Louis Gray has a great but sad post about his experience today watching Corvida and Wayne Sutton discuss the Verizon-Feldman debacle in video chat as a chorus of race baiting idiots piled on with comments the likes of which might make your racist Uncle Bob blush.Technigga-Golddigga Loren Feldman should feel proud tonight. The comments I've seen supporting him on FriendFeed show that he's got a real high-class following for his "comedy" act. Not. The cream of the crop must have shown up for this one, showing what Louis called the Web's racist underbelly.
"While both carried on a strong conversation around the issues of race, bigotry and getting ahead through hard work, their efforts were dwarfed by some of the most hateful, shameful, racist speech I've been exposed to in a very long time. ...as Corvida and Wayne talked about her family's efforts with Verizon, and how black tech bloggers are often stereotyped, with Feldman's video as an example, the Yahoo! Live chat screen filled with filth, with racist words, references to Kentucky Fried Chicken and watermelon, comments on Obama, and discussion of penis sizes."While I share Louis' anger, I don't share his shock. Sure, there are anonymous racist assholes online who have mouth-in-ass disease because they know they are anonymous and feel the thrill of yelling fire in a crowded theater. Nothing new there.
Then there are others, folks who are The Standard -- quite literally covertly and sometimes unknowingly practicing the subtler and often more damaging form of racism that fucks not just with the mind and heart and drive, but with the wallet--the ultimate take-down/keep-down in America.
And those same people will feign shock when a pastor from the South Side of Chicago spells America A-M-E-R-I-K-K-K-A. Hypocrites.
The threat of changing the makeup of a decidedly white power structure in Washington is bringing out the best in the best of people, and the worst in the worst of people.
It's not just the Web, Louis.
And I fear it's only just begun to get ugly.
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