Is Ted Cruz Satan? Discuss.

[taxwonk]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Anyway, your characterizatioon of how I imagine Adder going about it is spot-on. I envisioned this poor chick wondering to herself, "How in the fuck did I wind up becoming a love interest of Benjamin Braddock?"

Are you trying to seduce me, Ms. [name of crit journalist]?

[Pretty Little Flower]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Ah, the low hanging fruit...

You I'll tell to "suck a dick."

Creamy dick?

[Pretty Little Flower]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

So if you went into a Thai restaurant and the chef was a white hippie it wouldn't raise any red flag for you?

I can recognize hippies. I can smell them.

[taxwonk]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

So if you went into a Thai restaurant and the chef was a white hippie it wouldn't raise any red flag for you?

The chef at Pok Pok, this uber-trendy, really good Thai place in Portland (I think). He's now expanding and opening restaurants in other markets. Some of these guys went there for the Peace Corps and fell in love with the culture. Some younger chefs are going there because of the cuisine specifically.

[Icky Thump]

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

If one has designed one's life, consciously or not, in such a way that one will never come across a minority who is not in a service position, then maybe one should rethink one's approach.

TM

Yeah, this discussion made me think about this. When have I lived in more or less isolated worlds?

If I look at facebook and linked in and where my friends and work contacts come from, it has a lot to do with choices I have made. I look at my friends from high school, and the crowd is pretty diverse, despite being from upstate New York. The snooty college got markedly less diverse, though - there was clearly an issue there - and as I scroll through the facebook or linkedin lists, I see almost no black friends and just a few friends from other racial minorities at college. My post college life then got very diverse, which came from working in politics, until I went to law school, where my world got overwhelmingly fucking white again.

White people may complain about affirmative action, but, man, when I look at some of those places, they really need it. Because they're fucking white.

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

This is tough.

I know plenty of kids who were born in Detroit, but their moms busted themselves to get a suburban address so their kids can go to better schools. I get that taking the kids with motivated parents out of Detroit schools has a devastating effect. OTOH I do not know that I could fault any of them for wanting their kid to have a better chance. I mean, their kid is their kid, not a tool for social improvement.

Absolutely agree. And given the fact that it is irrational to think that if you pull your kid out of private school or your zoned district, others will follow suit, no one can truly criticize those personal decisions. But it would be nice if people acknowledged to themselves exactly what is going on and understand that the B-side of that record is the destruction of a group of people who don't share in that opportunity, even if your contribution to that problem is de minimis as an individual.

TM

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

White people may complain about affirmative action, but, man, when I look at some of those places, they really need it. Because they're fucking white.

Whenever I'm in a conversation with someone about the progress black people (or minorities generally) have made, I ask them to do some homework by just taking a look around. Take a look at who's in attendance at your next all-firm partnership meeting. Look around at the next conference you're attending. Take a gander at who makes up the client-base of the semi-high end restaurant you're in. Count the number of minorities at the resort at which your vacationing. Hell, take a stroll around your office, grad school, gated community, kid's private school, whatever.

My wife and I can't help but notice how often we are the only black people in the room. It really is amazing. There's this whole world where white people with money are just so at ease and comfortable. It truly makes no difference where you are. In Puerto Rico we were at a fantastic restaurant and there were zero dark-skinned puerto ricans. In Buenos Aires, we were driven around and through slums with lots of diverse faces, but never saw any of them in the restaurants we were in. Once you're in tune to who has the money, it's really hard not to constantly notice it.

TM

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

Whenever I'm in a conversation with someone about the progress black people (or minorities generally) have made, I ask them to do some homework by just taking a look around. Take a look at who's in attendance at your next all-firm partnership meeting. Look around at the next conference you're attending. Take a gander at who makes up the client-base of the semi-high end restaurant you're in. Count the number of minorities at the resort at which your vacationing. Hell, take a stroll around your office, grad school, gated community, kid's private school, whatever.

My wife and I can't help but notice how often we are the only black people in the room. It really is amazing. There's this whole world where white people with money are just so at ease and comfortable. It truly makes no difference where you are. In Puerto Rico we were at a fantastic restaurant and there were zero dark-skinned puerto ricans. In Buenos Aires, we were driven around and through slums with lots of diverse faces, but never saw any of them in the restaurants we were in. Once you're in tune to who has the money, it's really hard not to constantly notice it.

TM

I don't know, TM, when I look at all the brochures for those places, there are always pictures of smiling highly diverse sets of people on them.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

I don't know, TM, when I look at all the brochures for those places, there are always pictures of smiling highly diverse sets of people on them.

http://www.buzzfeed.com/annehelenpet...cal#.qg1PAGDR7 I JUST read an article on this very thing.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Replaced_Texan

http://www.buzzfeed.com/annehelenpet...cal#.qg1PAGDR7 I JUST read an article on this very thing.

I find this stuff fascinating. I'd love to see how stock images break down by country and by state or province. There are some places that are struggling with race issues in very different ways than we are: like those Scandanavian bastions of heterogeneity where all of a sudden, much to their chagrin, it's possible to find good Bhindi and Jerk and Fu fu.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Icky Thump

Dude, if you smoked more pot, you wouldn't smell them.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

I find this stuff fascinating. I'd love to see how stock images break down by country and by state or province. There are some places that are struggling with race issues in very different ways than we are: like those Scandanavian bastions of heterogeneity where all of a sudden, much to their chagrin, it's possible to find good Bhindi and Jerk and Fu fu.

Track down Anne Helen Petersen's writing in other places. She's very good at analyzing media of in all forms, though her specialty is celebrity gossip. She left academia earlier this year when Buzzfeed made her a great offer, but her writing is in places like the Hairpin and the Toast and some of the Gawker sites.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by taxwonk

The chef at Pok Pok, this uber-trendy, really good Thai place in Portland (I think). He's now expanding and opening restaurants in other markets. Some of these guys went there for the Peace Corps and fell in love with the culture. Some younger chefs are going there because of the cuisine specifically.

pok pok is great but it is no more thai than flower's fish on rice is sushi.

[Pretty Little Flower]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

pok pok is great but it is no more thai than flower's fish on rice is sushi.

There were those who were skeptical of Wynton Marsalis playing classical music because it was a white European music. Others felt that Jackie McLean and Chet Baker were the wrong race to play jazz. But I suspect you would be unable to listen to any of their music and be able to tell the race of the musician.