{"id":45669,"date":"2014-07-10T12:00:33","date_gmt":"2014-07-10T17:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=45669"},"modified":"2014-07-10T11:14:08","modified_gmt":"2014-07-10T16:14:08","slug":"everyones-a-racist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=45669","title":{"rendered":"Everyone’s A Racist!"},"content":{"rendered":"

SCENE:\u00a0 Mitch BERG is walking through the downtown branch of the Saint Paul Library.\u00a0 He’s way back in the stacks, deeply engrossed in a book, when Avery LIBRELLE pops around the corner.\u00a0 LIBRELLE notices BERG, and tiptoes up to<\/em> him.]<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE:\u00a0 Hey, Merg!<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0 (Startled<\/em>)\u00a0 Huh?\u00a0 Oh.\u00a0 It’s you.<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE:\u00a0\u00a0Bar Louie is Racist!<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0 Oh, the story about the dress code?\u00a0 That’s kind of a stretch.\u00a0<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE:\u00a0 They bar people wearing clothing that only black people wear.\u00a0<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0\u00a0You’ve never worked in a bar, have you?<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE:\u00a0\u00a0 I’ve been to a few.\u00a0 I love the Lurcat.\u00a0<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0 Naturally.\u00a0 But I meant a bar.\u00a0 A hangout.\u00a0 A dive.\u00a0 I worked in bars – places with pool tables and brawls on Friday and Saturday nights.\u00a0 Some of them barred people wearing “colors”.<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE:\u00a0 Because they were racist!<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0 Well, no – it applied to motorcycle club colors just as much as gangs.\u00a0 Our bouncers kept ’em all out.\u00a0<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE: Yabbut Bar Louie’s dress code pretty much applied only to black people.\u00a0<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0 Like Vanilla Ice, Robin Thicke, Ad-Rock and Eminem?<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE:\u00a0 Exac…hey, wait ! Those are white guys who dress like…<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0 …like what?<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE:\u00a0 Like you’re a racist!<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0 Naturally.\u00a0 So here’s a thought experiment for you.\u00a0 Let’s say we started a club.\u00a0 We had a dress code; guys have to wear suits with ties.\u00a0 Is that racist?<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE:\u00a0 Of course!\u00a0<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 Black people don’t wear suits and ties?\u00a0<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE:\u00a0 Of course they do.<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0 I thought they wore sports jerseys and flat-billed baseball caps?\u00a0<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE:\u00a0 Well, not all <\/em>of them…<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0 …what’s that?\u00a0 Not all black people are identified by their clothing?\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE: [stares blankly, jaw slowly undulating up and down<\/em>]<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0 Let’s try this on for size.\u00a0 Pick a bar.\u00a0<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE:\u00a0 The Lurcat!<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0 OK, sure, the Lurcat.\u00a0 Let’s say as you’re walking toward the Lurcat, you see a group of burly white guys in biker leathers wearing motorcycle club colors.\u00a0 They’re drunk, they’re looking aggressive.\u00a0 Do you go in?\u00a0<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE:\u00a0 That’s silly.\u00a0<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0 Or a bunch of intoxicated white guys in grubby jeans and “wife-beater” tank tops waving pool cues about….<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE:\u00a0 Don’t be silly. The Lurcat would never…[pauses, stops<\/em>]<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0 They’d never allow people in biker gang colors\u00a0in their joint, much less set up pool tables to draw the blue-collar crowd?\u00a0 Because they’re racists?\u00a0<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE:\u00a0 Because…[head slowly rolls about<\/em>]<\/p>\n

\u00a0BERG:\u00a0 Because social cues have meaning.<\/p>\n

LIBRELLE:\u00a0 Stereotyping people!\u00a0 That’s just so typical of you bitter gun-clinging Jeeeeebus freaks in flyoverland!<\/p>\n

BERG:\u00a0 Sure.\u00a0 Later!<\/p>\n

(And SCENE<\/em>)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SCENE:\u00a0 Mitch BERG is walking through the downtown branch of the Saint Paul Library.\u00a0 He’s way back in the stacks, deeply engrossed in a book, when Avery LIBRELLE pops around the corner.\u00a0 LIBRELLE notices BERG, and tiptoes up to him.] LIBRELLE:\u00a0 Hey, Merg! BERG:\u00a0 (Startled)\u00a0 Huh?\u00a0 Oh.\u00a0 It’s you. LIBRELLE:\u00a0\u00a0Bar Louie is Racist! BERG:\u00a0 Oh, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54,18],"tags":[236],"class_list":["post-45669","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ebony-and-ivory","category-pc","tag-dramatization"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45669","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=45669"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45669\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45673,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45669\/revisions\/45673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=45669"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=45669"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=45669"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}