Minorities At Risk For Drowning
Obama Honors Fallen Troops
And they say many members of the Tea Party aren't racist.
An altered photo depicting President Barack Obama as an ape (pictured below) with the caption, "Now you know why no birth certificate," was allegedly sent out by Marilyn Davenport, a Tea Party activist and Orange County representative, and then leaked to the media. When newspaper OC Weekly first broke the story and asked Davenport to respond, she said,"It was just an Internet joke," but then reportedly retorted, "You're not going to make a big deal about this are you?"
It's funny. Folks on both sides of the political aisle often agree that former President George W. Bush was one of the most incompetent commander-in-chiefs this country has ever had, but he was never disrespected (barring the shoe throwing incident by an Iraqi journalist) the way our incumbent president has been.
And this vitriol has continuously spilled over to the First Lady. Michelle Obama was depicted as an ape on the Internet back in 2009; when Googlers inputted "Michelle Obama," they were served with the offensive ape image as the top-search result. The website that hosted the photos removed the image and issued an apology.
Still, the shameful images of the First Lady resurfaced once again with the term "hail to the chimp," and a few months later, Glenn Beck thought it was clever to resurrect this age-old insult by calling President Obama's America a "planet of the apes."
What's the significance of equating black people with apes?
According to Assistant Professor of psychology Phillip Atiba Goff, this association -- both historically and currently -- makes it okay to abuse and or kill blacks.
New York Post cartoonist Sean Delonas ironically brought this concept to life in his cartoon, where an ape is shown with two bullets and the words, "They'll have to find someone else to sign the next stimulus bill."
Once the cartoon was met with stiff backlash, the newspaper released a lukewarm apology, with the editors insisting that "sometimes a cartoon is just a cartoon."
Goff's seven-year research on the "psychological phenomenon of dehumanization," though, reveals something much deeper. Participants in Goff's studies, which monitored how much of an association was made between blacks and apes and its consequences, tended to endorse police violence against blacks:
"In one study, participants who were made to think about apes were more likely to support police violence against black (but not white) criminal suspects. The association actually caused them to endorse anti-black violence."
Another study showed that in cases where black criminals were characterized in ape-like terms, they were more likely to receive the death penalty:
"Looking at a sample of death-eligible cases in Philadelphia from 1979 to 1999, the more that media coverage used ape-like metaphors to describe a murder trial (i.e. "urban jungle," "aping the suspects behavior," etc.) the more likely black suspects, but not white suspects, were to be put to death.Not surprisingly, black suspects were much more likely to be described in ape-like terms. And they were more frequently executed by the state."
Let's just let that settle.
We all know words and images are never just words and images. They shape and mold how we see ourselves and the way we see others. So if you can dehumanize someone by taking away their humanity and turn them into a beast, it makes it perfectly reasonable to abuse and kill that beast, because he was never really human after all.
Almost four years later, folks are still burning up about this nation's President and First Lady being black. I know four years doesn't compare to the 300-plus years of prejudice and social brainwashing that's occurred in this country, but it's time to really let this type of small-minded thinking go.
After all, with the GOP presenting no serious competition to the Democratic ticket in 2012, these haters would make better use of their time by humming to Young Jeezy's joint below:
Comments: (194)
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By: Bruce on 4/18/2011 1:32PM
If our schools teach evolution that we all descended from apes....what is the problem?
According to the pictures I have seen in books, everyone starts out as Monkees bent over and then we change into humans.
Where is the apology needed?
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By: barry jordan on 4/18/2011 5:55PM
Bruce, you are sick....if you don't see the blatant racism, then you are colorblind...forget this editor. I got my guards up for anything that may happen...White people, the world is changing and there is nothing you can do about it. God help you.
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By: Foday on 4/18/2011 5:38PM
Bruce, you must be truly brain deceased not to see how so racist this thing is or are you one of those still living on "blood money" from slavery so abusing and mistreating people who are non white is okay? Even that cartoon by that newpaper was pure racist but to you there is nothing wrong with it. How sad!
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By: Bruce on 4/18/2011 7:43PM
@barry Jordan and Foday,
I'm just kind of laughing, I thought it was a pretty good point. I actually like alot of things about Obama but if we are taught in schools that we came from monkees, my point is valid.
And as far as being first on the articles, just lucky I guess. You guys are pretty uptight. :o)
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By: LaLa on 4/18/2011 7:54PM
All I have to say is, when God comes back, white folks and anyone else with prejudices’ and any other sins are going to have to pay Big Time! Karma Baby! My grandmother said when Obama takes office; white folks are going to come out of hiding with their racial slurs and act a fool. The thing is, it has never gone away, just kept a little quiet. Also, don't believe everything you read or hear, we did not evolve from apes. Read your bible and pray for your ignorants!
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By: Bruce on 4/18/2011 8:19PM
Come on you guys, I'm just trying to make you think. If our schools teach that we came from monkees, why are we upset to see a monkey with a human face.
Would people get this excited if it were Jay Leno or Larry the cable guy.
If we are teaching our children that we are monkees, monkey pictures are ok. Democrats push evolution and Obama is the king of the Democrats... so logic follows that the king of the Democrats should be depicted as the King of the Monkees. If it were Bill Clinton, I would feel the same! He was the King of The Monkees too!
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By: clinton on 4/18/2011 8:36PM
Bruce? Suppose you provide us with a picture of yourself, then let us put you on you tube with your mother and father looking like apes holding you in your ape mother's arms with the caption underneath reading: THIS IS HOW I STARTED OUT!! I'll bet you wouldn't be what's all the fuss is about then. In case you don't understand a.. h..., it's a form of dehumanization when you compare a human being with a beast and makes it okay to torture or kill that person because afterall he/she wasn't human anyway.
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By: awrealtor on 4/18/2011 11:12PM
You know that this didn't have anything to do with evolution. You know that it has everything to do with the history of relating blacks to being monkeys, chimps, and apes. It's meant to be racist and you know that. Don't try to insult our intelligence.
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By: Noble on 4/20/2011 12:04PM
I don't agree that human came from apes. Very logical. Human is human and animals is animals. That's it.
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By: stein on 4/19/2011 5:11AM
THIS IS REGULAR Pee PARTY POLITICS...WHY EXPECT A
CHANGE NOW? ARIZONA SHOOTINGS...THEY STILL
CONTINUE WITH VIOLENT, HATEFUL, AND INCENDIARY
MESSAGES. WE KNOW THE PEE PARTY IS THE PARTY OF
ALL WHITE SUPREMACISTS AND NEO NAZIS....AND THEIR
THINKING AND STYLE COMES OUT! THE Pee PARTY WANT
TO CUT MINORITIES FROM EVERY POSSIBLE GOVERNMENT
BENEFIT, NEED, HELP IN ANYWAY, INCLUDING THE
REVERSAL OF CIVIL RIGHTS. SO, IF YOU DON'T LIKE
IT....DON'T JUST GET MAD AND BLOW STEAM
HERE, .....GET OUT AND VOTE AGAINST PEE PARTY
POLITICIANS....WHEN THEY RUN THEIR MOUTH IN THE
MEDIA.....CONTACT THEIR ADVERTISING SOURCES &
STATIONS TO LET THEM KNOW HOW NEGATIVE IT IS.
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