Thanks, sricki! You know, you're not the only one finding nice surprises like this. While my dad's NEVER been racist, he did have his doubts about Obama & his ability to win. Heck, he was for Hillary long before I came around!

But anyways, as soon as Hillary gave her endorsement speech on June 7, I saw an Obama bumper sticker on my dad's car. Life is good. ;-)

My neice and I were discussing child-rearing tonight, her son is about the age of my youngest daughter.  She is a very diligent parent (post-new-age?) trying to foster all the right things for him, while as much as I may try the same overall approach I lean more towards the "help them realize the consequences of bad decisions" side of things.  We were conversationally noodling around that fine line and agreed that "just demonstrating how to be wrong" is in itself sometimes a pretty great lesson.

Historians may, ironically, be able to correctly point back to Junior as being the catalyst that brought the country together.

Sometimes being very wrong in public is a good thing...

-chris

He's a one man 'great depression.'

You know, in a weird way, Shrub made all of the right conditions possible for this kind of seismic shift.

The one good thing that's come out of the Bush-Cheney years: They've been the best recruiting tools for Democrats! :-D

I'm too tired to write anything substantive. I'm just glad you didn't say this diary was a turd sandwich. That's high enough praise for me. ;)

Funeral and the aftermath took forever, and I was in and out of town looking for apartments. Found one, though! Moving Aug 2nd!

I think racism stems from "fear of the unknown". People who look different are "unknown" and therefore frightening. Or it could be as I said in my last diary -- it's a need to look down on someone to bolster oneself. It all comes from insecurity in one form or another, IMO.

Read it again. Your take on sricki's reasoning is incorrect.
Where did she say that the person in question was not a racist? In fact, the title of the diary is 'Even The Racists Will Vote For Him'....clearly making the point that diary was about a racist.

Based on YOUR comment, had Hillary won....and the diary were about you...it would be titled 'Even The Misogynists Will Vote For Her'.

You're bothered because I used vulgar language and quoted her calling Obama a "nigger"? I see no need to mince words -- racism is ugly and there's no hiding it -- but I put it in quotation marks for a reason.

I think you've mistaking my reasoning for something entirely unrelated. She isn't voting for Obama because she had drunken sex with a black man. She's voting for him IN SPITE of her bigotry because she knows it's the right thing to do.

Your sig makes ME jealous !!!

You and spaceman and I have the best sigs on this site. There's no question of it. It's something to take great pride in!

Proof that gotcha moments are not only peddled by the media hacks. We have our very own fail on this blog.

into being a nit-picking, irritating nuisance.

She's never been mean to an African American, as far as I'm aware. She treats them. . .

[bolding, my emphasis]

Them? As in those different people from us over there, them?

So you would have preferred the word "us" which would erroneously give people the impression that I'm also an African America? We are all people, we are all human, we all have equal worth. However, to pretend that we don't have differences is foolish. It is human nature to categorize and make distinctions. If I had said this:

She's never been mean to an African American, as far as I'm aware. She treats us...

...the statement would have no longer made sense because I'm not AA. I'm white, and she feels differently about AAs than about whites. From her point of view, that's a fact, and my decision to relate that fact is not a slur or a slight against people of another race.

was thinking you should have been in a good position to judge, but bragging about your sleeping habits to affirm your non-racism was the last thing I was expecting and about the weakest of affirmations you could provide, I thought.

That isn't "bragging about my sleeping habits". For all you know, I've had two partners, one of whom was white, the other black. It wasn't a means of affirming my non-racism; it ws an attempt to illustrate why I can't understand someone close-minded enough to believe there was such a base reason to prefer one over the other.

Congratulations, though. You've just taken PC to an all new level. For the record, I think your parsing and you faux outrage is tacky way to make your insignificant, overblown argument.

I've rarely seen anyone so unnecessarily confrontational and high strung. Please double your dosage and call your physician in the morning.

Hi RickWn.

I don't think the pieces you cited are really cringe-worthy. Obviously, you're welcome to disagree but I'll lay out my thoughts on why anyway.

sricki has done something here which is often quite difficult. She has woven a personal tale into something political in a meaningful way. When a person involves a portion of their own life in something that relates to others, the result often borders on the profane. The boundaries blur. People can almost feel that the author speaks to them and touches a portion of their own lives. In short, it can hit close to home.

There is nothing racist in this diary. No use of them, no use or nigger, nothing. These are words and phrases that exist in all of our lives. The explicit personal nature of this story, both in racial and sexual implications, can make it seem almost dirty. That's a testament to the skill of the author, not the meaning, hidden or otherwise, of the words.

For the record, most everyone counts their sexual partners. It's pretty normal. I'll also point out that you quoted her line there but you missed the most important part of it. She said she was in no position to judge. It's right there at the end, even in your own quote. That sentiment is probably something we could all use a little more (or less) of.

Have a nice day. -j

I'm always worried about labels applied to people. Your friend behaved racist on several occasions, but she cannot be reduced to that.

Kudos, mojoed and I may just hunt down some of your other comments and randomly mojo you.

I understand the diarist's use of the term from a literary perspective, and while I wouldna done the same thing I'm glad there are folks who do-it makes a point folks can grok.

The subject of the diary is a person.  A person who has, perhaps forever, sustained a set of beliefs.  This person (noun - immutable) may at any time change her opinions (mutable).  In fact, she seems to have displayed that her voiced views are not as simple as they seem, and that they are evolving.

Good for her.

-chris

it would be better to simply say she's prejudiced. She's never unkind to anyone, despite her personal feelings. I wouldn't be friends with her if she didn't have so many other wonderful qualities. We've just learned to avoid certain topics, and we do fine.

I can't even begin to tell you how proud she made me last night.

Or Tiger Woods. Actually Obama needs to recruit a squad of sports types to support him. If he could get Tiger and the Williams sisters on board it would be sensational. Somehow sportsmen/women are a much harder target for wingnuts to hit than Hollwywood celebrities.

around folks I don't know. And I didn't know how else to explain exactly why it was so incomprehensible to me that my friend was upset about sleeping with an African American. It's just nothing out of the norm from my POV.

Maybe it came across as sluttier than I intended... huh. Oh well. I just consider myself open-minded, but I'll leave people to draw their own conclusions.

If so, I'm sorry it offends you. It offends me as well. I was quoting someone, and I decided not to sugarcoat it. Bigotry in all its forms is hideous, disgusting, and loathsome, but it's real. For the purposes of this diary, euphemisms were not required. They would have diluted the message and the point I was trying to make.