"my brown self" DISCRIMINATION OVERSTATED, SAYS NEW COMMISSION CHAIR:

[rodeodance]

"http://www.americanprogressaction.org/site/pp.asp?c=klLWJcP7H&b=269754"


DISCRIMINATION OVERSTATED, SAYS NEW COMMISSION CHAIR: President Bush last week reshuffled the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights after declining to reappoint chair-woman Mary Frances Berry, "who has criticized Mr. Bush's civil rights record and earned a reputation for combativeness in nearly 25 years at the commission." The new chairman, Gerald A. Reynolds, is a conservative African American lawyer from Kansas City and a former employee of two conservative think-tanks in Washington.

[msgadget]

1. So, I guess there'll be no help for systematic discrimination

It's one thing to pat one's self on the back for pushing forward but it's a whole other thing to dismiss discrimination so airily, as if it deserves no acknowledgment.

>"I just assume somewhere in my life some knucklehead has looked at me and my brown self and said that they have given me less or denied me an opportunity," said the chairman, Gerald A. Reynolds, 41, an African-American lawyer. "But the bottom line is, and my wife will attest to this, I am so insensitive that I probably didn't notice."<

[rodeodance]

4. Middle easten peoples as Brown and Afro-Americans as Black

Perhaps I am out of the loop was was suprized to hear him refer to

himself as a 'brown self" while the article text referrs to the new leader of civil rights as Black conservative.

[msgadget]

5. Very telling, I hadn't even noticed that before

and it makes his viewpoint a little worse. The right, by embracing people of color to advance their vision, is working to remove the issue of race completely.

[pinerow]

2. And so it goes....

As Lady Day sang in one of her songs..."mama may have, papa may have, but god bless the child who's got his own"

[Logansquare]

3. I mean, look at Oprah and Michael Jorden

They drive fancy cars and get good seats in restaurants, so let's not go around overstating discrimination! </sarcasm>

[Niccolo_Macchiavelli]

6. perhaps he was referring to his political color (eom)

eom

[rodeodance]

7. tell me what you mean by "political color" please.

[Niccolo_Macchiavelli]

8. it's an european term

at least in german speaking parts

as example

red-> socialist
blue-> christian something (A) OR liberal (CH)
green-> enviromentalist
black->nationals

largely depends on party colors as well

brown is usually used for fascist/nazi/ultranationalists/überauthoritarian factions

[rodeodance]

9. Thanks--but somehow I do not think that is how he was using the term.

Just my gut feeling.