Utah business owner fires two who backed Obama

[Mickey Blue]

I doubt very much he knew it was a true term for a specific set of people, I suspect in his mind it simply drew imagery of the stereotypical bone through the nose drum banging African tribal person. Whether he deliberately did this in order to invoke that imagery, or whether he just has that image in his head when he hears a word like that and went with it (a more latent racism, sort of like how some people may react differently when a woman is assertive to the point of being irritating than when a man does it even if they aren't consciously sure of why) I don't know.

Either way, bad form for sure and merits an apology I'd think, but then perhaps offending black people (and liberals) isn't a major business issue where he's at, or at least not major enough to overshadow the benefits of courting the bigoted/idiot dollar.

[Pinecone]

It makes me think of this advert.

Um Bongo

[Auburn Red]

Even if it weren't a racist name, which it is, it's several steps away from "respecting the office, if you don't respect the man." How can anyone form a mature difference of opinion with some who so blatantly uses such infantile remarks against the President and in a news article? Of course, we know what happened to anyone who even tried to disagree with him. His actions annoyed me, but it was his comments that threw me over the edge, that he can't respect Obama enough as a human being to call him by his real last name.
It's one thing when those anonymous people on yahoo call him names, that's bad enough but when someone who is supposed to be a face of his business and his community does it, it really says a lot about the man's character and none of it good.

[ULTRAGOTHA]

I agree "Obongo" is racist. But don't lose sight of how many of us Lib'rals, me included, called Bush II either "Dubya" or "The Shrub".

I don't think the mere acct of 'not respecting the President enough as a human being to call him by his real last name' is racist. The actual name called may be.

[Auburn Red]

True, and there have been other nicknames for Obama, none that I will repeat that refer to his policies or a general dislike of him that don't have such racist connotations. I think the fact that he is supposed to be a public figure and he chose this exact name which as many here have said has definate racist connotations, shows overt racism and a strong lack of character.
But honestly, and this is a personal thing for me, I don't really care to use such nicknames for anybody. I just think it almost stoops the speaker to a juvenile level of calling someone names in a playground. There are many things that you can say about a person that will express your dislike of them, you don't have to call them names.

[Mickey Blue]

I think that the historical reality behind black people and white people changes some things from racist to not racist depending on whom they are being used on and it can be easily to accidentally fall into that trap.

The best example I can think of is comparing Obama to a chimp (a good non-political one would be at Halloween having 'a hanging man' or 'a hanging black man').. Bush was compared to a chimp countless times but all of a sudden it's racist to do so to Obama. And that's ok, we can't just pretend history didn't happen and obviously there is more baggage attached to comparing a black man to a chimp than a white man.. However at the same time I think it's unfair to jump to the idea that somebody must have been a racist to do so. I suppose you could call them clueless but even then it seems a little unfair and that's certainly still a far cry from racism.

I used to call my dog (Sam) "Sambo" as a nickname until I found out that was a somewhat old slur against black people (learned that from a movie). I consider myself fairly well educated but I never did sit down with the "Big book of ethnic slurs" and memorize them all so it was easy to make such a mistake given that I had never in my entire life heard that word used in that context before.


The difference however is when I found out I modified my behavior; I would have bristled if some idiot decided that because I didn't know it was a slur I was racist just for using the word, however once I learned that it was a slur I stopped using it. In the same vein I could understand how somebody may not initially put it together that it's all of a sudden wrong to portray the president as a chimp cause he's black, but once they are educated about that they have the choice of fighting it or not and many seem to fight it.


I don't think it's 'fair' that because of history some things are automatically racist even though that was not the intention of the person producing them, and I do think that (and I hate how this phrase has been coopted but it's the best one I can think of) there is a line somewhere where we move from being conscious of history to being 'politically correct' (blah..) but the reality is what it is.

Much like we shouldn't have to tailor our humor, our Halloween decorations, or our political insults down to the level of the most thin-skinned person who has the biggest chip on their shoulder.. But we can't pretend that we don't live in a society with other people whom we should at least attempt to live together in harmony which includes meeting in the middle on some issues and being respectful toward their worldview.