Randi Rhodes Forums

In the Midwest the term "shine" is used interchangeably with the "N" word. So many times I've seen Yahoo post an image of President Obama that shows his face shiny. Is Yahoo catering to the Koch Brothers, the South and the KKK?


By freshxwater

Image is currently on this story. Original has more shine.
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/brit ... ontainer-b

For the last year this has been Yahoo's go to AD showing President Obama half white half black.

By freshxwater

Dude, I think you broke your brain. Give it a rest.

Not sure about Yahoo, but NBC showed some pretty fucked up judgement and timing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6ju-qkYq4g

Not sure about racist given how far ahead a spot like that is prepared and placed. But a very unfortunate piece of timing.

I'd have to say that's exactly what it was. Exceptionally bad luck, but not bigotry or even grossly insensitive.

This is the sort of disaster that makes for a mind-blowing episode of "Mad Men." People lose their jobs over such things - though they probably shouldn't.

Got to wonder who was minding the store.

Personally, I think the ad was stupid, ill-conceived and ugly, regardless of placement.

That is my assessment of the show it promotes, or at least the concept. So in a way the ad seems to fit

So, you think it should be someone's job to make sure that no commercial that involves an ape of any sort should follow a story, event, sketch, program, etc that features a black person?

What sort of commercials should never be run after an Asian person has appeared on the screen? What about after a Jew has been on screen?

I just don't think extemporaneous coverage of an event like the Olympics can be held to the same kind of standard as making sure that an airline commercial doesn't follow a segment of CSI that sees a plane crash as part of the story.

It's especially embarrassing that this clash involved a gymnast, and then went to a monkey specifically performing gymnastics. But I just can't buy into this having been an intentionally cruel or even a grossly insensitive oversight.

Should the creators or the network have looked at the spot and said to themselves, "Holy shit - we'd better make sure this never runs immediately after a black athlete has accomplished something in gymnastics?" I really don't know. Doesn't that DEMAND people make a mental link that I and many others find repugnant?

I may be wrong about this, and I DO see conflicts in the argument I just made above. But I just haven't heard or seen the argument that convinces me. I'm open to hearing it.

If nothing else, I AM sure that this is not as easy as some others seem to think it is.

I tend to agree, and really I don't care if an ad features an ape, monkey, wapiti or wart hog...but with all the money they spend, creating ads, one would think the ad could at least have some artfulness to it.

And really, monkeys and gibbons do make a good comparison with gymnasts in general, not as an insult but as a celebration of a human physical art that to us non-athletes often seem super-human.

I will admit it is probably an emotional response on my part, I happened to be at a friends house when I saw it, he is black, his wife is white, his cousin who is also black was there, and they weren't to happy about it. So yes, that influences how I feel about it. I didn't realize it was for a new show, so when I saw the commercial right after Bob Costas praising Gabby Douglas I thought it was strange. My friend just shook his head, his cousin was actually pretty pissed.

As for what type of commercial should or shouldn't be run, I think it would have to depend on what was happening in America at that point in time. Maybe I am expecting too much from TV programming, you are probably right, it probably wasn't intentional, but couldn't the commercial have waited until after Michael Phelp's win or something? I mean there is a long enough delay.

Just seemed like extremely bad judgement to me and I didn't like it.

And if I was so damned sure I had "the answer" on this one, I wouldn't keep asking for input from others, looking for someone to point out some big gap in my argument.

In the end, we can at least agree it was embarrassing and unfortunate. I just don't know that we can expect the world to anticipate every possibility, and build a system/process to thwart every instance of the embarrassing and unfortunate.

I know, and I respect you for that. I'm not sure there is a gap in your argument, because I can think of another situation that happened maybe a year ago. I went to a party being thrown by a Persian friend, I brought along a co-worker that is one of those smart young types that graduated college after two years, almost zero social skills, but not a malicious bone in his body. I shit you not, as soon as we get in the door and he meets my friend, and a couple of my friends friends, he asks,"So are you guys from Islam?" I wish you could have seen their faces as well as my own. But to be fair I also met a young lady recently that didn't realize Canada is our neighbor.

You DEFINITELY need to be considering a new circle of acquaintances.

Though not nearly as blatant as the NBC incident, or asking "Are you guys from Islam?" I recently had my own little faux pas. I was chatting with a friend while I opened a package sent to me by an out-of-town family member. At the time this family member worked at a Godiva store, and he'd sent me a box of expensive chocolates. I offered one to the friend, and he literally turned around and stomped off. He sent a message later declaring that he couldn't believe my insensitivity. He's Armenian, and VERY active in Armenian issues, which I knew very well. He told me "everyone knows" Godiva is owned by Turks - you know, the Turks who killed 15 million Armenians in an attempted genocide in 1915!!!

WTF?

Now, I still think he's wrong - Godiva is based in Belgium, but he insists it's financed by Turks, though he's yet to provide the promised evidence. But, apparently what I did was akin to trying to give a Holocaust survivor a ride in my shiny Mercedes Benz, implicitly insisting they should just "let it go."

Wait, Canada is our neighbor?