Bad Jokes & Ebonics

[doktor at primenet.com]

The motivation behind any speech or publication is relevant to determining
whether that speech is racist.  The word "nigger," for example, is hate
speech on the lips of a Klan member, but may not be when spoken by an
African-American.  The act of reprinting the speeches of Adolph Hitler
could mean very different things, depending on whether it was done by the
White Aryan Resistance or by a scholar looking to document the evils of the
Third Reich.  Obviously, I have no truck with the Derrida/Lacan/Foucault
school of literary criticism which holds that the only focus of critical
attention is the text, the whole text and nothing but the text.

The "Ebonics" Lord's Prayer is nothing more than a "translation" of a
well-known text into an ethnic ideolect.  I have heard some form of this
(attempted?) humor used by black, jewish and Italian comedians.  Whether
these "translations" work as comedy depends upon how outrageous and melodic
they are.  When held to this lens, the Ebonics prayer is only mildly
amusing, if that.

I myself have never arrived at a comfortable, consistent position on humor
that makes fun of a particular ethnic/religious/sexual group's way of
speaking.  At times it makes me angry and uncomfortable; at other times,
I've found myself vastly amused.  I suppose my reaction depends on both the
quality of the joke and whether I perceive the speaker as a mean-spirited
jerk or as a sympathetic character with a good ear.

It's hard to judge the motives of people you know only through e-mail.
>From his posts and his web page, I see nothing to suggest that Gary Elshaw
is a bigot; in fact, I sense quite the opposite.  The most telling post in
this regard was the one in which he preceived the criticism of him as
"flaming."  I haven't been in this lest very long, but I have yet to see
any of what I'd consider flaming--abusive invenctive lengthily and/or
repeatedly leveled at someone.  The fact that Gary was so stung by the
suggestion that he might be a racist suggests that he is a pretty sensitive
fellow.  Let's acquit him of this racism charge and move on.

Gary, remaining silent isn't the solution here.  Take a few more nips of
that bourbon you drink and wade back in.  The list would be poorer for your
absence.

--Jimmy