SLSL 'Low-lands' racism?

[The Great Quail]

Jbor writes,

> A Negro dump watchman in a pork-pie hat who is a bigamist
> and an alcoholic is a particularly condescending and offensive stereotype.

It's also fairly believable. People who serve as night watchmen in dumps are
not, generally speaking, representative of the mid-to-upper class. In my
experience as a janitor, working my way through college, and as a
construction worker on night-shift at a coal plant, I can assure you that
the only thing odd about Bolingbroke is his name. To say that it is
condescending and offensive is to imply that Pynchon generalizes that *all*
black Americans are bigamists, alcoholics, feckless wanderers, and pork-pie
hat wearers. (Oddly, I frequently wear a pork-pie hat, and I have been
finding all this antihaberdasherist talk rather amusing.) He does not; no
more than he generalizes that all Italian Americans are garbage-haulers, all
white communication officers are slacking Peter Pans, and all white sailors
are like Pig Bodine.

I really, honestly, truly do not see the racism here. Mild stereotyping as
*characters*, perhaps, but no racism. Again, when I was a night-shift
construction worker, I saw all types of, well, stereotypical behavior from
blacks, whites, Hispanics, you name it. In fact, I think Bolingbroke is
rather sympathetically drawn.

So, I still am in disagreement with my esteemed and respected colleagues Rob
and Terrence; but I've said enough, and will move off the topic. The
character that really grabs my interest is Nerissa....

Good night,

--Quail, a little worried that Rob finds Pig "normal." ;-)