About Rep. McKinney ... our reactions are instructive

Shark Fu at Angry Black Bitch and Erin Aubry Kaplan of the Los Angeles Times (and formerly the LA Weekly) both said it better than I ever could.

Ms. Kaplan's column is entitled "Going ghetto: Last week, Cynthia McKinney's big hair collided with racism that never dies."

Shark Fu's blog entry is "Uppity..." I dare you to read them.

Update: 4/16/06

Left my own little mini-post at Shark Fu's blog, so will share here too:

Until there is innoculation for the virulent virus of racism (sexism, homophobia, theocratic intolerance ... and other forms of bigotry), I regret to say that so many (okay most, not all, just a whole damned LOTS) of my brother & sister white folks continue to have few insights into the irrational, emotional, hate-filled, punitive, over-the-top reactions and the 'law & order must be maintained at all costs...(except when we're the perpetrators)" rationalizations which erupted over Rep. McKinney's not-exactly-brilliant, unfortunate actions -- gee though in the context of what elected officials have been doing forever -- forget the recent lawbreaking of the mega-million-bucks Abramoff - Delay - Cheney/Halliburton/botched Iraq kind...

Focusing on Rep. McKinney (much to the glee of the repugs) sure offered a convenient distraction from far more consequential misbehaviors among the electorati and power holders (remember Enron, Kenny "pro-Bush" Lay, Tom 'bug-killer' DeLay, Scooter 'just-following-orders' Libby, Leaker in Chief 'just following Cheney's orders' Bush-boy ? ... the list goes on and on and on ...)

So talk about a failure to put things in context or the proverbial 'mountain out of a molehill' emotional outbursts... I believe it tells us much more about the state of (whites created it, we should own it) racism in our less than ideal republic.

Sigh...I believe the expression is: Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. I don't know of any community that doesn't have work to do on their 'issues' -- but what's that other saying: with great power comes great responsibility -- and who has the most power in our society/nation/predominant culture?

I say, "more power to the people" and the sooner the better while we're at it. And since my responsibility to social/political/economic etc justice necessarily involves dealing with the challenge of challenging my own community first and foremost (never-ending work, I might add)....

I remain yours in (a weary and 'still I rise' determined) solidarity,

Buzzzed