Not worthy of a thread News

[harmless]

I'm not saying that nobody can speak for anyone else, but speaking for others who aren't you does not tend to make for great satire.

But, in this case it did.

Demonstrably no. The effectiveness of satire depends on who it helps, and who laughs. If vast swathes of people you were joking about are offended (Asians *and* Native Americans -- the ones I read on Twitter were at best indifferent to the whole 'joke'), you've done it wrong.

When did you find out the Washington Redskins existed?

Right, because American Football is a niche interest and the Washington Redskins have a tiny cult following.

Dan Snyder? Instead you choose to make a stink about Colbert. Really? A joke foundation? Because Asians are so oppressed in America?

Instead of what? I'm not talking of priorities; I'm saying that offending one group in the interest of supporting another is a big fat fucking fail. Sorry. And are you denying that every non-white people group faces varying levels of systemic racism, including Asians? Because that's going to be a difficult thesis to defend. One doesn't need to defend one and not the other. I don't have to choose. Neither do I need to ignore a stupid mistake in the writing of a joke because of Colbert's intentions. Colbert is not, and never has been, the only player in the anti-Redskins name campaign. If you want to defend him instead of saying the movement is probably better served by more self-advocacy from Native Americans themselves, go ahead. But I'm not.

So, should I not laugh when a comic puts on his white guy voice and pokes fun at my stereotypical behavior?

You can laugh at whatever you want, I'm not stopping you. Self-mockery is great, without using racist slurs in some effort to make a disingenuous 'comparison'. Interestingly the only person who is guaranteed to not be offended by the joke is Colbert himself, because it's about Native Americans, Asians and Snider.

I should be offended because I have no rhythm and I can't dance? Or, is that okay because I'm white and I hold the keys to the fucking planet? Everything just falls out of the fucking sky, for me.

Well, I'm not going to bother qualifying 'everything' for you. If you can't acknowledge you have systemic advantages over Asian people on one level and Native Americans on another, why are we even discussing this? It's all about your need to defend Colbert's great 'liberal' show and you don't care about ethnic minorities any more than you say I do.

[digster]

that article didn't come across to me as trying to undermine twitter as a venue for anything. it came across to me as pointing out that twitter, like all new forms of technology is just as capable of fostering misunderstanding and misguided activism as anything else in the media realm, and with constrictions on length of tweets etc, is likely more capable of of being capitalized on as a form of activism that requires no further involvement in what the purpose of a specific type of activism is being used for etc, thus the comment about fact checking etc.

Twitter is great for many things, but I can't imagine even its most ardent defender would point to it as being adept at nuance or sarcasm. If someone saw the twitter posting without the context of the clip, I could see the strangeness.

[digster]

Who exactly was Colbert speaking for?

[harmless]

Native Americans, allegedly.

[digster]

OK. I don't think commenting or having an opinion on something (or joking about it) necessarily makes you a spokesperson.

[harmless]

It definitely doesn't. But there's a paradox whereby complaints against this joke are thought of as 'silly', while defences of it are embraced as 'sensible'. That's the same systemic racism that protects the Redskins name because... oh yeah, because that's also 'satire'. We're beyond racism!

[BurtReynolds]

Could one technically even tell a joke like that across the pond? The brits lack of faith in the merits of free speech relative to that of the colonies has always intrigued me. I am unclear about some of the laws, though.

[digster]

It definitely doesn't. But there's a paradox whereby complaints against this joke are thought of as 'silly', while defences of it are embraced as 'sensible'. That's the same systemic racism that protects the Redskins name because... oh yeah, because that's also 'satire'. We're beyond racism!

I haven't seen anyone come close to saying such a thing.

[harmless]

It definitely doesn't. But there's a paradox whereby complaints against this joke are thought of as 'silly', while defences of it are embraced as 'sensible'. That's the same systemic racism that protects the Redskins name because... oh yeah, because that's also 'satire'. We're beyond racism!

I haven't seen anyone come close to saying such a thing.

I see people say and write it all the time, and contemporary "post-race" culture says it on a wide level. "I don't see colour." Or to make it not about race, "I don't think of you as disabled."

[digster]

I can't speak for all of society; I was just talking about here and now.

The issue with me is that, looking at the joke, they're not at the 'expense' of Asians or Native Americans or whoever. Like most of the jokes Colbert tells, he is cartoonishly exaggerating the tone of conservative commentators. Speaking of across the pond, if there's no parallel there to someone like Bill O'Reilly it would be hard to see how specifically Colbert's character is a rebuke to him and those like him.

[harmless]

But anyway, look, no one's going to be able to see how this relates to anything, so. Night fellas.

[Jorge]

"I don't even see race. Not even my own. People tell me I'm white and I believe them because I just devoted six minutes explaining why I'm not a racist. That's the whitest thing there is."

[BurtReynolds]

Demonstrably.

[harmless]

I can't speak for all of society; I was just talking about here and now.

The issue with me is that, looking at the joke, they're not at the 'expense' of Asians or Native Americans or whoever. Like most of the jokes Colbert tells, he is cartoonishly exaggerating the tone of conservative commentators. Speaking of across the pond, if there's no parallel there to someone like Bill O'Reilly it would be hard to see how specifically Colbert's character is a rebuke to him and those like him.

If you remove the frame / excuse of 'satire', mocking the voice of someone else being racist may well be called out as being racist. As a writer, you have to be very careful to avoid this. I don't think Colbert was. I'm not trying to destroy his career by saying this. I'm saying it in the full knowledge that he has no reason to care about my opinion. It's just my opinion.

[harmless]

OMG the harmless account is so misguided and wrong about everything, in spite of his best efforts. Bless him, he'll never quite 'get it'.

[Jorge]

Who are you reacting to? My quote wasn't meant to convey that.

[harmless]

I'm not reacting to your quote. Just the general furore I inspire whenever I strongly state and clarify an opinion.

[harmless]

Could one technically even tell a joke like that across the pond? The brits lack of faith in the merits of free speech relative to that of the colonies has always intrigued me. I am unclear about some of the laws, though.

Leaving aside the fact that I think 'free speech' is a fallacy (someone always gets awarded free speech, it's rarely the people who need it), yes, the UK has a long history of satire. There's this weird implication that people who reacted negatively to this joke don't know what satire is.

[digster]

This doesn't really have anything to do with free speech either way; that's regarding government censorship, not sniping between late night hosts and twitter users. She's well within her rights to call for Colbert to be cancelled, and people are well within their rights to say they think it's for a poor reason.

[McParadigm]

OMG the harmless account is so misguided and wrong about everything, in spite of his best efforts. Bless him, he'll never quite 'get it'.

Nah. He's just kind of prejudiced, is all.