Gawker (yes, Gawker) puts things in perspective in the wake of Newsweek‘s frankly irresponsible and ridiculous cover story.
Don’t miss this quote:
Indeed, as everyone knows, Muslims, and especially Arab Muslims, have no lives, feelings or thoughts external to constant, violent rage, directed at old white people living in the Midwest (due to their freedoms).
If we take Newsweek’s prior reporting on none other than Michelle Bachman (“The Queen of Rage”) seriously, then I think we ought to expect an even more explosive response from the Muslamic Islams should they ever connect the dots and thereby discover who their queen is, on account of the rage and so forth. Beware the rage, and if that isn’t tiring enough, beware the old white people living in flyover states. So many people to turn against one another, so many people to righteously loathe, so little time.
The quote you called out appears to be not much more than a sarcastic, overstated straw man paired up with a bigoted jab at imaginary old white people who, apparently, due to where they live, threaten the political sensibilities of our writer at Gawker. The guy’s got a point about the laughable tone of the Newsweek article, but manages to drown it almost immediately in teenage sneering and over the top sophomoric rhetoric. There have to be twentysomething pop culturists kicking ass somewhere, but it sure ain’t here; the forever 16 vibe isn’t working for them. Surely this can’t be the stuff passing for searing commentary in the technosophisticate college set these days. Please tell me it isn’t.
Old white people as our new effigy? Really? Do my parents qualify? I mean, they are are fairly old….and white. In my edgy underground newspaper writing youth, I remember zinging all kinds of people, usually based on their dopey behavior/culture, but not their race or age. When did it become stylish to do so and be celebrated as clever and bright for doing it?
I’m wondering if we’d be as comfortable with the increasingly popular refrain of “old white people” as a target of mockery and loathing if we introduced a socioeconomic identifier into the soft-edged slur.
So, how about “poor old white people”? Anybody squirming yet?
Rich old white people. Poor old white people. Rich young white people. Poor young white people. Rich old black people. Poor old black people. Rich young black people. Poor young black people.
Once you start the slicing and dicing, there really is no end to it. However, if you want to makes things worse across the board, it’s a great construct to use.
Oh I Don’t know, burning down our Consulates and killing ambassadors and then buggering their dead bodies certainly speaks to some rage. Barry has not done shit to soothe the Muslim street, and so it goes.