ABWW Hater of the Day: Steve Harvey

Long before Steve Harvey gained mainstream fame I was not feeling his brand of humor. I thought he was the least talented of the Kings of Comedy and was constantly distracted by high top fade toupee. I thought his sit com was bland remix of every school sit com from Welcome Back Cotter to Saved by the Bell to Hanging with Mr. Cooper. I tried to give it a chance but I began seeing the disturbing mysogynoir patterns in the Steve Harvey Show. While sweet, but dim witted Lovita easily settled into a traditional romance and wedded bliss with Cedric, Steve Hightower chaffed at being supervised by and in love with an obviously more qualified Regina Greer. The time honored trope of “will they, won’t they” is marred by what would become Harvey’s signature black woman hating schtick on stage. Calling the gorgeous and svelte Wendy Raquel Robinson “piggy” changes from affectionate adolescent snapping to ugly mysognoir power plays if one is paying attention to the growth of Harvey’s comedy career.

Black men have created a cottage industry of books about why black women’s marital rates have plummeted. Mainstream media jumped on this trend for a while too. They made a pretty penny with this twaddle by conflating sexist black religiosity, pseudo Africana mythology (also know as Ashy Hotepology) with that special brand of respectability politics born out of a need control black women with a Jim Crow level of ferocity. No of these “writers” examined why black men are marrying less on whole but those who do are out marrying more. Harvey is the king of this movement.  Even though his book was simply another ashy tome, it went mainstream and his deeply ignorant view of black women mutated into Dear Abby style advice for everyone color and crees. This twice divorced, thrice married adulterer was suddenly an expert on relationships!!!

On smart women:

Well, I mean, you know if a guy is out for one thing, it’s best to go for shallow, unintelligent women. You don’t want to break this news to really bright women. “Hey, I just want to do something to you this evening”…You want to find somebody shallow, really simple unintelligent, that you can run this by and they’ll sit there and go, “Wow, that sounds great.

Men cheat because women are hotass hos

Women ask that question all the time: Why do men cheat? But it’s really because there are so many women out there willing to cheat with them.

I could go on and on but someone was kind enough to compile  a youtube video of the ignorant sexist, mysogynoir, homophobic, religious intolerance swill that has seeped from the open sewer that is Harvey’s mug. Harvey has ridden this trash train to a syndicated radio show, a daily talk show, two movies, hosting a daily game show and the Miss Universe pageant (insert schedufreude here). Last week, Harvey decided to expand his poison beyond his twisted version of gender and include race. This time he wasn’t just attacking black women he decided to go after Asian men.

Last week, Steve Harvey aired a segment on his his eponymous syndicated talk show about obscure, absurdly specific advice books. These were niche interest titles like Dating for Under a Dollar: 301 Ideas and How to Date a White Woman: A Practical Guide for Asian Men.

The audience laughed at the latter book in anticipation as Harvey took 15 seconds to gather himself. “That’s one page,” he finally gasped. “’Excuse me, do you like Asian men?’ ‘No.’ ‘Thank you.’”

The comedian then offered a sequel, How to Date a Black Woman: A Practical Guide for Asian Men — “Same thing. ‘You like Asian men?’ ‘I don’t even like Chinese food. It don’t stay with you no time. I don’t eat what I can’t pronounce.’” – The Hollywood Reporter

In order for you to appreciate my ire at this clown on this issue, I have let you know about my ancestry I was born in The London Borough of Haringey, UK of Jamaican and Grenadian ancestry. My maternal grandmother was half Indian and half Welsh. My parents also had friends of mixed Asian ancestry and so do I. When I moved to the Bronx, I had no idea about the sociosexual stereotypes that are imposed on Asian Americans and had crushes on many an ethnicity hue including Asian dudes. Since I was the immigrant, I saw my Asian friends as more American that I was. It really wasn’t until I moved to the midwest that I noticed the fetishization of Asian women and the emasculation of Asian men. Although black female and Asian male intermarriage occurs in the Caribbean and South American, it is rare in this country. There have been brief periods of when black women and Asian men married both in the  Jim Crow South and the North before the Chinese Exclusion Act was lifted in 1943.

Harvey’s typical hotep arrogance managed to bring the ugly trope Asian male emasculation together with the oft-promoted fantasies of black male sexual prowess and his own presumptions of the unattractiveness and hypersexuality of black women with his usual mysoginoir flair. Of course black women are too stupid to pronounce a Chinese food menu how could they possibly desire the miniscule charms of Asian men? Harvey knows that all we desire is BBC. Luckily, millennials are not in Harvey’s target demographic and some young black women and Asian men are slowly shrugging off what Harvey and many black & white fuckbois with OK Cupid profiles want them believe and are figuring out inventive ways to meet, hook up and start relationships.

Oooops…. I forgot to mention Harvey met with Orange Shitgibbon on Friday on housing issues. He wants to work with to Sleepy Uncle Ben in some capacity at Department of Housing and Urban Development. Now if that isn’t the Kingfish leading Amos and Andy into another con (Google it, young’ens,) I don’t what is. Here are some pics of sexy, hotass Asian men to momentarily take your mind off the upcoming Orange Apocalypse.

Donnie Yen

Edison Chen

John Cho

Daniel Dae Kim

Sendhil Ramamurthy

Ian Antony Dale

Rick Yune

Ken Watanabe

B. D. Wong

Will Yun Lee

Kenny Styles

Naveen Andrews

Tadanobu Asano

Raza Jaffrey

Byung-hun Lee

 

 

Source: The Disturbing History Behind Steve Harvey’s “Asian Men” Jokes | Hollywood Reporter

Amy Poehler on black women & SNL. “Ugh, I don’t want to talk about this. Pass.”

A week after Ani Di Franco finally apologized for her having a feminist song writing retreat at a plantation that white washes slavery so much that  it calls the slaves, “workers,” Amy Poehler comes up with the white feminist #fail for the week. Is it any wonder that the supremely talented Rhetta has never had a major story line or love interest? Amy is no beginner at passing over black women.

Amy Poehler and Tina Fey did an interview with the Hollywood Reporter pegged to their hosting Sunday night’s Golden Globe Awards. The interview was wide-ranging and well worth reading, about this year’s movies, past awards shows, and the pair’s history as former “Saturday Night Live” players. But it’s what Poehler didn’t say that’s the most interesting.

While Fey answered every question, including ones about controversial topics, with carefully chosen and diplomatic words, Poehler made clear she wasn’t interested in going too far out on a limb — and seemingly growing more frustrated as the interview progressed.

This came through in the pair’s responses to a question about “Saturday Night Live” having cast Sasheer Zamata as its first black female cast member since the departure of Fey and Poehler’s colleague Maya Rudolph in 2007. Fey praised Kerry Washington’s hosting gig in November: “You saw how great it was for Jay Pharoah to have someone playing Michelle Obama opposite [his President Obama]. So I feel like they registered that really quickly and they’ve acted on it really quickly.”

Poehler was less game: “Ugh, I don’t want to talk about this. Pass.”

Read entire article at Salon

ABWW Hater of the Day: Kenan Thompson

As  a young teen it was a mark of coolness to be known as a person who was allowed to stay up long enough to watch Saturday Night Live. The original Not Ready For Primetime Players were bawdy, political and populated their jokes with drug references. They were not afraid to tackle race either. If you have never seen the Job Interview sketch with Chevy Chase and Richard Pryor, do so right now! By the Eddie Murphy era  the sociopolitical commentary had been tamped down but his Undercover White Man skit is still on of the best comedic commentaries of white privilege ever.

I don’t find today’s SNL funny. I figured that I had aged out of the demographic I was also peeved by the fact that show has not kept up with the glacial pace of diversity television casting. There has not been a recognizable black woman on the show since 1995 (In addition to mixed race Maya Rudolph, the only other black women on SNL has been Ellen Cleghorne and Denitra Vance.)

Current cast member Jay Pharaoh has openly questioned SNL’s lack of black women cast members on the show, saying that the producers “need to pay attention.” When a black woman is needed for a skit Kenan Thompson plays them, Tyler Perry Medea style or black up Iranian American (Iranians consider themselves white) Nasim Pedrad. Thompson, the only other black cast member feels differently than Pharaoh and said in a new interview with TV Guide that the diversity problem on SNL is due to the “lack of quality black female comedians.” He states in the interview: “It’s just a tough part of the business. Like in auditions, they just never find ones that are ready.” I know that Kenan has played Herman Cain on SNL but I had no idea he shared his “blacks are lazy” ideology. Kenan may not see black woman as romantic partners (he married the white “Maxim model” Christine Evangeline in 2012) but to open up your mouth to say that there are no hard working, prepared black comedians is some ignorant bunk. I hope the ghost of Mom’s Mabley slaps some common sense into this fool and lest him know that there a plenty of black comedians out there that could run rings around his sad self:

• Aiesha Tyler is on three TV shows (Archer, Whose Line Is It Anyway and The Talk) has a best selling book and a popular podcast.

• Wanda Sykes does stand up, has been in movies and TV and has had her own talk show and still has time to work for LGBT rights.

• Monique has an Oscar and hosted her own talk show

• Debra Willson & Kim Wayans have decades of experience in sketch comedy

• Loni Love is a regular on the Chelsea Handler show

• Sheryl Underwood is on The Talk along with Aisha Tyler

• Rheta is on Parks and Recreation

• Jessica Williams is on The Daily Show

• Yvette Nichole Brown is on Community

• Sommore is the reigning queen of the black comedy circuit, closely followed by Adelle Givens, “Miss” Laura Hayes and Luenell
• Francesca Ramsey went viral with her youtube video “Shit White Girls Say

• Darmirra Brunson from Drew in Tyler Perry’s  comedy Love Thy Neighbor, is a talented mimic. Her celebrity impressions include Beyonce, Kerry Washington, Lil’ Kim, Mariah Carey, Nicki Minaj, Oprah, Rihanna, and Wendy Williams.

• Issa Rae’ the creator of the award winning youtube comedy Awkward Black Girl has been profiled by Rolling Stone and Carson Daily and has development deals with HBO and Shonda Rhimes.

Coco Loves Ice…And Someone Else In Vegas?

IceT is another one of those black men who defames black women but seems perfectly happy to marry a white woman who does all the things he rags on black women about. Coco has proven that white women fall off the pedestal that black men place them on quite easily. Would you be a bit miffed if you saw pictures of your spouse being intimately kissed by another man?

Saturday morning hit with Ice-T having to see pictures of his wife, Coco, wrapped in arms with another man named AP9 while she was in Las Vegas.  Coco was the first to address the pictures but kept it very light by saying, “Woke up to people in a panic about some pics,please guys I’m happily married,sometimes fans & friends take silly pics. Its harmless. #RELAX”

via Coco Loves Ice…And Someone Else In Vegas? Suspect Pictures Send Ice-T Into A Frenzy | Madame Noire | Black Women's Lifestyle Guide | Black Hair | Black Love.

White South African Model’s Racist Tweets Enrage a Nation

The more things change the more they stay the same. With a name like Dos Santos, she wouldn’t be white in this part of the world.

FHM model Jessica Leandra dos Santos used the word “kaffir” in a tweet on May 3, summoning South Africa’s nasty history of racism and segregation. “Kaffir” is South Africa’s version of the n-word in the United States. It may even cut deeper in South Africa, however, in South Africa, because the wounds of apartheid are still fresh.

“Just, well took on a on arrogant and disrespectful kaffir inside Spar. Should have punched him, should have,” she tweeted. The backlash came immediately, forcing the model to delete the tweet within hours. Dos Santos later claimed that the incident inside Spar, a South African supermarket, came after she was confronted with sexual remarks.

Read more

The Media’s Gabby Douglas Problem – EBONY

I am reblogging this great article from my  good G+ friend T. F. Chatterton:

The reports of Black women hating on Gabby Douglas’s hair have been greatly exaggerated. Articles claiming that Black women have fixated on Gabby’s hair have sparked the usual discussion about White beauty norms, hair politics, and internalized racism. But is it reallyBlack women who are obsessed with Gabby Douglas’ hair, or the media?

The idea that sisters are paying “more attention to her hair than her gold medals” is exactly the image of dysfunctional, belligerent Black women that the media loves. In the understandable rush to defend Gabby from critics, we’ve overlooked that this narrative is being pushed by racist, sexist media that can’t be trusted to report accurately on Black women’s opinions on just about anything. There’s very little evidence that hair is a priority when it comes to Black women’s feelings about Gabby Douglas.

This story can be traced back to one blog post quoting all of three disparaging comments, that Jezebel slapped a few more tweets on as proof of a trend. Everyone from NPR to the LA times has since weighed in, all seemingly basing their analysis on the Jezebel piece and a small sample of tweets. Outlets have specifically searched for negative tweets about Gabby, probably overlooking many more celebratory comments. We should question whether the coverage reflects an actual trend, or confirmation bias creating a news story out of a few isolated fools being mean on the internet. It’s possible that the real viral story here is the original piece and the media furor it’s spawned.  Read More

Jamaican Singer Diana King Comes Out as a Lesbian

Anyone who knows me knows that I am disgustingly proud of my Caribbean heritage. My Jamaican born mother imparted the wisdom “no matter where you live remember you always, know that you come from somewhere, you have a home.” To bring that point home my mom sent me to Jamaica for many summers during my youth. I was often surly (or fiesty as yardies say) about leaving my friends in the Bronx, but now I appreciate what she did. The ink on my citizenship papers were barely dry when the military might of the United States descended on the tiny island of Grenada, the land of my father’s birth. Ever since that day I have been ambivalent about being fully American.
Jamaican politics are deadly serious. Jamaicans have been about political change since the Caribs fought the Spanish conquerers and the maroon slave resistance forced the British to give them their won independent homeland on the island. Jamaica had the most slave rebellions in the Caribbean and the fight for independence on the island was at the forefront of the liberation for other West Indian island. The Caribs of Grenada leapt off a mountain cliif rather than be slaves to the French colonialists. Julian Fedon a Grenedian planter kept the island free from British rule from from March of 1795 to June 1796. With a history like this who wouldn’t be proud? There is one thing that makes me hang my head in shame, Jamaica’s history of homophobia. Gender roles in Jamaica are very traditional. Deviation from the norm can bring familial & societal scorn. The antiquated sodomy law is still enforced with up to ten years of hard labor. This ideology has manifested in dancehall music in songs like Boom Bye Bye. It is sad to hear this hate come from music that descended from Bob Marley’s cries for justice and equality. Many gay Jamaicans choose to immigrate and simply trudge through the arranged dates that wait for them when they visit home. Recently, some brave Jamaican LGBT folks have been making a stand. J-FLAG provides legal, educational and social support for the emerging community and uses the traditional Jamaican values of unity and struggle to appeal to the mainstream. The organization has documented 7 anti-gay deaths in the country since 2007 so coming out is a very dangerous act. This hateful tide may be turning since Jamaican celebrities have begun to advocate for their gay brethren. Beenie Man released an apology for his previous homophobic lyrics and now Diana King has bravely come out while still living most of year in Jamaica. I salute sistren Diana King’s brave stand against homophobia and patriarchy. Read her statement at the URL below.

DIANAKINGDOM: YES!! I AM A LESBIAN.

Chris Rock ‘White People’s Day’ July 4th Tweet Sparks Controversy

Chris Rock’s tweet about the fact that American blacks did not secure any freedoms on July 4th has caused a lot of white racial butt hurt. Minimizing slavery nothing new and the drama around Rock making a joke about historical fact is an excellent opportunity to examine the multiple ways that some whites minimize the history of racial oppression in this country. White apologists for slavery, Jim Crow and institutional racism need to have a convention to come up with some new talking points. The ones they repeatedly circulate are time worn, ignorant and twist history beyond all hope of recognition they use really needs an update. Here a ten nifty ways to debunk these tired tropes.

1 – Other nations had slaves what’s the big deal?
America is the only nation that espoused freedom for all citizens while legally denying people of color the same rights. The Constitution specifically marked blacks and Native Americans as non-citizens. Native Americans did not become citizens until 1924 and blacks did not receive full citizenship until 1968.

2 – Africans sold slaves, so blame them.
First of all Africa is a continent, which is composed of hundreds of ethnic groups. Can you get a little more specific? The African empires that supported the slave trade had many communities within them who fought against enslavement. Empires like Dahomey were in a state of constant civil war over this practice. Many seem to forget that whites bought slaves, created the chattel slavery industry in the Americas and continued it by making a child’s condition depend on the status of their mother. White men created their own slave stock and sold their own offspring. Antebellum white men where the original dead beat dads. Whites get so busy blaming Africans for slavery they forget the the Greek and Roman ancestry captured and sold slaves for a millennium. Historical amnesia is not your friend.

3- Blacks owned slaves too!
Mulattos in Louisiana had slaves but they were considered a different racial category by state law. In other slave owning states, free blacks bought their relatives but were unable to free them. It became illegal for recently free slaves to stay in Southern states so they could not manumit their wives, parents or children. No black slave owner maintained plantations with hundreds of slaves. No black slave owners rallied to keep chattel slavery the law of the land.

3- Mentioning anything slavery, Jim Crow and institutional racism or anything about blacks is racist.
Most whites have a habit of seeing whiteness universal and generic. They do not notice that most whites live in all white neighborhoods, go to predominantly white schools, work at all white jobs and socialize with whites only. When a crime is reported on TV a caucasian suspect is always described as male or female without a racial designation. You can look at any mainstream magazine and you will see a dearth of people of color. The majority of films, TV shows, books and plays produced in this country have all white casts despite the fact that over 36% of Americans are not caucasian. When this is mentioned it drives white apologists into a frenzy! The rant usually ends with a mention the fact that there is not a WET, because that would be racist! Those who deny the long history of legalized white supremacy in this country fail to recognize than traditional black institutions havenever banned whites from inclusion. Acknowledging these facts is recognizing history not racism.

4- The Civil War was not about slavery. Whites died to free blacks. Why do blacks always have to make things about them?
The Ordinances of Session of every Confederate state prominently mentions the hostility the North has toward the slave owning states. The Conerstone speech given by Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens states that the “natural state of the Negro is slavery” and proudly declares that the institution is an essential part of the new nation. Apologists also fail to consider the thousands of black union soldiers who fought for less pay and substandard equipment and faced being killed on the spot if the were captured by the Confederate military. Despite these facts many cannot see that ending the slavery of black slaves the most important outcome of the Civil War, even though this was not the President Lincoln’s intention.

5- Slavery is over! Get over it! Why do blacks have to live in the past?
Millions of whites run around in Confederate garb while flying the battle flag of a treasonous nation. Tea Partiers dress up in gear from 1776, yelling “I’m taking my country back.” Some of the post popular shows on TV (Mad Men, Game of Thrones, The Tudors, The Borgias) take place in the past. White Americans go to renaissance fairs and participate in battle reconstructions. Apologists seem to forget that the Civil War was followed a hundred years of legal segregation and racial terrorism. Yet, its blacks that are living in the past?

6- But the Irish were slaves too!
From an approximately 1600 to 1699 many Irish as well as criminals and debtors from all over the United Kingdom were sold into indentured servitude (there goes that blacks sold blacks excuse)and sent to America and Caribbean. There were abuses of this system and many suffered. But in 1664 blacks were made slaves in perpetuity in Virgina. Other states quickly followed especially after the leader Bacon’s Rebellion promised freedom to slaves and indentured servants who would join their cause in 1676. The threat of interracial rebellion led to legal enforcement of indenture contracts. When indentured servants were freed, many in the South joined the slaved based economy by buying chattel, becoming overseers or paddy rollers, informal bands of whites that patrolled their communities and captured runaway slaves. After emancipation in the British Caribbean former white indentures servant purchased Asian indentured servants, black Caribbean people did not. Some apologists claim that the Irish were treated worse than Africans because the black slaves costed more. I wish they would read slave narratives and then dare to tell me white servants were treated worse than slaves.

7- Blacks would be worse off if they all stayed in Africa.
This one is a favorite because it twists history like a pretzel. Most of Africa was devastated by the Trans-Sahara and Trans-Atlantic slave trade. This was exacerbated by the Scramble for Africa, where Europeans divided the Continent like it was a cake, destroying traditional empires and ties between ethnic groups. That did not work so well in post-communist Eastern Europe, so why is this so hard to understand what happened in Africa? The United States undermined African independence by killing political leaders & and supporting tyrants who supported the West’s political & economic ideology. The neocolonialist strategies of the IMF and World Bank has kept the wealth of Africa flowing into white hands. African countries would be major players on the world stage if whites had not landed on their shores.

8- If the Founder’s did not write the Declaration of Independence, blacks would have never been feed.
History is your friend get to know it. If America had remained an English colony the importation of slaves would have ended in 1792, America ended it in 1807. There was still an illegal slave trade in this country until the Civil War, while the British Army detained slave ships & sent captured blacks home. British ended slavery in 1834 31 years before the last American slaves were finally freed in Texas in 1865. The British never legalized segregation after ending slavery. Britain is not a racial paradise but since the majority of the Founder’s had a history of owning slave the idea that they were abolitionists (except for John Quincy Adams) is absolutely ridiculous.

9- Blacks are lazy, hypersexual, criminal immoral beasties who life off entitlements like welfare and affirmative action.
This must give white apologists a boner since they use it so often. It serves to disguise centuries of white affirmative action and the fact that affirmative action was put in a coma before its 45th birthday. It also serves as an excuse for white dysfunction which is on the rise. More whites are being jailed for meth related crimes and the majority of births by white women who do not go to college are to single mothers.
Whites lead the criminal pack in child rape & sexual abuse, serial, mass & spree killing, bank robbery, embezzlement & fraud. White men tanked the global economy playing dice with America’s savings yet none of them are in jail. Which leads to….

10- Blacks are more racist than whites!
This is usually followed by a sob story of a black kid took their lunch at recess 30 years ago. There is also the false moral equivalency rope a dope to put some punch into their crazy claim. Al Sharpton & Jessie Jackson Sr. are the same as Hitler, the NAACP is the same as the KKK and Ben Jealous is the same as Nathan Bedford Forrest, the founder of that racial terrorist organization. There is also the idea that every black person knows and supports the New Black Panthers a group that consists of four black men whose principle income comes from scaring white viewers FAUXNEWS. Very few whites want to have a substantive conversation about race in America. The live in fear of being called the “R-word.” Even former Grand Dragon & Presidential candidate says he is not racist, but a white civil rights activist! Neo Nazi/White Supremacist/KKK groups are much more brazen since the election of President Obama (who completes the Hitler trilogy). Just ask the good Reverend William Collier, who is hosting an All White Christian Conference in Alabama this weekend complete with KKK attendance and a “cross lighting ceremony” for religious purposes. Even a Middle Eastern Jew Like Jesus couldn’t get into this shindig!

Please feel free to use any of these facts the next time there is an outbreak of white whine & check out Derailing for Dummies for more ammunition against the racist trolls who spew their venom in cyberspace.

Louis C.K. Casts Black Onscreen Wife, Internet Goes Wild | Clutch Magazine

I am a big fan of Louis C.K.and since the Law & Order:NY franchise is grinding to a halt Louie is on of the few shows where I can see the Big Apple in all her glory. He is also one of the only non-black comedians to talk about race. Although his is a ginger, Louis Szekely was born in Mexico of Indo Catholic and Hungarian Jewish ancestry. I am also a gigantic fan of Pootie Tang (don’t hate me) which Louis wrote. I don’t why so many people took Pootie Tang seriously and vehemently hate it when it simply a comic book movie. Sada Tay to all you haters.
Louis made news recently for casting a black woman as the mother of his extremely WASPy children. I see no problem with this, Wanda Sykes twins are white and she jokes “I did it because if I died before my wife who would comb their hair?” I was all for it until he started talking about a black women demanding that he get a job. I do recall several racially cringe worthy moments on the show. For some inexplicable reason one of the daughters dressed as Frederick Douglass for Halloween complete with blackface. In another episode, a black waitress repeated the racist trope that black people don’t tip. Louis often includes black comedians in his groups of friends. When Louis ended up at Chris Rock’s house in the middle of the night his offscreen wife was an angry black shrew. Since black comedians like Chris Rock’s stock and trade is putting down black women, I hope it has not rubbed off on Louis. Perhaps Louis was thinking of this all along the opening credits of his show are accompanied by a song that extolls the joy and danger of a white guy loving a black woman. Louie’s ex-wife is played by the talenp da yardies) actress Susan Kelechi Watson

Spike Lees Co-Writer Pens an Open Letter: “Nothing in this world happens unless white folks says it happens.” | Filmmakers, Film Industry, Film Festivals, Awards & Movie Reviews | Indiewire

via The difference is this: When George Lucas complained publicly about the fact that he had to finance his own film because Hollywood executives told him they didn’t know how to market a black film, no one called him a fanatic. But when Spike Lee says it, he’s a racist militant and a malcontent. Spike’s been saying the same thing for 25 years..