That's racist...

I have used the term "That's Racist" for almost anything. From someone saying they don't like chick flick movies, to someone actually being racist. Usually they are just being ignorant, sexist, classist, a vegetarian, a liberal, hating on handicapped people, or just disagreeing with me. By using that phrase I am not trying to weaken the severity of someone actually being racist. I just believe that phrase and that label is thrown around too much. I have seen racism as well as sexism, and a few other "isms" and in my heart I believe I have experience it. So I do know the difference, just think it is time for us to concentrate on being united and not so damn divided.

Very few people will argue that racism is not limited to a white man using race against a black man. I am not sure if I realized this as clearly as I did earlier today. I was listening to one of the comedy channels on my Sirius satellite radio, when I caught the middle of an interview of Gabriel Iglesias. If you have not guessed it already from the name he is Latino... He was talking about not dumbing down his comedy routine.  I am going to paraphrase here since I did not record word for word what he said... He realized that too many sub-cultures in America try to make their own little world and they are not able to see the big picture. I think he cited George Lopez as one who broke out, went mainstream and was successful throughout the world. He said, having your own Emmy's, own channels, own pageants, ect.. is only going to leave you exposed to your own people. He went on to say if you were a comedian and went to Europe or Australia and did Latino specific jokes that many Americans might understand, you could bomb outright. He also said its ok to make fun of our stereotypes (much like Carlos Mencia has said over and over) but to be successful you cannot alienate the people who are NOT LIKE YOU.

Since Mr. Iglesias is among the fasted growing population of the U.S. this is an interesting perspective. He does not come out and say everyone should assimilate, and I am not sure if that would be his position, but he is saying, you can't bitch and whine about the man keeping you down and not being able to succeed if you don't at least meet in the middle. Again - my words not his, but that is kind of what I got out of it.

I have had this idea too, but being a white male I am not really allowed to have that opinion. Seriously, if I come to the defense of a George Zimmerman I am a racist, if I like Run DMC I am a wanna be, if I say one of my best friends is black (or blue or yellow, or purple) I am just patronizing. BUT to hear an Iglesias put it out there I got to thinking again.

Just a few minutes ago I was going through my news feeds, and ran across an article on one of my favorite actors. Samuel L Jackson. First of all to clarify. He is one of the few people who can make a living on having a foul mouth (or what I prefer to think as profan-poetry) yet sit down and talk on a variety of subjects and sound like he is educated on it. Maybe it is because he is and when he is acting, well he is ACTING. When not in front of a camera getting paid to be someone else he is a different person. So I was not surprised to find this article about Mr. Jackson basically sounding off that the President is "Fronting" i.e. trying to play to the masses and not being true to himself and his background. Read the article since I don't want to rehash it here. My whole point is, if someone else were to call the President out, they might be called a hater, or uncle tom, or racist ect... and I would say then that would be like me calling out someone who hates putting peanut butter on their waffles sexist...

P.S. Sidenote - here is a left leaning blog that has the same article to show I am being fair and balanced...

P.SS before you get any ideas I am copyrighting the word "profane-poetry" so please feel free to use it but give credit where due or I will sue you