was the first one I found when I searched for this story - it’s not necessarily an endorsement or not of The Guardian).
I was thinking about the fact that, even though police officers are supposedly well-trained in the use of a gun, things like this still happen:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2006/nov/27/usa.julianborger
I am not referring to this story to discuss its racial aspects. I am referring to this story because I don’t understand the necessity of 50 bullets to kill, let alone subdue, one man.
I would say that it’s especially the young, new inexperienced cops with guns that make me nervous, but in this case, it was actually the senior officer who fired 31 of the shots.
Catherine
March 11th, 2008 at 11:37 pm
This was an awful incident. Surprisingly perhaps, quite a few cops, even old timers, are not particularly skilled with guns. I have trained with quite a few. Many are very devoted to practice and put in a lot of time, sometimes on their own dime. Others have very little interest and do the minimum that the department allows them to get by with. I don’t understand it, as it would seem to put ones own life in jeopardy, as well as everyone elses. Makes me nervous too.
By the way, I see from your one of your sister’s posts that you are a folkie in NYC. This is my kind of music. Do you listen to WFUV - its my favorite station of all time.
Keith
March 12th, 2008 at 8:04 am
I once heard this example of the way a child thinks,
If it’s mine , it’s mine. If I think it’s mine, it’s mine. If want it to be mine , it’s mine. If no one else is looking at it, it’s mine. and so on.
This is how some people see racism, simply replace the word “mine” with “racism” It may have nothing to do with reality, just perception. If more of one race are in jails, it’s not racism, it’s who commits the most crime. I saw an article recently about teen girls and STD’s. 25% of them have or have had an STD. The article went on to say that the rate of 40% of teen black girls have or had STD’s. I expect to hear mental giants, like Sarah intially mentioned, to blame this on racism, instead of personal responsibility. People seems to look at the world through racism colored glasses, just to see what they want to see. Sure, there has been, is, and will continues to be racism around our world. I want to let you in on something, there will always be. Check the history of mankind, it has not changed very much in the past 8 or 10 thousand years. We just seem to be a bit nicer and quieter about it in present history, at least in some parts of the world. If we are unable to do anything, it must be the MAN holding me down, black man, white man, corporate man, government man, boss man, old man, rich man , etc. In reality, it’s time for all of us to look at what the problem really is, it’s easier to blame someone or something else instead of taking personal responsibility for our life. This applies to guns, work, education, or racism. There are countries where you cannot improve your lot in life very much, this is not one of them. The example of the man Sarah gave inially is someone “selling” discord for a living, like plowing a field and planting weeds, not really very productive.
March 12th, 2008 at 4:26 pm
Hi Keith,
Calling myself a “folkie” would be a bit of a stretch - my music tends more towards indie/experimental rock/pop. But thank you for the station suggestion - I’ll definitely check it out. I rarely move the dial away from WNYC.
Catherine