Thursday, May 07, 2009

Field questionnaire.


The picture that goes along with this post (I know, I have been into images a lot lately) along with others with it , have been generating quite a bit of buzz among certain parts of the bloggosphere. Seeing and reading different people's take on it has been interesting to say the least. Hey, I am not here to preach, just to observe and read tonight. I get the subliminal racist Mandingo buck raping Missy imagery. And the not too subtle sexually charged messages that feed into our stereotypes of the black male.

I get all of that. But what I really want to know is this: In this "post- racial" world where it's supposedly cool to bet on black, and where we are told that generation Xers and those who came after them really don't see race. Who do you think these pictures would piss off more?


There is no wrong answer.


A. The crowd at a black sorority convention? (Where my pink & greens at?)


B. The aging congregation of a large, black, Southern Baptist church?

C. The aging congregation of a large, white, Southern church?


D. The crowd at a republican town- hall meeting? (Any town)


E. None of the above.


Please hurry with your comments. I am trying to get off of this page as soon as possible. Mrs. field doesn't know how to act when she sees "cut" brothers. I can't chance her walking by and seeing this pic.



Hat tip to Emmjay for e-mailing me the link to the Gisele Bundchen photos.

238 comments:

«Oldest   ‹Older   201 – 238 of 238
Deacon Blue said...

Granny,

I'm doing well...just been busy and not able to come around here as much as I'd like. So many visitors here that reading the comments is almost a full-time job.

In any case, nice to know I was missed.
:-)

Rudy said...

Abbey Lincoln, huh? I never heard of her until reading her passage. I guess she beat me to the punch when I was just age 1.

Rudy said...

Granny, I had three short tours to Iraq, totaling 10 months. Then I got the hell out.

alicia banks said...

fly!

thanks for calling us out when he twisted zora neale hurston's take on black females as the "mules of the world"

she meant precisely the same thing that john lennon meant when he said "all women are the niggers of the world"

both were speaking about political/financial/labor/sexist/
abuses...both refs had absolutely nothing to do with sexuality/sexual attraction

but sexists like us see/warp all through distorted misogynist eyes...

peace
ab

knockoutchick said...

If Sølve Sundsbø's pics can get over 200 posts.

I think Vanessa Beecroft's pics might overload the capacity of the site.

Sundsbø is a young fashion photographer and his photos are meant to be beautiful. Beecroft and the other hand is looking for "shock" value a la Andres Serrano's "Piss Christ".
http://www.racialicious.com/2009/05/07/the-thin-line-between-art-and-explotation/#more-2428

I wonder what FN has to say about this one!

alicia banks said...

abbey lincoln is a classic jazz singer and actress...

see more:
http://www.starpulse.com/Music/Lincoln,_Abbey/Biography/

she starred in:
"for the love of ivy"
with sidney poitier
etc

peace
ab

Blaque Swan said...

Without necessarily getting into the back and forth, census records show black husband/white wife marriages by far out rank white husband/black wife marriages. I think it's pretty common knowledge that America's standard of beauty is still Eurocentric. And for whatever reason, black women and white men are hooking up with each other like black men and white women. But, a big shout out goes to Brian Simon and Sanaa Lathan of Something New! I even watch the Mentalist just for him.

Also, black solidarity is a perfectly acceptable, if not (re)commendable response to institutionalize anti-black racism. It serves as a guard against racism, internalization, and the emotional bruises. Tommie Shelby - We Who Are Dark.

Lastly, can we not have a comment thread without it dissolving into personal attacks on people sexuality and wo/manhood?

Anonymous said...

what can brown do for you????

szpork

Dr. Nuwang said...

BTW uptown, did you say "tee hee" with your pinky finger up, LOL??

GrannyStandingforTruth said...

Rudy:

I'm glad your home safe, sound, and alive.

Anonymous said...

How about "F" - ALL of the above...?
Sarah Deere

Say It Loud said...

"Why in the world is this baby intent on putting something in its mouth that is harmful to it." Granny

Respectfully Granny, the baby is you. It's the untouched by the world, innocent part of your being.

Give the dream a little more thought from that perspective. I believe that you'll see what it's driving at.

Say It Loud said...

"Why in the world is this baby intent on putting something in its mouth that is harmful to it." Granny

Respectfully, Granny the baby is you.

It's the untouched by the world, innocent part of your being.

Give the dream some thought; I believe you'll get what it's driving at.

Unknown said...

"He can "pratice" on the Black female but he can't adore her (I do mine of 36 years) let along protect her, This picture message can also holler out the the Black male can adore the white women so much that he can be satisfied with just having just "a small bit of her"."

And this is exactly why I now see through American Black men and don't see them as viable mates.

I also no longer feel the need to support Black men since they don't support their women. This is a 180 degree turn for me. And it looks like it will stay that way.

Unknown said...

"But it always kills me how protective you white righties are of your black conservative pets."

There is the solution to our little problem, Black women could become more conservative to gain protection from the Whiteys of this world since Black men generally are not up to the task.

grinder said...

My guess is that it would piss off the black sorority sisters the most. I think the church congregations would be bemused, and the Republicans would say, "See what happens when you put someone like Obama in there?"

No need to say, "black guy." Saying "someone like Obama" would suffice. But the black sorority sisters? I think you'd have hundreds of fingernails polished and filed to razor sharpness! It would be almost as bad as the reaction of a white sorority to learning that the primary transmission route for AIDS was the heterosexual blowjob.

NaturalSmile said...

Since, I'm comment #217, I'm only doing this because you asked AND because I realize you left out an option....

F. ME

I'm pissed off because it reminds me that I'm often taken back in disgust as I watch how my fellow black brother always felt obligated to treat the white woman as a little delicate flower that has to remain elevated at all times insensitive to the fact they don't need anymore elevation because they already feel like they can have and persue any man they want (i.e. Obsessed). Insensitive to the fact that it is really sisters who need their elevation. So I don't think it would piss off any of the white groups because the picture depicts strong black "field" men doing what they are suppose to do - protecting their flower. The only think missing out of this picture is evidence of some lashings on their skin!

My consulation to this picture is that Dr. Spock gets the black girl. Black women like intelligence. And the most intelligent man likes the black woman. Certainly, not as I recall Star Trek, but I will take it!!

Anonymous said...

Grata,

How do you reconcile your broad-brush reasoning with the fact that approximately 9% of black men date/marry interracially?

Anonymous said...

As a white man who married a Nisei woman (first generation born in America Japanese for those unfamiliar with the term) and as someone who has dated women of all colors I understand the concerns some have. Race in our family has been an issue at times, though to be fair I suspect it would have been more of an issue if I had married a black of African American descent. I think how anyone loooks at this picture depends upon their own experience, their own fears and their own prejudices.

Here's my strictly personal reaction. I'm jealous of the male figures for their great physiques. As a middle aged, flabby bodied male, that would apply regardless. I find the woman too thin, which reinforces stereotypes of what our culture (or specifically the world of fashion) celebrates in the female form. I find lots of women beautiful, tall, short, thin or not thin, and I find it offensive that my daughter and other young women are constantly bombarded by these images of fashion models as the ideal to live up to. As for the picture, it seems oddly devoid of passion to me. Everyone is depicted as a passive, emotionless figure. This makes the entire image more a symbolic expression of the photographer than about real people. I suppose it would look good on an Ancient Greek Vase.

Steven D

GrannyStandingforTruth said...

Steve D:

For some reason, I like your description of the picture better than all I've read so far. That was good! BTW, you wouldn't happen to be a fan of art now would you? (smile)

GrannyStandingforTruth said...

Grinder:

"I think you'd have hundreds of fingernails polished and filed to razor sharpness!"

LOL!

alicia banks said...

koc:

i saw the vb photo...

i found them far less racist and sexist than the one FN posted

fyi

thanks for the link!

peace
ab

Seda said...

I'm not close enough to any of those groups to have a good sense of who would be most pissed off, but I'll guess C based on things a Marine Corps acquaintance from Georgia said back in '82.

My own take, I have mixed feelings. There are a number of ways to take this: Are the naked black men "servants" carrying out the clothed white woman's bidding in a humiliating way? Or rapists pillaging? (pillagers raping?) Are all bodies willing and happy? Or is it just a play of light and form and beauty in photographic art? The expression on the woman's face doesn't indicate clearly her experience.

I think the image is intentionally provocative, and suspect that ambiguity is intentional; also that all models were willing, and did of their free will. So that's something.

Blaque Swan said...

I hear all the comments that the photo is just supposed to be provocative for the sake of provocation. I get that.

But like someone mentioned maybe 100 or so comments back, why must all the provocation involved white women and black men. Is it not as provocative with another ethnicity of men? of women? For the color contrast, they could find a dark-skinned black woman to go with some white men?

I mean, as "provocative" as it is, it's not anything new. Even if we accept that it's a play on Greek art, it doesn't have much original artistic value. A classmate used a picture like this to write a poem about (creative writing: poetry) almost ten years ago.

So, as striking as the image, and as provocative, it loses it's claim to race-neutral artisty. The play is old. It plays on old attitudes. And the photographer had to have known this.

Gemini's Lair said...

What I see with this shit is that white people are trying to get black people to appeal to them. Its nothing more than them elevating their status over the black man and woman because as it stands right now and with the current election they think they are being placed on a lower status. There is always that underline fear that blacks will rise above whites in this country so they must continue to put forth subliminal messages and use psychological warfare on blacks to keep them thinking that they cannot rise above the sun lizards in this country.

Black people have no integrity when it comes to money. They tell themselves that it is ok to place themselves in these kinds of positions because its only a photo, movie, etc and they are getting paid for it. Its the love of the dollar bill that has them degrading themselves and continuously have that free man slave mentality. If they refused to be put into these kinds of positions then perhaps they would gain some kind of respect in the industry and abroad.

The black men holding up the white woman in the picture is offensive. It could of just as well been white men holding her sun lizard ass up. I call them sun lizards because they are forever on the beach all oiled up soaking up the sun.

It also could be that in their eyes "black" sells. Regardless of what the case may be they are some very sick minded people.

Gemini's Lair said...

You can also check out

http://www.foxhound-network.com

The black perspective. Not a politically correct zone.

Saleema said...

OMG. Those are some good looking men. And what a lucky woman to be photographed with them.

greek gods. you know the statues from the Grecan and Roman eras? the perfect human body. handsome faces too.

Now, what were you asking?

B# said...

"It also could be that in their eyes "black" sells. Regardless of what the case may be they are some very sick minded people."

Life is like a Rorschach Inkblot Test: What we see is what we are feeling. That is, 'We don't see things as they really are, we see things as we are.'

Art often points out to us that what we are seeing is coming from 'inside' ourselves. The funny thing about humans, is that most of the time they don't recognize themselves in what they see.

Unknown said...

"How do you reconcile your broad-brush reasoning with the fact that approximately 9% of black men date/marry interracially?"

Broad-brush reasoning? I am no statistician, however giving a single digit for marriage and dating non BW by BM is an underestimate even for an amature.
And that is not the reason I choose not to see American BM, that would be silly.
As a collective lot BM have let down BW terribly. Yes there are the Fields that are rare.
But I see the whole unfortunately.

ArtMaggot Hysteria said...

229 comments based upon a photograph.
It has just gone from commercial art to ART.

Mena said...

George Lucas is not married to Mellody Hobson, they are just domestic partners.

Anonymous said...

"i have also heard tons of afro white women say bi-racial babies are cuter etc...

i chat about this often with afro peers, and they agree:

if white men could produce white looking babies with black women, far more would wed black women"

I wonder it this could be a result of what each gender needs to be successful in life.

Despite black women not being held up as a standard of beauty, our features are. Women, black and white, know that for them to succeed, beauty plays an important part.

Evolutionary speaking, white women are trying to increase their offspring's chances of success by reproducing with someone who can give them beauty charactersitics that they cannot.

For men, physical appearance plays a role in success, but maybe they are more aware of how their "whiteness" has contributed to their success. Not to mention the security of knowing by looking at the child they are the father without a doubt.

Not to mention that while all men have difficulty striking up conversations with women, white men trying to start up a conversation with black women is the absolute worst. They get so scared and get flustered that most of them don't even bother to try. They just look. This from a black girl in the suburbs.

Anonymous said...

All this white woman can say is, where do I sign up my sorry white ass? Is is racit to say "yummy"?

DBA Rat said...

I see a lot of beautiful people, and honestly I didn't see anything sexual about it, mainly because it looks like the men aren't looking at her, and she isn't looking at the men, but the viewer. It kind of reminds me of The Birth of Venus by Botticelli - where beauty is being brought into a world and presented by otherworldly beings, (because seriously, those guys are gorgeous), that don't really care what she looks like, because they are surrounded by beauty all the time, or they are looking away out of respect. Um, I just didn't catch the whole black/white thing in a sexual way, but more of an ethereal way.

Anonymous said...

Gods holding up the whore of Babylon!
33

Maryscott OConnor said...

Do I have to CARE whom it pisses off?

Can't I just look at it and think it's really fucking HOT?

Can I just ignore the ignorant fuckwits who are still, in this day and age, getting all worked up over skin colour... and enjoy the beauty of a gorgeous photograph?

Please?

Fuck 'em if they can't take a picture.

Anonymous said...

BUDCHEN IS A NIGGER LOVER ANYWAY........

CW said...

Field, I don't think there are any large black Southern Baptist Churches. I hope I'm not being too picky about one little capitalization, but there are plenty of large black southern Baptist churches, on the other hand.

Southern Baptists are, by and large, white, and, at least in my area, pretty monolithically white.

Maybe in other areas (besides Mississippi) there might be black Southern Baptist Churches, and if there are, I apologize (and I'd really like to know where in the country they exist). I'm an EX-Southern Baptist.

Past that, you left one group off (black women), and yessir, I agree with your wife. Thanks for the photo (making me smile, baby).

«Oldest ‹Older   201 – 238 of 238   Newer› Newest»