Over the weekend I went to a party out by my house. Where do I live?? I'm glad you asked: Jefferson County. (Don'ty worry, I've probably heard all the remarks you can make about it...) Anyway, it is my experience at some parties I have attended where the more drunk the guys get, the more racist their jokes become. They all say "C'mon, I'm not racist, I have black friends....but these jokes are just funny" and so on. At the first sign of a racist joke I usually gather my things and leave after giving them a little piece of my mind. (Not everyone out there tells these jokes and usually those that are, are not my friends--I don't want you to get the idea that they are all bad....)
Well, at this most recent party a friend of mine was stirring up trouble, just to get a rise out of people. He was saying that Rush Limbaugh is his idol and that he was crazy about some other well-known guy (whose name escapes me right now....) who is pretty annoying. I was laughing because I could see that a new face in the group did not understand that he was joking and was getting really heated up about all that. People started telling jokes and they were getting close to the edge of "I'm not ok with that" so I said very loudly that if anyone throws out a racist joke I'm outta there. Well this guy looked at me and asked if I was really that up tight....and I simply said "No, I just don't put up with it". No racist jokes were told.
But I was wondering about this guy's comment "are you that up tight?" -- it just stuck with me since then. Maybe it just bothers me that it would be the first thought that came to him...that just because I don't support racist jokes I must be up tight. If I'm up tight, I'm not cool? I need to loosen up? I don't belong? I don't care what he thinks about me, but I am just wondering what that is supposed to mean. Have any of you ever been given a hard time for NOT being racist?
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I definitely have been in and witnessed situations like this. I think it does suddenly become "uncool" to stand up to someone saying a joke because after all... everyone knows the are "just kidding" right? I'm not so sure people are actually kidding when they say these things... i think "just kidding" is a way to cover themselves. I'm really impressed you are able to stand up to these situations because usually I find myself being very awkward and just trying to ignore it....especially if its not said by a friend (I find it easier to tell friends how I feel!) Social issues are often laughed at inappropriately... but race should not be one of them. It is no ones fault for the color of their skin and jokes just help perpetuate the problem. White people laughing it off as "just kidding" is ignorant as well because it is clearly a problem. I think more people at parties need to act like you do because people go along with them even if they dont agree and its wrong.
ReplyDeleteI know exactly what you are talking about because I have been in almost the exact same position. I have many friends, especially here at SLU, who love to make racist and sexist jokes that drive me absolutely insane! I do not and have never found race or sex based jokes funny because as a woman I get sick and tired of being the brunt of everyone's jokes. I can imagine it infuriates other minority groups as well, so I just don't put up with it.
ReplyDeleteI believe that many of us have found ourselves in such a position as yourself, Miranda. I'm proud of you for standing up for your own beliefs in this situation, and impressed that such a show of conviction actually had an effect. Both Lauren and Kelly's responses bring to light an interesting breakdown of these supposedly joking situations. That as a population, there is a large proportion that tend to joke about so-called "social issues." However, the most joked about topics in this sense are usually race or sex based. I find this interesting because these two phenomena are that they are biological in the case of sex and widely perceived as biological in the case of race. Yet, people are far more hesitant to make a joke about something like social class in our society. I find this curious because people are more comfortable making a joke about something that is considered "finite" than a more malleable topic (people can change social class quite easily). I am going to assume this is because of the ability to stereotype more observable things like physical characteristics (skin color and physical features) than something you cannot always differentiate between individuals like their socioeconomic status.
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