Posted on 06/23/2013 7:24:00 AM PDT by RoosterRedux
SAVANNAH, Ga. — The line of Paula Deen fans waiting for her restaurant here to open grew throughout the hot, muggy morning Saturday.
They discussed what they might select from the buffet inside The Lady and Sons, her wildly popular restaurant in the heart of Savannah.
But they also talked of boycotting the Food Network, which dropped their beloved TV chef on Friday after she awkwardly apologized for having used racial slurs and for considering a plantation-themed wedding for her brother, with well-dressed black male servants.
The predicament that Ms. Deen finds herself in began when a former employee — a white woman who is now managing restaurants in Atlanta — filed a discrimination lawsuit in March 2012. She claimed that racial epithets, racist jokes and pornography on office computers were common while she managed Uncle Bubba’s Oyster House, one of the restaurants in Ms. Deen’s empire. Forbes has estimated her net worth at $17 million.
Most of the diners in line on Saturday morning were white and more than ready to defend one of their favorite cooking stars. But at the very front was Nicole T. Green, 36, an African-American who said she had made a detour from a vacation in New Orleans specifically to show up in support of Ms. Deen.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
I think I see Governor Christie in that picture.
Even if she is an Obama supporter, should she lose her livelihood because of a word she used years ago? If we believe that, we are no better than hypocritical liberals. I can take her or leave her. I liked her show but didn’t watch it very often. I respect her because she is self-made and a woman. She was poor and worked hard and now she is rich. Good for her. I support her.
That’s the entertainment industry in a nutshell, all is well as long as you dance to the piper’s tune. Say something out of line, like you are pro-life, or against gay marriage, kiss your career goodbye.
I’ll care about the use of the infamous “N” word when they ban its use in rap “music”.
I think that the root of this (or at least, near the root) is a lack of comprehension amongst liberals about the ramifications of what they really believe in.
I am certain that this whole brouhaha was a complete surprise to her, as on one hand she thought that she had paid her liberal dues, and anyone hearing the things she had to say would take it for granted that her heart was in the right place, and that she was really “down for the cause”, and on the other hand, she had no idea that she is likely viewed as useful idiot by those wielding power on the left.
It is always a surprise to liberals when they are dragged away by the very people whose policies they support. It has happened time and time again, as long as there is been a defined “left”, that the useful idiot is dragged away by the very people they put in power, the liberal being dragged away saying with eyes bulging from fear, confusion, and anger: “But wait… I’m one of you… I believe in all of your ideas… I supported you! Why are you doing this?”
The best example of this is outlined in entire chapter in Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s book “The Gulag Archipelago”. As a Soviet authorities arrested millions of people over the years, the most common refrain offered by the person being arrested was: “Me? What for?”
In way of explanation, I feel it is important to define who I am speaking of. As a rule of thumb, I tend to divide liberals into thirds.
The first third of liberals are generally normal people, but they are composed of both softhearted people who want to do good, and people who couldn’t be bothered to do any more than support liberals because someone told them that’s who they should support. Many of these people have an understanding of issues that is a mile wide and 1/32 of an inch deep. Once you scratch the surface and get below the slogans and stereotypes, there isn’t anything there. However, given to human nature, only a fraction of these people may be reasoned with. The rest of them may listen, but they won’t change their minds because human nature tends to keep that from happening.
The second third of liberals are the committed, spittle-lipped leftists who have the same shallow comprehension of issues that the first third of liberals do, but they have the zeal and intensity of true believers. They can’t be reasoned with, and serve as the honest-to-goodness useful idiot cannon fodder set forth by the last third of liberals described below. The second third of liberals are the ones that you see at the Code Pink rallies, antiwar rallies, or immigration reform support rallies. Trying to reason with them (for the most part) is like teaching a pig to sing.
The last third of liberals are the committed ones who understand fully what is at stake. They know that leftism isn’t about rights for minorities, healthcare that works, workers rights or any of the other things that leftists say that they stand for. They know that those things are just tools and levers, and that the real goal is to achieve a utopia, and reaching that utopia justifies all means to that end. We all know (at least those who have taken the time to think about it, and have looked at the history of humankind) that utopia is not achievable, and that the journey or quest to achieve utopia involves totalitarianism, because totalitarianism is the only way to get human beings (who are so completely different and so my respects) to walk in step with each other in obedience to the dictates of the state. This last third of liberals are the Marxists and socialists (socialists simply being Marxists who haven’t figured out what an AK-47 is for) who at a base level subscribe wholeheartedly to the underpinning concepts of Alinsky’s “Rules for Radicals”. These are people who understand that leftism is really about power over other people. This third of leftists are the ones who think it is entirely reasonable to exterminate large portions of any population to achieve their goals that will bring them closer to their utopia.
Paula Deen is very likely one of the first third of liberals, she enjoyed the fame and popularity of being associated with the president and First Lady, and given her ignorance of the ramifications of liberal policy, along with her desire to be thought of as a progressive person fully set her up to be, as you so eloquently put it, hoisted on her own petard.
Right now, as she is being dragged by both arms down some hallway in a concrete building (figuratively speaking, of course) she is probably wondering why those she admired, sympathized with, and supported are treating her in this fashion. She was after all, in her mind, “one of them”.
“We have lived with each other and loved each other here for a long time,” said Mrs. Jones, who is white. “Sometimes I think there is more prejudice in the North than there is in the South.”
Amen to that last observation. Especially among Democrats and in MSM newsrooms.
Good post 43. Reminds me of the ‘Newspeak’ and ‘Groupthink’ terms read in George Orwell’s book 1984. We are there albeit a few years beyond.
That is indeed a major issue. It is as if there is a constitutional amendment about The Right To Not Be Offended.
At least one would think so, from watching the way we conduct ourselves.
It's very hard to make money at any kind of hand-crafted wares, especially since the rise of globalization.
Remember that they have succeeded when they (the government) does not have to censor your speech or thoughts, but that you censor yourself.
I believe the term was a component of “ThoughtCrime” called “Crimethink”.
Where even thinking it was a crime.
I think Paula Deen was raise in a “We always have been Democrat” family. I have run in to go many of these people who will not give it up because mom or dad was a Democrat. They quote what their parents use to say about Republicans. You tell them that it is not the party of their parent but the family tie blinds their hearing.
At least she was. It's been said a conservative is a liberal who's been mugged, and I think she just got mugged.
I enjoy Coulter’s writings... usually agree with her about 90% of the time... Thanks for the suggestion.
See my post at #45 above.
The problem is, this first third of liberals enables and serves the second set, who then enable and serve the third set.
I think what you are seeing is not that people cheer her losing her livelihood based on a word she used years ago, but that people cheer seeing her consumed by the negative forces she visually (on television) vocally and financially supported and enabled.
I think it is the irony or justness that has people cheering, if cheering is what it can be called. More like grim satisfaction.
It is one of her very best books, and unfortunately the MSM was so terrified of it that they buried it completely. She had previously been invited on morning shows by people like Matt Lauer whenever she released a new book, but not this time. It chronicles a disgraceful history of rioting and deaths that have occurred as a direct result of race-mongering, more often in the North or West than in the New South.
Mugged: Racial Demagoguery from the Seventies to Obama.
Agreed 100%. There is a lot of that, too.
I see what you did there! Nice graphic treatment!
But you are astute in observing just how lard-ass the people in line are. Wonder if that was typical of all the patrons, or if it was "selective journalism"?
Yes. That is 100% true. They used to enjoy bringing her a liberal shows at one point, but there were too many instances where she would embarrass the liberal who thought it would be easy to pin that butterfly to the board as a trophy.
Discretion being the better part of valor, I think they simply decided the potential upside of inviting her as a target to throw darts at in a public setting was outweighed by the possibility she would make them look foolish.
Now, they simply just don’t invite her. She understands how that game works, if you are a conservative writer.
I think the best example of this type of behavior against conservative writers is “Unlimited Access” by author Gary Aldrich. He experienced firsthand during the Clinton administration what happens when you try to publish something that is going to skewer the current liberal in charge, whoever that might be.
The converse of that is the wide multitude of anti-Bush or anti-Reagan writers who got plenty of invitations to various television shows as well as fawning, boot licking reviews from all of their contemporaries across the country.
This is a double sided controversy. On the one hand, Deen sucked up to the Obamas and is now feeling the PC wrath of their reign. She is evidently not favored enough-despite the brownnosing-to be given a pass for PAST language.
Then there is the fact that the PC police are selectively crucifying those who use the ‘n’ word-because if it were universally verboten there would be NO ‘Rap Music or Stars’. In fact, most of the black population would have to be excoriated and ‘ruined’ for it’s daily use. How can one be damned for calling a race of people what THEY THEMSELVES call themselves ? It’s ‘n*g**er’ this and n*gg*r’ that on the streets, in film, in ‘music’. If that’s how you self-identify,what else can someone call you?
And she admitted to committing this grave sin IN THE PAST. Stupid of her. But isn’t this like walking up to the kid who pushed you down in second grade and decking him when he’s 45?
And when did someone’s personality flaws become part of their food? Is her food good? That’s all that should matter. Because if this applies across the board then every restaurant in the country has ex-cons and people with criminal records handling your food-so that ends eating out ANYWHERE if the morality of all owners/employees is not saintly.
Does the general public REALLY want to apply such standards of perfection(retroactively even) to everyone? Who would be left to deal with?
Eventually, many members of the current ruling junta will be having the same experience. If not in this life, then in the next. "Rethink" before it's too late, progs!
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