The Rude Pundit: A Defense of Paula Deen Followed By a Condemnation

[meegbear]

If you don't like "the N-word", stop reading NOW!! -- meegbear





(Note: The Rude Pundit doesn't use the phrase "the N-word" because he's not a fucking child.)

Really, is there anyone who didn't think that TV chef and restauranteur Paula Deen didn't say "nigger" at some point in her life? Because the Rude Pundit's gotta tell ya, that revelation is about as surprising as James Gandolfini dying of a heart attack. The first time you look at or hear Deen, you know that a racial epithet or two, at least, passed through those lard-slicked lips. If you think that it was "shocking," you must live in a narrow little world of perfect liberals and you're more than likely white.

Unlike most people commenting on Deen's situation, the Rude Pundit has actually read the entire tedious transcript of her deposition in the harassment lawsuit filed against her and others by Lisa Jackson, an ex-general manager of one of her restaurants, and he has a few problems with the destruction of Deen because of the allegations of racism against her because she said a bad word.

One aspect here that ought to bug the shit out of everyone is that Deen confessed to saying "nigger" and other racist stuff while under oath. She was asked about conversations between her and Jackson. It would have been the easiest possible thing for her to simply deny everything. After all, there were only two people there. Yeah, it would have been perjury, but that would have been impossible to prove. Instead, Deen admitted that she had said "nigger" and that she had loved a restaurant with sharply-dressed black waiters who acted "professionally," even going so far as pondering how she might be able to do such a thing in a place of her own, but afraid that "the media" would misinterpret it. Again, take points away from her on many levels, but she said she said it. She owned her words, for good and for ill. The lesson for others is to lie, if you think you can get away with it.

This is the point where a white guy who was raised in the South tells you how it was. He doesn't do this to forgive anyone's sins or excuse anything. He does this to say that, unless you did grow up in the South in the 1980s, there's things you don't get. And he does this with full knowledge that he is white and that he cannot know how it was to be black during that era (or any era). All he can say is that this is how we lived because he lived it. There. Is that enough caveats? Fine. Then gather 'round, children, and listen:

In eighth grade, the Rude Pundit's social studies teacher in Louisiana, Mrs. Broussard, was talking about immigrants to the United States in the late 19th century and the harsh, Sinclair's Jungle-like conditions under which they had to live. She told us that she would have rather been a slave in the south than an immigrant in the north because, as she put it, "All you had to do was what they told you and you'd have a roof over your head and food to eat. You only got beaten if you did something wrong." No one, black or white, in that classroom disputed it, and, in fact, both blacks and whites agreed with her when talking about it later (although the Rude Pundit, upon reflection, decided that he'd have probably preferred to have the freedom to walk around and, you know, maybe make some choices of his own).

The Rude Pundit's high school, like most high schools in the district, gave out awards at the end of the year. Among those awards - and he cannot emphasize enough that this was in the 1980s - was "Best All-Around Black" and "Best All-Around White." A male and a female were voted on by all students for each. The thinking was, and he swears this is true and propagated by the teachers and administrators, no black student would ever have the grades to be best and no white student would ever be as good an athlete as the black students. No one thought there was anything wrong with this back then because students wanted that award. In fact, this "separate but equal" approach was seen as enlightened because it guaranteed that black and white students would get awards. (Fun fact: in the Rude Pundit's class, the "Best All-Around Black Male" is now a big-time lawyer in Seattle. The "Best All-Around White Male" is a bartender in Breaux Bridge.)

And, back then, if as a white person, you didn't say the word "nigger" yourself, you sure as shit knew plenty of white people of all ages who did. (Although, you know, the Rude Pundit has racked his brain for a time when he might have used it back then, but he can't think of one that wasn't a rap or Richard Pryor quote. Weird. When he started writing this, he was sure he was gonna confess to something. Huh.)

One other thing here: the Rude Pundit went to plenty of nice restaurants with black waiters in tuxes. Since most of the patrons were white, they were often playing up a kind of Old South vibe to please the customers. It always made him feel uncomfortable because it not only was fake, but the white people mostly either didn't know or gladly went along with the act, enjoying a few minutes being Massa.

Paula Deen was asked if she had ever said "nigger" in her life. She said she had. She was honest about whites in the South during a certain time period in a way that few whites in the South are. It doesn't meant that she or anyone gets a pass. But she should not lose her livelihood for that (and, remember, she's got something of an empire - if she goes down, others employees go down with her).

However, the deposition also makes perfectly clear that Paula Deen is a desperately stupid but lucky person whose vile family members, especially her brother, Bubba, fer fuck's sake, are the kind of ignorant, hateful motherfuckers who deserve nothing less than being forced to live in a ditch for the rest of their depraved lives. It is her blind loyalty to these cretins, people who, by Deen's admission, regularly spout racist shit now (not in the past) and are, at best, drunk, redneck shitheels who think their proximity to Deen makes them special.

See, the Rude Pundit has also read Lisa Walker's complaint. And if even half of what is there is true, Bubba Hiers should have been fired and made to wash dishes in a backwoods catfish joint. Deen's defense of Hiers and his racism at work is far, far worse than her admission of her own in private. Frankly, it's more offensive that she dismisses his use of "nigger" than that she herself said it 25 years ago.

One more story: The Rude Pundit worked in a warehouse, unloading trucks, for a couple of years. While African-Americans worked there, one of the crews had just a single black worker, Melvin. The warehouse's supervisor was a white relative of the Rude Pundit's who he had heard say racist things during more than a few family dinners. But when whites on the warehouse crew started to call Melvin all kinds of things, including "coon" and "porch monkey," Melvin, who trusted the supervisor, went to him to complain. Instead of dismissing it, the Rude Pundit's relative-supervisor came raging into the warehouse and tore into the whites, putting them on notice that if they said one more harassing thing to Melvin, he would fire all of them but Melvin. The harassment ended there.

Paula Deen apparently stood by while her brother and other employees degraded women and minorities at at least one of her restaurants. For that, she deserves what's happened to her.

(Note: The Rude Pundit's basic attitude is "Fuck Paula Deen." She made a ton of money getting people fat and getting them to believe that eating piles of fattening shit was somehow just fine. This is not to even get into the cultural colonialism of her appropriation of African-American cooking without an acknowledgement of it. Then, after it turned out she had diabetes because of the butter-rich slops she threw in a trough to gorge on, she hid her disease for a couple of years until she signed a deal with a pharmaceutical company. And her TV show was just awful. So, yeah, fuck her.)

http://rudepundit.blogspot.com/

[ChairmanAgnostic]

1. from your keyboard to her heart bypass operating table.

She's not the kind who takes advice well, given the sums she wasted on the top PR & spin control firm in the country.

[mn9driver]

2. Yep.

There are an awful lot of people who joined in the 3 minute hate for Ms. Deen who have obviously never set foot south of anywhere. People who confuse words and ingrained culture with their academic idea of what "racism" is, and who probably think they can pin the whole concept down with that neat and tidy label.

People are rarely just labels, and Deen is no exception. But DU has lately become a place where labels and particular words are often more important than discussion. In fact, large parts of many threads remind me of the sort of simplistic cartoon world that exists over at FR.

Of course, pointing that out generally results in an attack shitstorm. I doubt the Rude One cares. Thanks for posting it.

[Zoeisright]

3. What a bunch of bullshit.

Racism is alive and well in this country, and it is particularly ingrained in the south. I have far more than a "three minute hate" for that prick Deen and her repulsive brother. This is about people who defend racists and misogynists and about the idiots who think there is no more racism in this country because some people of color are successful. This is about the working conditions in HER restaurants that broke the law and routinely demeaned anyone who wasn't a white man. Grow the fuck up.

Of course, pointing that out generally results in an attack shitstorm.

[mn9driver]

4. Yawn.

See what I mean?

[LuvNewcastle]

5. I agree with the Rude One.

All of this is not about something she said a long time ago. It's not even about something she said five minutes ago. It's about the shit she allowed to go on in her company. She either agreed with all the bullshit that went on around her or she didn't give enough of a shit about it to change it. Regardless of who did what, she is ultimately responsible for her company and she should pay the price for how she ran it.

[sofa king]

6. My evil defense of Paula Deen.

Sometimes, there is little point in fighting an evil, and I have to confess that I try less hard when I see that evil working in my own favor. That certainly makes me a little bit evil, too, and while I don't like it, there it is.

Let's skip for the moment that Paula Deen's utterance is in no way diluted by its commonality in our culture, rather it is amplified by its common use. That's not the perpetuation of evil that I wish to talk about.

Instead, let's skip to the mass-killing of Republican voters part. What? You didn't notice that part?

See, conservatives have continued to hate upon public health services even as they have lost their jobs, homes, pensions, and retirements (much of that sacrificed in an ultimately futile attempt to keep gay people from being miserable, by the way). They cannot afford to be sick any longer, and the policies they were suckered into supporting have ensured that there is no social safety net to help them once they do get sick, so death is the cheapest item on the menu for them.

Conservatives are also easily duped and doublecrossed simply by seeing a liberal point out the truth. So as long as "tha librul medea" continues to point out Deen's faults, her stock raises in their eyes. As we speak, more conservatives are heading over to check out her healthy livin.'

Paula Deen has a cooking show that offers horrifically unhealthy recipes that, over time, are sure to cause diabetes. Then, during the commercial breaks, she offers a treatment--NOT A CURE--for the disease her recipes cause.

That's a profitable racket for her, but for conservatives who have already lost everything, they can afford the diet, but not the treatment to prevent the diet from killing them. So they are dying.

Better educated voters, of course, are far less susceptible to all of these things, and are not dying as fast from Deen's show.

Therefore, Paula Deen is disproportionately killing off an unknown but certainly huge number of conservative voters, resecting their political influence both in the short term (some voters will be too sick to vote, will vote in their own interests (not Republican, ever), will be forced to migrate into urban areas with better services and have their votes absorbed, or will die before the next election) and the long term (conservative voters now have a shorter "shelf life" and vote in fewer elections over their abbreviated lifetimes than their liberal counterparts).

What Deen is doing is converting political power--voters--into cash for herself and her corporate overlords, at the ultimate expense of the conservative politicians and the conservative voters.

So let's cut to the chase here. Paula Deen has money of her own and the support of the most powerful and evil people in the world. She'll be back, bigger than ever in every possible sense, and so will her uninformed and largely conservative clientele. No matter what we do.

The less we do, the more conservative voters die, the sooner they die off, the sooner we get to rebuild this country.

So I'm gonna go walk the dog now. And y'all have a nice day.

[nyquil_man]

7. She's nothing special, either in her attitudes or in her career.

Cable TV seems to have an obsession with these pig-ignorant rednecks who represent the very worst of the South. I grew up in the region and I've had my fill of them, up close and personal.

I'm glad to see her go. She's one less highly visible embarrassment.

[msanthrope]

8. He expressed my feelings after reading the complaint exactly---

Bubba Heirs is an utter piece of shit, and Deen's covering for him was a vile choice she should have to pay for. The issue is hostile work environment... using the N word is such a small albeit revolting part of this. yes it's disgusting..... but the shit that was detailed in her complaint is unconscionable.

[bullwinkle428]

9. A well thought-out essay by RP, and makes the extremely salient point

that the reason she's at the receiving end of a shitstorm is how she allowed her brother to treat all of the AA employees of theirs, and NOT for what she said, be it 30 years ago or 5 minutes ago!