Posted By:
warshawlawThere is a part of the book where Clem Labine is minimizing a racist insult to Jackie Robinson by saying that he would not be that offended if some guy on the other team had called him a French-Canadian **** (rather than calling JR a black ****), and someone pointed out to him that they don't lynch French-Canadian ****s. In other words, some things said to some folks are just more subject to criticism than similar things said to others because of the history they carry, and that's just a sad residue of centuries of racism and bad behavior. Members of many minority groups are hyper-vigilant as to any signs of bigotry because we've all learned that once discrimination gets rolling, it inevitably sucks in all minorities (like Chris Rock said about tolerating immigrant-bashing: "Next comes the blacks and the Jews; that train's never late"). For those who consider the Jewish collectors who responded angrily to this post to be overly sensitive, there are a lot of things I would like to say about whiny white boys feeling oppressed, but this isn't the time or the place to get into it. Suffice it to say that you have to walk a bit in their shoes first before you can understand how an ambiguous comment like this one can trigger a seemingly out of proportion response. Maybe the Robinson example will give you some ideas in that regard. It just wasn't that long ago in this country that signs reading no negroes, Jews or dogs were posted.
My take on the post, for what little it is worth is that it was just a not very clever effort to make fun of the Jewish players post, but I can see where it could be interpreted as a backhanded anti-semitic comment to the effect that those who collect cards of Jewish ballplayers are being "too Jewish" about their collecting [Blazing Saddles: TAGGART: "I know; we'll kill the first born male child in each household." LAMAR: [shaking head] "Too Jewish"). What I don't think the post was meant to be was a serious question about Sudanese players. I also don't think the Darfur situation or racism against blacks played into it at all.
I applaud Leon for allowing this post to stay up. Censorship isn't the answer except for obscenity and totally off-topic stuff.