If you are one of the five people who didn't see Oprah's interview with Meghan Markle and her hubby last night, you might want to sit this blog post out. I watched it instead of the NBA All Star game (don't judge) and I'm glad I did because I was able to contribute my two cents to the water cooler coterie today.
First, I have to come clean about my background. I am a product of the British Commonwealth (Jamaica), and for better or for worse, I understand the concept of the Monarchy and the ridiculous adulation and reverence that those who are in the fold command. I also understand the history of racism and colonizing that comes with the House of Windsor and the British Empire.
I was probably the least surprised person in America to hear that certain members of the Royal family (or "the firm" as Meghan called them) worried about baby Archie being too dark. Most white Americans were shocked to hear that the Royals might be racist. Black folks were like...duh! Tell us something we didn't already know. It didn't take Meghan (bless her half black soul) to figure it out. One could argue that Meghan was seriously naive if she didn't see all of this coming. Or, the other school of thought is that she might be playing us all. Maybe she knew all along what was coming and rode it out for maximum benefit.
What has been interesting is listening to certain folks who automatically jump to the defense of the Royals and declare that they are not racist, and that Meghan is simply being a drama Queen. (I see you white Santa lady.) These folks, like Piers Morgan and those of his ilk, are always quick to defend the racist status quo. We all know that if Meghan Markle looked like Kate Middleton the British press wouldn't have treated her the way that they did, and people like Piers Morgan and Megyn Kelly would be much more sympathetic to what she had to deal with.
Personally, I am glad that Meghan Markle and her husband were able to break away. I am glad she got to tell her truth to Oprah, and that seventeen million Americans got a chance to hear it.
Honestly, I have never understood the fascination with the Royal family, because, frankly, they have no impact on the lives of most people in the world, and they perform primarily ceremonial functions in Britain. I didn't hear anything last night that I didn't already know, but watching the reaction of others and the way this story has captured the zeitgeist of the moment has been interesting to say the least.th
I wish Meghan and her husband the best. Hopefully they will be able to live out their years, and just soak up the California sun without any drama.
I would be careful, though. Remember what happened to Diana
That's Meghan Markle? News to me. She's half-black? Also news to me, and I wouldn't have guessed from her picture. Not only is 'race' pseudo-science, skin 'color' is an exaggeration. We're all brown, just different tints. Really, 'white' isn't a biological category, or even an optical description; it's a club, one that you can buy into, and one that they'll beat you with if you don't. If Meghan Markle isn't white, then who is?
ReplyDeleteParadoctor,
ReplyDeleteI agree totally with you. You nailed it. I have never been able to logically explain why light tanish pink people should be called white. The only truly white people suffer from a condition called albinism, defined as an "inherited disorder where there is little or no production of the pigment melanin." https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/albinism/symptoms-causes/syc-20369184
Therefore, I believe that racism based on skin tint developed to justify the enslavement of people with darker skin than the people who enslaved them. It's all nonsense of course, but the people who profit from it refuse to give it up.
I wish we truly were a "color-blind" society.
I really think she was naive about this, especially being a biracial person who looks very racially ambiguous. My ex husband is biracial, and I was the first person to explain the finer points of the one drop rule to him... at 40 years of age. We also had endless conversations about why his white grandparents would never accept him. He really believed that having a white parent meant something in this racist, colorist world. I think Meghan has had a similar experience.
ReplyDelete"Maybe she knew all along what was coming and rode it out for maximum benefit." You lost me there, Field. What benefit could there be in pretending to be shocked by racism at The Firm, or by being unwanted, or to have, finally, her chosen husband and children under these circumstances?
ReplyDeleteIt's quite a contrast: British and palace racism revealed while the George Floyd justice bill awaits passage in the Senate. Hurt feelings among the royals while we try to stop the unending stream of police brutalizations and executions against black citizens.
I didn't see the interview but today's press can't get enough of it. Oprah knows her business.
I believe that racism based on skin tint developed to justify the enslavement of people with darker skin than the people who enslaved them.
ReplyDeleteThat's bullshit and you know it. Turks and Arabs are darker-skinned than Europeans, but they enslaved lighter-skinned people all the time (including Irish from Baltimore). The English word "slave" comes from "slav", because that's where the Turks raided most for slaves.
Chattel slavery was established in the English colonies due to a suit pressed by an African (Anthony Johnson). We have no pictures of Johnson and his slave John Casor, but it's a good bet that neither was any darker than the other.
It's all nonsense of course, but the people who profit from it refuse to give it up.
The ones who refuse to give it up are the likes of Arabs and Chinese.
I wish we truly were a "color-blind" society.
You mean, abolish the NAACP and all the affirmative action, special scholarships and business set-asides and just judge people by their actions and actual abilities? Hold blacks RESPONSIBLE for their misbehavior? You'd never stand for that, and you know it.
BRAIN DEAD JOE BIDEN opens the southern US border and now is SHOCKED tens of Thousands of ILLEGAL BEANERS are storming into America!
ReplyDeleteShe brought her ghetto attitude to Buckingham Palace and treated the staff poorly.
ReplyDeleteGambler2: Albinos are pink. The only white-as-in-white people I’ve ever seen are fictional. Boris Badenov, Casper the Friendly Ghost, Frosty the Snowman, Nosferatu, the Borg. One Halloween I saw a guy dressed as the Pillsbury Doughboy. White shoes, pants, shirt, gloves, chef’s hat, and white grease paint on wrists, neck, and face. Damn spooky costume.
ReplyDeleteI wrote a Kafkaesque tale in which Richard Spencer, after troubled dreams, awoke to find himself transformed in his bed into a white man. Hilarity ensued. Rex Morgan MD was baffled; Dr. Kildare was pessimistic.
I forgot to mention the Sta-Puft Marshmallow Man.
ReplyDeleteI propose that the tint of brown of the skin of people of European descent be called ‘caucasian’, with a small c.
ReplyDeleteI’d like to see a science-fiction show starring the Viridians, who have green skin, with slightly different tints that they’re racist about, which the Humans have trouble distinguishing, and constantly screw up.
I feel like Meghan Markle was unprepared for the demands of royalty. She might have thought she was already famous and it wouldn’t be a huge change; however, she was only a b-list actress on a mediocre TV drama. The intensity of the spotlight that the British monarch and immediate family live under is so much more intense.
ReplyDeleteAnd that’s before you take into account the horribleness of the British right-wing newspapers, who almost immediately loathed her. This was because they thought her identity unsuitable for a princess (biracial, American, divorced, a Hollywood actress), because she has mildly left-wing opinions (British wingnuts consider the monarchy a conservative pillar of society and so were horrified by the notion of a “woke” princess), and because she and Harry didn’t give them the amount of media access and interviews that they felt entitled to.
I do think that she could have toughed it out. If she’d stayed in the UK, the press would eventually have moved on and targeted some new villain for their readers to jeer at. In a few years, they’d all be acting like “oh we love Meghan!” as if their earlier demonization had never happened. Although, it is admittedly a lot easier for me to say Meghan could have toughed it out than it would have been for her to actually do it. It has to be deeply painful to have to regularly read nasty things about yourself in the papers when you’re trying your best not to elicit that response.
And I do question how much the royal family could have really done to shield her from this treatment, though Meghan seemed to think they could but were refusing to. The royals have minimal political power and are mostly ceremonial at this point, as Field noted. They owe their status entirely to remaining popular with the British public, and so they cannot risk their reputations being tarnished by launching an all-out war with the press. They are stuck with the approach of cajoling and flattering the press and trying to avoid controversy, unsatisfying though that may be when confronted with intentional defamation by media barons.
Meghan and Harry are well rid of the Firm.
ReplyDeleteGambler2: "White" and "black" are exaggerations, ideological in source, visibly risible if you use your own eyes rather than other people's lies.
ReplyDeleteMy imaginary Viridians, upthread, are slightly lime green and slightly olive green, but they call it white and black, to Human's bafflement.
Here's another science-fiction fantasy, one that I'm sure will come true: the Paint Job. Gene engineers figure out how to make your children's skin tint be whatever you choose. The procedure is gene engineering's first killer app. It is cheap, quick, safe, effective, a huge market success, and intensely controversial. The ironic upshot is that it makes racism, like religious bigotry, about an _invisible_ stigma.
I admit I am that 5th person who did not watch the interview, no tv programming of any kind. I have a tv I use to watch dvds.
ReplyDeleteI am as sick of the royal squabbling as I am of drumpf and his humping magats. As for racism in royals, it is in their DNA, same as magats.
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ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteThe closest thing to an actual "white" person I ever saw was my friend Rob in 1989 right after the Cypress structure fell down right across the low wall of the wrecking yard where he was working.
ReplyDeleteIt passed fairly quickly, though, as there was all of the sudden a lot of work to be done.
-Doug in Sugar Pine
Piers Morgan, Meghan's biggest hater in UK media, had an on-air spat with some other TV personality because Morgan accused her of lying in her interview (about some royal making racist comments, or her mental health complaints, or whatever), then stomped off set. And then he either quit or got fired from his TV show.
ReplyDeleteMorgan is a massive jerk, and was a big Trump fan until recently, so this is pretty satisfying.
Not that he'll be gone for long. There is always a place for sneery, hate-spewing commentators, unfortunately.
Oh good. Candace Owens is getting her own stupid talk show, to be shown on Ben Shapiro's wingnut website. She'll be the Oprah of self-hate, I guess.
ReplyDeleteJust what the world needed.
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ReplyDeleteDear "You People are Insane,"
ReplyDeleteIt's so refreshing to hear from an expert. So many people talk about slavery without having any idea of the historical context. I think it is important in any relevant discussion to take all of human history into account. That's why whenever I take up the topic of slavery I always like to start with the slaves of the great Pharaoh Khufu who built the tallest of the pyramids at Giza. I then will often segue into the well-known bible stories such as how Joseph was brutally sold into slavery by his jealous brothers. Joseph was a good slave and soon gained favor in the eyes of the Pharaoh. Then I like to put things in perspective by talking about Saint Paul and his really good guesses about how Jesus might have felt about slavery.
Many people get caught in the trap of putting slavery into the context of the European settlers of the lower North American continent between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries. An even more myopic view of slavery only looks at historical slavery within the United States of America. Silly people like this often equate darker skin as a justification for enslavement. Nothing could be further from the truth. When you think about it, with the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act it was entirely possible that the meddling Northern States might have found a path to acceptance of slavery by the South. Abolitionist agitators and the conductors of the Underground Railroad really destroyed a good thing for all of us. We already had freed slaves. A slave could be legally freed by a benefactor who was willing to give up his claim to the slave or a purchaser who might buy the freedom of a slave.
Thank you for the clear, ringing voice of sanity once again. People often forget that even our beloved Saint Patrick was once sold into slavery. Good show.
I'm with you Paradoctor. Sometimes it's the furthest thing from your mind until a racist so kindly points it out. I believe that a kinder, gentler way of pointing it out used to be the term olive-colored skin. Maybe I'm showing my age.
ReplyDeleteWhere I live there are just as many people with pigmentation as there are lily-white sons-of-bitches like myself. Even if I do have a nice tan. You just can't really take the time to notice it. It doesn't make sense. People are beautiful.
"You People Must be Insane," certainly gets it. He says, "No fucking way those Turkish bastards are white!"/s
lolz
Fani Willis has hired John Floyd to assist her with any RICO investigations or prosecutions in the case against Fergus in Georgia.
ReplyDeleteFergus might indeed be in a heap of trouble.
-Doug in Sugar Pine
I do not think the royals are racist at all. But it is definitely a class issue. Eg - Kate was never accepted for years due to here being middle class.
ReplyDeleteAnonymous said...
ReplyDeleteBRAIN DEAD JOE BIDEN opens the southern US border and now is SHOCKED tens of Thousands of ILLEGAL BEANERS are storming into America!
9:42 AM
------------------
The media is shocked, but Biden is not. Your opinion that he is brain dead is ridiculous, and even if he were, he is surrounded by some of the brightest, most knowledgeable people on the planet. Furthermore, most of the people wanting to come into the U.S. are from countries in Central America, not Mexico. They are coming because the United States' foreign policy of the last hundred years has screwed up their countries. Obviously, your knowledge of history is nonexistent.
"Remember what happened to Diana."
ReplyDeleteI'm fairly confident that is etched into Harry's consciousness.
“BRAIN DEAD JOE BIDEN opens the southern US border and now is SHOCKED tens of Thousands of ILLEGAL BEANERS are storming into America!”
ReplyDeleteBiden hasn’t “opened” the border. He has just stopped abusing wannabe migrants AT the border (or pressuring Mexico to abuse them) in an effort to deter them from coming here.
This is not a crisis. The vast majority of the unaccompanied children will be deported back home after processing. At some point, it will sink in that unaccompanied children don’t have any special asylum rights here (there seems to be a myth about this in some parts of Latin America), and their parents will stop sending them.
It is not necessary to be gratuitously cruel in order to enforce our immigration laws. Thank goodness we know longer have people like Stephen Miller in government, tasked with brainstorming creative ways to inflict misery on people who are committing the terrible crime of wanting to live and work in America.
*“no longer”
ReplyDeleteMore details have come out on Piers Morgan’s departure from his morning news show. Apparently, his bosses demanded he apologize for saying Meghan was lying during her Oprah interview when she said hostile UK media coverage of her had caused her to have suicidal thoughts. He refused to apologize, so they fired him.
ReplyDeleteMerrick Garland confirmed as Biden's AG. Now, maybe magats can watch and learn how a real AG does his job, prosecuting crooks like drumpf and magats.
ReplyDeleteRepublicans meeting after seeing that Merrick Garland was confirmed.
ReplyDeleteTaking a break from fulminating about Dr. Seuss, it seems Republicans' (Jim Jordan and Matt Gaetz) newest cause is ... #FreeBritney.
ReplyDeleteWith all the serious problems our country is dealing with, this is the kind of crap that Republicans spend time worrying about. I can only shake my head.
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ReplyDeletedrumpfuck jr say he could care less about Meghan then proceeded to bloviate for 8 minutes about her and her Prince.
ReplyDeleteI had hoped drumpf's just curled up and rotted away. No such luck so far.
Meghan is head and shoulders easier on the eyes than drumpf drash.
ReplyDeleteLet's see... The Republicans had a trifecta during the first half of the Fergus administration and their only major legislative accomplishment for his entire term was a $1.9 trillion dollar tax cut for corporations and the wealthy that was mostly used to buy back stock and enhance the wealth of the stockholders in those corporations.
ReplyDeleteThe Democrats now have a precarious trifecta and in the first fifty days have passed a $1.9 trillion rescue plan that funds the vaccination effort to end the covid pandemic, rescues state and local governments which have borne the brunt of the frontline covid response and were staring down the barrel of massive layoffs of teachers and firefighters and cops, cuts child poverty in half and poverty at large by a third, reduces the cost of health insurance for millions of citizens while also making COBRA insurance for those who have lost jobs that came with their health insurance free for a couple of years.
And more ways the ACA is shored up and expanded to meet the needs of the covid infected and the covid unemployed.
And because of reconciliation, those healthcare provisions have to expire at the end of next year, right after the midterms, which are now officially about keeping one's health insurance by reelecting Democrats or losing it by electing Republicans.
You know, as a Democrat, you don't get that many opportunities to be unambiguously proud of them as politicians, but this is one of those times. As president Biden said to then president Obama a decade ago, this is a big fucking deal.
-Doug in Sugar Pine
Black Man Accused Of Killing Wife Allegedly Made Kids Open Christmas Presents In Front Of Her Body
ReplyDeletehttps://www.yahoo.com/huffpost/william-wallace-murder-trial-christmas-presents-231153214.html?soc_src=social-sh&soc_trk=ma
She is about as credible as Tawana Brawley......
ReplyDeleteYou think people would learn after the juicy smollette debacle.......
ReplyDeleteMagats have no credibility accusing POC as liars with a yoooge drumpf albatross around you lying necks.
ReplyDeleteFauxknee kristian wasicu child molesters get turned in by molested daughter for all kinds of abuse on rebellious girls. What a fucking surprise!
ReplyDeletehttps://www.rawstory.com/circle-of-hope-girls-ranch/?traffic_source=Connatix
102 felony counts between the two white monsters.
Trump's epic losing streak continues.
ReplyDeleteTrump campaign loses defamation lawsuit against New York Times over Russia ‘quid pro quo’ op-ed
https://www.theroot.com/michael-regan-confirmed-as-1st-black-man-to-lead-enviro-1846455324
ReplyDeletehttps://www.theroot.com/michael-regan-confirmed-as-1st-black-man-to-lead-enviro-1846455324
ReplyDeleteMerrick Garland was confirmed, and prosecutors in both NYC and Georgia have hired RICO experts to work on Fergus' cases.
ReplyDeleteHave fun in jail, Ferg.
-Doug in Sugar Pine
Oklahoma's House of Representatives passed a bill intended to allow drivers to legally drive over and kill protesters who try to block streets and highways.
ReplyDeleteI'm surprised they didn't name it something like the Smush BLM Act. That's clearly what they're going for.
Have the Republicans passed through the moral event horizon?
ReplyDelete“Have the Republicans passed through the moral event horizon?”
ReplyDeleteA long time ago. Time to kill the party off and start over.
Daytona bike week is slightly less likely to become a superspreader event than Sturgis was because the weather is warmer making it less likely that there will be large, unmasked, indoor gatherings.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, it's in Florida, so perhaps all bets are off on the dangerous behavior front.
-Doug in Sugar Pine
"Daytona bike week is slightly less likely to become a superspreader event than Sturgis was because the weather is warmer making it less likely that there will be large, unmasked, indoor gatherings.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, it's in Florida, so perhaps all bets are off on the dangerous behavior front."
I'm sure there will still be all sorts of indoor drunken socializing.
Both because it's Ron "mini Trump" DeSantis' Florida, and because I figure a significant number of the attendees will be idiots of the "COVID is just the flu" persuasion and will make zero effort to avoid infection.
I did see "fuck covid, let's ride" shirts... But riding isn't what spreads covid, it's the indoor stuff.
ReplyDelete-Doug in Sugar Pine
The White Right wingers are so insecure that even this pop cultural issue of Meaghan Markle's calling out the racism of the British Royal Family has caused them to appear on this site and try to hijack the thread and divert attention away from these claims.
ReplyDeleteCut through their propaganda about "individual liberty," that is White Conservativism is really about: Conserving White power and wealth, which according to them doesn't really exist because they are "color blind."
Minneapolis agrees to 27 million dollar settlement with George Floyd family over his death.
ReplyDeletehttps://news.yahoo.com/stacey-dash-apologizes-political-past-235354217.html
ReplyDeleteDash does buyer's remorse over drumpf and magats.
Piers Morgan was so spot on, he is one of "yours" is he not???
ReplyDeleteTawana Brawly II
ReplyDeleteYeah, what happened to Diana would give one Pause, wouldn't it? I Wish the Young Couple well and to live in Peace. I find it hard to Believe either of them didn't know this would happen tho' or why anyone would be Surprised. My Mom was Welsh and the English and Royal Family have treated the Welsh, Irish and Scotch as sub-humans and dominated them... not to mention all the Colonies and Oppression of those inhabitants... so, DUH! I also don't understand the devotion to the Monarchy, long past due to abolish it and utilize the money for the good of the regular people.
ReplyDeleteThe Negress of Sussex went into the UK expecting to tell them how to be and what to do. The UK is, uh, a WHITE culture. Why should they listen to some mulatto American divorcée's opinion?
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile, the royals went out of their way to spend a couple million on a house for her, a few more million on her dream wedding, Prince Charles was kind enough to walk the Negress down the aisle because she blew off her real father, and they let her bring her hellfire-and-brimstone black preacher to their Anglican church service. They did all they could to make her feel welcome.
But that wasn't enough. Typical negro attitude. Gimme mo' .