I wrote, some years ago:
In our modern lexicon, a taboo is a legally or socially enforced prohibition against speaking openly of certain things: usually, particular topics considered offensive by a politically privileged group....One must ask why some subjects are tabooed. The answer is simple, but enormously daunting: to speak of it is to invite inquiry, which threatens the perquisites of the group behind the taboo.
The most important examples relevant to contemporary American life pertain to groups that have been accorded “victim status.” Such groups sometimes wangle privileges from the law. Others are granted a degree of forbearance for antisocial or illegal behavior that persons outside the group would not receive. In either case, the rest of us are enjoined by social mechanisms – usually denunciation as an “–ist” – from speaking of the privilege and its consequences.
Allow me a penetrating (if vulgar) quote from the late Florence King:
Did your Congressman fuck a Doberman on the steps of the Capitol? He’s guilty of bad judgment, not dog-fucking. Who said anything about dog-fucking? Where in the world did you get that idea? Dog-fucking has nothing to do with dog-fucking. It’s a question of bad judgment, and if you don’t agree, you’re not only an –ist, you’re a –phobe.
And of course, the screaming will double if it was a male Doberman.
In light of the tabooing mechanism mentioned above, consider this story reported by Paul Kersey:
What does social capital look like in a 92 percent black community? This… [Enclosed aisles of goods at Kroger angers Metro Atlanta customers, CBS46.com, September 25, 2019]:COLLEGE PARK, Ga. (CBS46) — Stereotyped, intimidated, racism, and uncomfortable, all words used by shoppers to describe their shopping experience at a Kroger in South Fulton.“I think it’s kind of racist you definitely see that here on Old National,” said a mother of three who had just finished shopping.
College Park Kroger shoppers are upset over a new security installation leaving them to feel stereotyped.
“You won’t see that in Fayetteville or maybe Cobb County anywhere, doubt it,” said the mother.
The security installation only has one entrance.
Many took to social media to voice their anger at what they say feels like shopping in a prison just to buy toiletries or laundry detergent.
We asked the City of South Fulton for crime rates at the store but did not get an answer in time for this report. However, shoppers were more than happy to tell us about the amount of theft at the store.
Please read it all.
A great deal of theft in that Kroger’s moved the franchisee to create extra security around the most frequently stolen items. You or I might have done exactly the same. But in College Park, Georgia, it’s “racist.” What makes it racist? The surrounding community is black – meaning that its adults, who are probably mostly law-abiding, neglected the upbringings of their progeny and don’t trouble to discipline them when they go bad. And that must never, ever be expressed, whether by word or by deed.
Yet the same consideration had forced two Kroger’s stores in Memphis to close completely. The same conditions applied there, too. And once again, there were cries of outrage:
Memphis City Councilwoman Jamita Swearengen is claiming Kroger pointed to theft as a reason for closing one of its stores.At a news conference Friday afternoon, Swearengen recounted a phone call said she had with a Kroger representative on Tuesday.
She said the representative cited millions of dollars in losses over a three-year period at the Lamar Avenue Kroger as the reason for closing it.
“I then asked, ‘What was the contributing factor?’ She shared, ‘Mostly theft,'” Swearengen said. “I was in disbelief because this is the community that I live in and this is the Kroger where I shop.”
I’ve written about this on many other occasions. It’s one of the unspeakable truths about “diversity.” It propels more relocations and geographic reshufflings – legal, sotto voce segregation, really – than any “respectable” analyst is willing to admit.
But I’m an unimportant Web essayist. What candidate for public office would be willing to say any of this? What “respectable” social analyst would say it from behind a lectern in a public forum?
And what future has race relations in these United States if it isn’t addressed with appropriate clarity and vigor?
To the best of my knowledge, only one generally respected black analyst of cultural affairs, the great Walter Williams, has dared to address the fatuity of shouting “racism!” over entirely reasonable efforts by white Americans to defend themselves against predation by (mostly) young blacks. Professor Williams was shouted down for it. He was called a “race traitor” – what else? – for speaking a forbidden thought. But worse, he dared to state that real racism is about differences in rights and privileges granted by law. In his view, racism is in force if one race is allowed to do what others are not, and nowhere else.
Under the Williams formulation – with which I agree, just in case you were in any doubt – where does racism function in these United States, and in which race’s favor?
Paul Kersey could tell you.
I was raised in a community that now in the top ten of worst cities. There are sections where all stores closed, except for a few convenience stores. These areas are predominantly inhabited by minorities, and they accept their living conditions. Why? I don't know, but the better areas of the city are being encroached on by these same minorities, the crime rate is increasing, decent people of all races are leaving, and the decay continues to creep.
ReplyDeleteThe solution requires admitting there is a problem with certain segments of society. I don't see this happening, since the problem has existed for decades, is accepted by those most affected, and the leaders they elect have the same mindset.
So why don't these paragons of virtue signaling gather together money and open up their own competitor to Kroger, without said security features that they decry?
ReplyDeleteCrime is a community problem and not a race problem. That said, more often than not in the USA race is a factor but not the only one. As a community, its members can band together and help stop the crime by willingly participating in efforts to curb it.
ReplyDeleteInstead of accepting the fact that their neighbors are criminals, the members of this community have used the term racism as a means of condemning Kroger for doing what any prudent business would do in the face of rampant theft in their store. Racism is the label tossed by those who use 'diversity' as means of browbeating people down so they will accede to their demands.
If the citizens of this community embraced the security they would be taking the first step towards solving their local crime problem so why do they resist? They are of the belief that by using racial bias they can get more results than by simply cooperating with the effort to clean up their community.
This same logic applies when it comes to police activities in these neighborhoods as well as attempts to attain more social welfare funding. The overall effort is to protect their racial cohorts at the expense of quality of life. This is the equivalent of doing the same thing over and over with the same failed results or a form of 'insanity'. This makes no sense as far as improving things but making their community safer and therefore more like others around them that are not crime ridden would make them less 'ethnically' able to claim 'racism'.
This is the equivalent of a dog chasing its tail.
Walmart closest to me, there are three big versions (I shop at all given need and timing) and two neighborhood versions (almost never), about a year ago, closed off the cosmetics area and gave its own checkout. I asked the clerk right after it 'opened' and she said the store was losing $500,000 a year JUST in cosmetics. Since then, all three stores have done the same. A store in New Orleans and in Atlanta that I visited on my roadtrip also had them.
ReplyDeleteRecently, the store closest to me added security access doors to over the counter medicines of every type (aspirin, cold medicine, laxatives, female hygiene issues, and eye/ear drops). I expect similar situations to expand to other stores.
My neighborhood (around all three stores) is very mixed. White is about 40%, black and hispanic each around 30%. Each store is dominated by one group with maybe 50% of the customers from one group.
Shoplifting here in CA is all but decriminalized and it is BLATANT AND RAMPANT. I see it every time I shop. And yes, either because they are more stupid or more prevalent, one group seems more consistently abusive.
But you can't SPEAK about THAT. And of course with the checkout bag issue here in CA ($.10/bag) lots of people DON'T buy them. It is pathetically easy to add items to your cart you don't pay for - because Walmart ALSO encourages self checkout.
Who woulda guessed...
College Park is near to Riverdale, where I was born (1962) and raised and lived my life until 8 years ago when I took my family and left for NE Florida. I've shopped in that Kroger many times since it opened long ago. People like those decrying the "racism" of Kroger are the reason why. My hometown became a ghetto, my family and I were eyefucked and treated with contempt while out and about, my children got the same treatment in school. We're white, there are fewer white than black in the area now, so according to them we deserved it. One black woman ran for a seat on the county commission with the slogan, "It's Our Turn Now!"
ReplyDeleteBut none of that is newsworthy, it seems.