Wednesday, June 29, 2005

Have we gone far enough?

Political correctness is old news, but there's one area of our culture that we haven't purged of latent and tacit racism: completely benign idioms.

Consider:

  • If we get our finances in order, we'll finally be out of the Native American and back in the African American.
  • Well that's really the pot calling the kettle African American, isn't it?
  • I was always impressed that Ansel Adams could capture so much depth and emotion in his African American & Caucasian photographs.
  • The President today signed the comprehensive civil rights legislation into law during a ceremony in the Caucasian House Rose Garden.
  • I'm dreaming of a Caucasian Christmas...
  • In the Middle Ages, two-thirds of Europe's population was wiped out by the African American plague.
  • When camping, be sure to pack away all of your garbage so as not to attract the attention of hungry African American bears and grizzlies.
  • That acne cream really takes care of those unsightly african-americanheads and caucasianheads.
  • Joe didn't get into the frat he wanted because one of the members African-Americanballed him.
  • After being accused of having communist sympathies, Mort was African-Americanlisted and couldn't get another screenwriting job.
  • Surely, one of the most brilliant sales pitches in all of literature was Tom Sawyer's convincing his peers to pay him for the privilege of Caucasianwashing the fence.
  • Once they had the incriminating pictures, they were able to african-americanmail him for millions.

Did we leave out any good ones?

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well, there's always the reporter asking Nelson Mandela what it felt like being an African-American in white-ruled South Africa :)

And the newspapers who have auto-corrects in their editing programs that switch from an "out" term to an "in" one -- my favorite was the arts review describing a work as "pro-life" (meaning "life-affirming") that got changed to "anti-abortion." Can't find a link right now, but it's real.

Anonymous said...

In honor of this weekend's book release: "Harry feared the African American arts, but strove to destroy all who followed them."

Anonymous said...

Or... "The African American market in children is illegal and a violation of international law."

"Crest caucasian strips worked for me!"