You've GOT to be kidding.
Some guy who may have had a criminal record, and may have resisted arrest, dies in Minnesota thanks to one lousy cop (and a few standby cops who didn't do anything) and the ENTIRE world goes nuts. There is, of course, tremendous looting in America, and since Covid-19 means nobody can go to a bar or a ball game, people decide to ignore distancing and have a nice social protest every day for weeks.
The World Trade Center is demolished, ISIS blows shit up, and it's "don't blame the Muslims for a few radicals." In England, a little girl is stabbed in front of her father, and a soldier is beheaded on the street and..."don't blame all immigrants because of a few." But a few cops go way too far, and we actually hear that ALL cops should be fired, there should be NO police force, and...oh, by the way, we're putting hundreds of people out of work because we don't like reality shows about the police anymore! Cancel those shows!!"
This is almost satire. This is almost laughable. It isn't too far from a black comedy (excuse the term) like "Day of the Locusts."
How much more ludicrous does it get? Oh. You ain't seen nothin' yet...
Yesterday's news, said that Pepsi (purveyors of brown-colored soda dangerously sugary and diabetes-producing) has a CONSCIENCE. They are POLITICALLY CORRECT. Having modernized the "Aunt Jemima" logo years and years ago, now, NOW, NOW that there has been a lot of RIOTS and LOOTING that cause a lot of fear and financial loss...lets NOT take chances. CANCEL AUNT JEMIMA.
Yes, our "CANCEL" culture...borne of Twitter (where a few thousand nitwits can pressure people to do almost anything)...has led to people being fired, people resigning, and people hiding under their beds like it's Salem Massachusetts or the McCarthy era. SAY THE WRONG THING and YOUR LIFE IS OVER.
BOYCOTT! POINT THE FINGER! GET THE PITCHFORKS! BRING OUT THE MOB!
Where was I? Oh, let's throw in the Liberal Media (sorry, that Phil Ochs song is sounding MORE AND MORE appealing to me every day). Let's hear it, Liberals...getting all righteous about pancake syrup and breakfast cereal IS the right way to handle Civil Unrest:
FINALLY! FINALLY!
Yes, it took the death of George Floyd the Martyr to get people to understand how awful AUNT JEMIMA's FACE is.
THIS FACE:
I don't get it. Does she look any different from Oprah? From Maya Angelou? Aunt Jemima looks like a proud woman who owns her own company. She could have her own talk show like Gayle King. She KNOWS why the caged bird sings, and she KNOWS that you don't turn over the pancake until the top is bubbling.
As for Mrs. Butterworths, who the HELL could even SEE this woman's features? She's full of syrup! It seemed like the company was trying to present TV ads that encouraged blacks to be glad ANY black people were being used as mascots. Mrs. Butterworth is a disgrace as a mascot? Compared to what, the mascot for the Cleveland Indians? The Washington Redskins? The Atlanta Braves?
Frankly, I never even knew Mrs. Butterworth was black. Or brown. If you filled the container with milk, she'd look white? I have no idea, because...I never bought this product, and I NEVER THOUGHT ABOUT SUCH STUPID SHIT.
Now, how about the Cream of Wheat guy, and Uncle Ben?
What am I missing? The current logos for Cream of Wheat (which I haven't eaten since I was 12) and Uncle Ben (the only product of the four that I have tasted in the past 30 years) look fine to me. They look like older black guys you might see on the street.
Don't they reflect the truth? How different do these two guys look, compared to Ben Carson? And if we are going to get upset about Uncle Ben, do we start pulling jazz CDs from the shelves on Louis Armstrong or Clark Terry? Do we start snipping any subservient black from any movie, including Dooley Wilson in "Casablanca?" When does this BLACK COMEDY end?
As I said up top, quoting Steve Allen, COMEDY is TRAGEDY PLUS TIME. Well, the tragedy of George Floyd and the time it took to start looting and protesting, has yielded the comedy of this pathetic over-reaction. Right, right, this changes the world: no more Aunt Jemima.
Do you replace UNCLE BEN with...Malcolm X? Do you NOT use anyone at all, black or white? Do you put an ASIAN on the box, since RICE originated in ASIA? (Or did it, I'm not up on revisionist history).
Speaking of revisionist history, we're being told it's NOT just the PHOTOS. As the Liberals search for reasons why they should be loved, and why their homes should not be looted, they write THIS:
"Uncle Ben’s rice, which uses the image of an elderly Black man (previously dressed in a bow tie evocative of servants and Pullman porters, per the New York Times) on its packaging, has been criticized for both the image and the use of “uncle” in the name, as white Southerners once used “uncle” and “boy” to refer to Black men because they refused to call them “Mr.” Mars Inc., Uncle Ben’s parent company, said that “now is the right time to evolve the Uncle Ben’s brand, including its visual brand identity, which we will do,” the Washington Post reports.
Cream of Wheat similarly uses an image of a smiling Black man that was formerly named Rastus — a pejorative term for Black men and a frequent character in minstrel shows — and previously depicted as barely literate. The porridge brand’s parent company B & G said that it is launching an “immediate review” of the image and the packaging, which was updated in 1925 to instead depict Chicago chef Frank L. White.
Mrs. Butterworth’s signature syrup bottle was intended to look like the image of “a loving grandmother,” per parent company ConAgra, but it has been criticized for its resemblance to the racist mammy caricature. According to the Post, the bottle’s shape was “believed to be created using as a model the black actress Thelma ‘Butterfly’ McQueen, who played Prissy in the 1939 film ‘Gone with the Wind.’” ConAgra announced that it has begun “a complete brand and packaging review” of Mrs. Butterworth’s.
May I point out how demeaning "WHITE BREAD" is for white people? Wonderbread is no wonder. Most white bread is stripped of all nutrition, not just color. Should white people be rioting over this, and demanding the name be changed? Call it TRUMP BREAD or something. Likewise, there's WHITE AMERICAN CHEESE. As if AMERICAN CHEESE wasn't awful enough. How did AMERICA get associated with such a lousy cheese?
I hope you're laughing about this. Just a little. Because it's all just a little ABSURD. It's also a little dangerous, especially for people who like comedy, because you know what is next, don't you? COMEDY FILM CENSORSHIP.
There's already been a lot of very iffy bits of PC games in the world of comedy. It's a good thing Moms Mabley turned out to be lesbian, because her garish clothes and toothless rasping could be considered demeaning. "Moms" isn't too far from "Aunt" is it? And "Aunt" and "Uncle" are demeaning if you want to look at it the "right" way. A TV documentary presented the problem of "Amos and Andy." Hosted by black comedian George Kirby, it featured a variety of black performers praising the show and declaring that Tim Moore (Kingfish) was a comic genius, and wasn't doing anything stereotypical. Certainly not any worse than Sanford the Junkman as played by Redd Foxx. Should the show EVER be allowed on the air again? It hasn't. It's not had any official DVD release either. But the TV special seemed to suggest that it was a pretty good, pioneering show with its all-black cast, and that Jimmie Walker's character on "Good Times" was a lot worse. (PS, a few of his co-stars on that show agreed!)
It's quite possible that "Swing Low Sweet Chariot" and the entire ending of the Marx Brothers' "Room Service" could end up snipped and banned. There were blackface moments in Laurel & Hardy and Three Stooges films. The brilliantly funny black comedian Dudley Dickerson could be snipped out of Stooges shorts, too. Some who worry about his eye-popping funny faces, or those of Mantan Moreland, may next cast a jaundiced, un-popped eye at the many, MANY times in Richard Pryor movies where he acted scared to get a laugh.
There's a serious question about how...funny...blackface moments in 30's and 40's and 50's movies are...from now-banned Bugs Bunny cartoons to Moe getting hit with a bottle of ink and Larry Fine laughing and saying "Mammy!" Do we start snipping? Put a warning notice in front of the film? And do we bother to look at the way Native Americans, Asians and others have been treated for a laugh? Anyone hear the difference between Fred Allen's comical Mrs. Nussbaum and Jack Benny's wimpy and obnoxious Mr. Kitzel? The irony is that Jack was Jewish, and Fred was not. But if the jokes were good, is it such an issue?
I could go on, but hey, my Cream of Wheat is getting cold...
That's a JOKE son. I told you, I don't eat that crap.
PS...apologies to any Southerners who didn't like my Senator Claghorn reference, or the fact that I am a Northerner.
PS, who WAS that Mr. Penny from "Penny Lane" named after? It makes SUCH a big difference. And who was "Strawberry Fields?" Any relation to W.C. Fields, who once joked about a "Nubian in the fuel supply?"
