What a Difference ATTITUDE Can Make!

A humorous comparison

By now everyone’s heard of Oprah Winfrey’s outrage over a “racist” Swiss store clerk, who, not recognizing her, refused to show her a $38,000 handbag, exclaiming “No expensive, it’s too expensive!”

According to Ms Winfrey, she asked a clerk to see a $38,000 Tom Ford bag behind a glass case, but “she says, ‘No, it’s too expensive.’

“She said, ‘No, no, no you want to see this one because that one will cost too much,” Winfrey recalled, with the clerk adding, “You won’t be able to afford that one.’

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“She refused to get it…said Winfrey, then added ‘I don’t want to hurt your feelings,’ and I said,‘Okay, thank you so much, you’re probably right I can’t afford it.’ Now why does she do that?”

Indeed WHY would anyone not be willing to rake in a sale on a $38,000 handbag?! The store owner has claimed it came down to confusion over the clerk’s incomplete command of English. The clerk has said she only meant to offer her other choices of similar bags that cost less…something she claims to do for everyone.

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Store owner Trudie Goetz publicly defended her employee, telling Reuters, “This is an absolute classic misunderstanding” possibly caused by the clerk’s imperfect command of English.”

When asked by the Swiss newspaper what should would say to Winfrey if she had the chance to talk to her again, the clerk responded: “I would apologize and say it was all a misunderstanding.” (http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/gossip/oprah-account-racism-switzerland-true-shop-clerk-article-1.1424327).

That perceived slight is, to Oprah Winfrey, a sure-fired bit of “racism,” after all, according to her own account “What else could it be?”

Funny story, a very similar thing happened to another big media star, albeit with a very different result.

A New York City hotel kicked out one of the stars of “Duck Dynasty” after an employee mistook him for a homeless man.

Appearing along with his family on “Live with Kelly and Michael” Wednesday morning, Jase Robertson described the incident.

“The first thing that happened to me at the hotel was I got escorted out,” Robertson said, joking that it was a “facial-profiling deal.” Robertson said that the hotel employee simply didn’t know who he was.

“I asked where the bathroom was and he said, ‘Right this way, sir.’ He was very nice,”Robertson explained. “He walked me outside, pointed down the road and said, ‘Good luck.’”

Robertson continued, “So I circled back around and my wife said, ‘What happened?’ and I just said I just got kicked out.”

Robertson took it in stride and didn’t blame the employee for the incident. Robertson continued to stay at the hotel despite the incident.

(http://houston.cbslocal.com/2013/08/15/nyc-hotel-kicks-out-duck-dynasty-star-after-confusing-him-for-homeless-man/)

This would be funny if it weren’t so tragic. America has built up a massive grievance industry that actively encourages blacks and some others to blame everything bad in their lives on “racism.”

A person who believe they’re “poor because of racism,” proves that it’s behaviors, like the lack of skills, especially a lack of cognitive skills (a/k/a “stupidity”) that causes poverty, not misfortune.

Ironically enough that attitude itself (looking outward to blame others for our problems) amounts to a huge disadvantage to those who embrace it.

The ONLY way to change your circumstances is to improve yourself and if you blame your misfortunes on others and outside forces, you’ll never look inward to improve.

A Call for Lawlessness?

Capt. Paul Washington recently commented on the NYPD’s “Stop & Frisk” operations saying, "When the mayor is so happy to give felony convictions through these stop-and-frisks, your chances of getting this job (FDNY firefighter) are even slimmer."

Is Capt Washington actually making the argument that a black person walking down the street with an illegal gun is any less a threat, any less deserving of a felony rap than, say, Marc Ringel, whom police arrested with a veritable arsenal of weapons and marijuana in his parent’s Long Island home? (SEE: http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Police-Marijuana-Greenhouse-Weapons-Arsenal-Long-Island-Marc-Ringel-141768183.html)

 

Is THAT the argument that Capt Washington would make? THAT neither Marc Ringel, nor a black teen walking down a South Bronx street with an illegal weapon deserve felony charges?

REALLY?!

None of that should be surprising considering that Capt. Washington and the FDNY Vulcan Society’s lawsuit against the FDNY’s entrance exam process is based entirely on the very flawed legal construct of “disparate impact.” The very SAME construct that triggered and exacerbated the mortgage meltdown of 2008...a crisis that we're STILL dealing with.

A tremendous amount of harm has been done with “disparate impact.” Through the 1990s many U.S. banks were sued using that construct, by those claiming that, “traditional lending criteria had a disparate and negative impact on low income Americans.” As a result banks were forced to engage in risky “creative financing” and to abandon traditional lending criteria. This helped generate the mortgage meltdown and the subsequent credit crisis we are still dealing with today. “Disparate impact” is NOT new. It’s been around a long time and it’s been used in a lot of cases.

The issue with the FDNY testing lawsuit isn’t the Vulcan Society’s challenging the entry process (it has every legal right to do that), but with the interpretations of a very liberal judge (Nicholas Garaufis) that has looked at a job (FDNY firefighter) that requires a minimum 12^th grade reading level (a H.S. diploma) giving exams set to a 7^th and 8^th grade reading level and finding that even that very LOW standard can be seen as “discriminatory.”

It also fails to look at the city workforce as a whole. The City of NY not only doesn’t have a history of discriminating against black applicants, black applicants are the most OVER-represented group in the city’s workforce and the primary reason why both Asians and Hispanics are so under-represented.

There are just 2 groups over-represented in the NYC public workforce, they are non-Latino blacks and non-Latino-whites. It turns out that non-Latino blacks are the ONLY ethnic group OVER-represented by more than 10% their numbers in NYC’s population.

According to a recent City Lights article, titled “The Whitest City Agencies,” non-Latino whites (35% of the city’s population) comprise 38% of the NYC workforce appx. 8.8% over-represented according to their proportion of the city’s population, while non-Latino blacks (23% of the city’s population) comprise 36% of the NYC workforce, appx. 57% over-represented according to their proportion of the city’s population! (SEE: http://www.citylimits.org/news/articles/4038/the-whitest-city-agencies)

Captain Washington’s own mantra that “The (FDNY) entire NYC workforce should mirror the population of New York City,” amounts to a call against the sizable OVER-representation of non-Latino blacks within New York City’s Municipal workforce.

His charge that the Bloomberg administration’s “Stop and Frisk” operations are racist” appears to amount to nothing less than a call for lawlessness and a call that would render the actions of folks like Marx Ringel non-prosecutable!

What’s All This About Race?

I get the impression from some folks that it seems I write more than a fair amount about race, even if most of the time it’s peripheral to my main points. That seems to make some folks a bit uncomfortable.

I suppose I do that because race/ethnicity remains a major issue in this country, probably far more than it should be. It's either that or I'm just a race-obsessed dipshit...I'll probably have to get back to you on that - it's a tough one.

At any rate, it seems that there are a number of people who are a might confused about the “facts of life” concerning race and other such matters, so I’ve decided to go over them right here, right now.

First of all, there have always been some whites who hate “other” people just because they ain’t like them. There’ve also always been some blacks who hate “other” people just because they ain’t like them.

What can I say? Life’s rough, grab a helmet. One of the more unsavory things about FREEDOM is that free people are free to like and dislike whomever they please for ANY reason, or NO reason at all. You can too, and I bet you do that all the time, even if you aren’t all that obvious about it. We all do it - we all often find it hard to explain why we like some folks and dislike others. The vast majority of us DON'T base such decisions on race, ehtnicity, religion, etc.But it's OK not to know why you like and dislike folks, it's called "freedom of association," and it's a wonderful thing, that is often misconstrued and attacked by people who naively consider themselves "freedom loving."

One thing I’ve never understood is why any reasonable, rational individual would care at all about what some trailer park, or housing project bigot has to say about them.

If you are one of those who cares about that, I’d say, “Get over yourself and don’t worry about it. In other words, go out there and get a life, they ain’t all that expensive, at least not near as much as you might think.”

To all those whites who say I “tend to sugar-coat things too much,” or I’m “not tough enough on black bigots,” and "I don't focus enough on black atrocities against whites," I can only say is that, “I vehemently disagree.” In fact, I disagree so much, that all I can really say is pretty much, “Go F*%k yourselves.”

And to those blacks who say that “I’ve got no business discussing race, since I’m white and all,” well, I vehemently disagree with that too. In fact, all I can say to that is, well, “Go F#*k yourselves too.”

Now, for all of you folks out there who don’t like my bluntness, please, by all means email me and I’ll invite you to my workplace where I will promptly and pleasantly whup your ass but good.

Now, IF you DO email me, please be aware of what your role is – YOU’RE the “ass-whuppEE,” and, of course, that would make ME the “ass-whuppER.”

I just want to be clear about what’s expected of you, that’s all.

If you email me and come to my workplace, I expect you to show up and say something like, “Hi, I’m a black/white bigot and I’m here to see you whup my ass.”

And speak up, after nearly a quarter century riding under a siren, my hearing ain’t what it once was. So, speak up and annunciate clearly and then I’ll know what you’re there for and I’ll commence to beating your ass the way an organ grinder’s monkey beats his drum...or his cymbals, or whatever, but either way, your ass will be beaten, please believe that. Oh yeah, and PLEASE, don't be a hard-ass, I HATE that, it makes my hands hurt!

Got it, get it...GOOD!

Oh yeah, and for your own sake, you probably want to keep this on “the QT,” or for you black folks, on “the DL.” You don’t want to spread around the fact that some broke down old fireman just whupped your ass but good, OK!
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Seriously though, this racial hypersensitivity is part of a broader personal hypsersensitivity that's a result of way too many of us taking ourselves waaaaay too seriously...and that's part of the even broader hyper-litigious society we live in, a place where way too many people mistakenly believe they have some non-existant right "not to be offended.

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What can I say about that, except, "Lighten up, Francis!"

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This has been a public service announcement. I’m just doing my part to increase the peace.