ATR 111 – Kirstie Alley, Sotomayor, interracial roommates, Birth of a Nation
by Carmen Van Kerckhove
Addicted to Race is New Demographic’s podcast about America’s obsession with race. Here’s a rundown of what you’ll find in this episode:
What does the recent Twitter exchange between actress Kirstie Alley and media assassin Harry Allen tell us about this country’s discourse on race? Is the brouhaha surrounding Sonia Sotomayor’s nomination indicative of anxiety on the part of white males that they are an endangered species? Can dorming with a student of another race turn you less or more racist? And why is DJ Spooky’s “(Re)Birth of a Nation” experiment an epic fail? Carmen Van Kerckhove, Tami Winfrey Harris, and Andrea Plaid discuss.
Addicted to Race is broadcast live every Sunday afternoon at 12 pm Eastern. You can listen live on our BlogTalkRadio page and call in by dialing 347-996-3958.
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Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of
Trishana wrote:
I also think the idea of the exception to the rule also resonates with President Barack Obama. Many people think Barack Obama is the exception to the rule and every other black person or person of mixed heritage is just another stereotype. Some white people do feel like this country is post race now that we have a mixed race person as president and any more “complaining” from people of color is just unwarranted. A lot of the vibes that I get from white people is “We elected a black president. What more do you people want?” Just because America elected a person of color does not mean years of racism are automatically erased.
Posted 19 Jul 2009 at 4:50 pm ¶
Lxy wrote:
Is the brouhaha surrounding Sonia Sotomayor’s nomination indicative of anxiety on the part of white males that they are an endangered species?
Endangered species? LoL.
More like the Sotomayor hearing reflects an underlying White nationalist paranoia about not completely being the master … sorry majority race in the USA.
Never mind that Sotomayor’s actual judicial history does not represent any fundamental challenge to an American criminal injustice system that, for instance, massively imprisons racial minorities completely disproportionate to their numbers.
Freedom Rider: The Sotomayor Hype
http://www.blackagendareport.com/?q=content/freedom-rider-sotomayor-hype
But even a tokenistic symbolic “change” in the Supreme Court is too much to bear for many White nationalists/rightists in the USA.
A lot of the vibes that I get from white people is “We elected a black president. What more do you people want?” Just because America elected a person of color does not mean years of racism are automatically erased
This is probably one of the reasons why Obama was supported by much of White America: as a new multiracial political mask for the same old racist US system.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 3:37 am ¶
maus wrote:
“A lot of the vibes that I get from white people is “We elected a black president. What more do you people want?””
But those seem to be primarily the obnoxious younger “south park republicans”, and if they voted Obama, they did so for bandwagon reasons. I seriously don’t see many mainstream Dems/Progressives who voted for him who would raise hell about affirmative action.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 5:30 am ¶
mike wrote:
Sometimes I really feel like you guys are missing the guys perspective in some of your podcasts. On the Kristie Alley segment I felt like much of it missed the point. I don’t really find her tweet posts offensive at all, sure they were racial but Kirstie Alley is hardly a beacon of wisdom. She’s become a comedian of sorts and I don’t think the intention of her post was to be offensive. Secondly, I think that we would have to assume a lot more for it to be offensive.
On the whole weight thing, I think what she was giving voice to is that there are two very different ideas of what it means to be beautiful in both the black and white world. I don’t think that it was about black men finding intrigue in ‘hideous’ women it was more that black men have different conceptions of beauty than white men.
Posted 20 Jul 2009 at 4:25 pm ¶
julia clare wrote:
I disagree, Mike, I think the discussion was really rich and nuanced. I especially liked how you all we able to bring together the “black bootys” converation — and Alley’s obsession with weight, and her projections onto black women/the black community (not to mention the Fat Boys…LOL) about weight…I thought it was really well done. This was definitely one of my favorite podcasts so far.
I was wondering if anyone had the link for the Racism Resistor blog that Karmen mentioned? I tried entering the URL but I must have gotten something wrong [speaking of, I think it would be really great if someone, maybe a listener?, could go ahead and post all the links mentioned in a podcast when the podcast gets released]…
Posted 21 Jul 2009 at 6:44 am ¶
AJ Plaid wrote:
@mike–
I think what Latoya said in her mod comment on the Kirstie Alley thread best answers your comment:
“If all your comments are following the same vein i.e. ‘I don’t really think this is racist…’ this is not the blog for you.”
Your comment, IMO, is very much in that vein.
Posted 21 Jul 2009 at 9:08 am ¶
vcious wrote:
Just to let you know, on iTunes, the episode that downloads is from last week. It says ATR 111 but when I began listening it was the one about race and sex.
Posted 21 Jul 2009 at 12:57 pm ¶