*applauds*

Sir, I congratulate you on your eloquence, sensitivity and above all, the mahoosive balls it takes to write a post regarding an opinion on racial stereotypes.

Every brilliantly written word of your post is either a) Correct, or b) Your opinion which you are completely entitled to.

You don’t deserve any flaming - I’ve lost count of the amount of times people slag off America on this site, and you patiently put-up with the ill-educated bilge-buckets with such dignity that it makes me proud to have met you (and drunkenly talk to you on the phone once)

Keep your pecker up TRL!

One other thing – the mention of the ‘N’ word reminds me of the classic Viz Letter:

“How is it that when ‘ICE-T’ uses the ‘N’-word on a song he gets a million dollars and a MOBY award, yet when I used it at my 8 year old son’s football game I was asked to leave the sidelines!

Bloody double standards eh?”
( Pooflake braces for an onslaught..., Fri 17 Oct 2008, 16:27, 1 reply)

Thank you.
In truth, last night I was very angry at having been basically called a racist in here for some of the things I posted yesterday. I'm not racist. I have no issues at all with people whose ethnicity is different from mine, and whose skin color and hair texture is not like mine- in fact, like many men I have a bit of a weakness for exotic looking ladies. So it really ground on me to be called a racist- but at the same time, I understood why they were saying it. I knew that the problem was that I wasn't expressing myself clearly enough.

So this morning as I was showering and brushing my teeth I was thinking long and hard about how to get the real point across, that it wasn't so much a racial thing as a cultural thing. That's when it hit me- American culture and sub-cultures are different from English ones, so the terms I was using to express myself were not translating properly. Another American would have understood, but the English wouldn't.

This also triggered me thinking about the question itself. I read what Chickenlady posted about it and how angry it was making her, and while I understood her point I could feel that there was something else going on here besides feeling smug about being "better" than poorer people. I've known- and fallen in love with- people who come from much poorer backgrounds than mine who I liked and respected, even if they weren't the most refined people I've known. At the same time I don't have any use for people who flash their bling and make a big show of demanding "only the best" when they're clearly not used to it- so did this make me an elitist? And that's when it hit me that again it's a cultural issue.

Doubtless there are others who have delved far more deeply into this than I have and have expressed it more eloquently and in more detail than I have, but in my case I was merely defending my positions and trying to give people something to think about.

Anyway- if you ever get over here, the first night's beer is on me!
( The Resident Loon Not a demographic. Do not measure., Fri 17 Oct 2008, 16:42, closed)