P a g e 16
'ri’c IJnrtlattò (Dhseruer
September 22, 2010
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Fantasy Attacker as a Black Woman
Why Oprah and everyone else swallowed the lie
by
E arl O fari H utchinson
O p rah sh o u ld n 't feel too bad
that she in itially sw allo w ed
w h o le B ethany S torro's lying
claim that a black d o u sed her
face w ith acid and then booked
h er on her show .
O prah, T he facebook crow d,
th e s p o n s o r s o f p la n n e d
fu n draisers, and the thousands
that sent sy m pathy letters and
cards to the V ancouver w om an
and bought her lie too. O bviously
they didn't rem em b er C harles
Stuart, Susan Sm ith, and m ore
recen tly B onnie S w eeten and
A s h le y T o d d . W h ite s w h o
scream ed a black m an did it to
co v er up m urder.
T here's a long sordid history
o f w hites scream ing that it w as
a black m an that raped, assaulted,
and robbed them to co v er up
th eir crim es, m isdeeds, or carnal
lust. T he only tw ist in the S torro
fantasy is that the alleg ed a t­
tack er w as a black w om an. But
g e n d er is incidental here. Storro
d id n 't get a p o tential date on
E
E E
A
O p r a h a n d public still p erceiv es those m ost
w o r l d w i d e I ikely to com m it crim es are poor,
outpouring o f jo b le ss and black. T he study did
sym pathy be­ m ore than affirm that race and
cau se
h e r poverty and crim e are firm ly
f a n ta s y a t ­ ram m ed to g eth er in the public
tacker w as a m ind. It also show ed that once
b l a c k
the stereotype is planted, it's v ir­
w o m an , but tually im possible to root out.
an A fric a n - T hat's hardly new either.
A m erican. R ace, again, trum ps
In 2003 Penn State U niversity
everything in the public eye.
research ers con d u cted a lan d ­
T he w ishful thought w as that m ark study on the link betw een
O bam a's election buried once crim e and public p ercep tio n s o f
and for all negative racial type-, w ho is m ost likely to com m it
casting and the perennial threat crim e. T he stu d y fo u n d th at
of w hites lying about being put m any w hites are 1 ikely to a sso ci­
upon by black m arauders, and in ate pictures o f blacks w ith v io ­
som e cases, getting aw ay w ith lent crim e. T his w as no surprise
it. It did no such thing.
given the relen tless m edia d e ­
Im m ed iately a fte r O bam a's pictions o f y o u n g blacks as d y s­
e le c tio n a n d m o n th s b e fo re functional, dope p eddling, gang
S torro's falsified attack, team s bangers and drive by shooters.
o f research ers from several m a ­
U niversity research ers w ere
jo r universities found that m any plain ly fascinated by this result.
o f the old stereo ty p es about p o v ­ Five years later th ey w an ted to
erty and crim e and blacks re ­ see if that stereo ty p e still held
m ain ju s t as frozen in tim e. T he sw ay, even as O b am a's political
study found that m uch o f the star rose, and legions o f w hites
E H A
>
Specializing in hair replacement
and all phases o f Beauty Work
by
J im H ightower
Sometimes I don't
know w h e th er to
laugh, cry, or go bowl­
ing. This is one o f
those times.
America is now in a
Great Jobs Depression
that has already lasted
10 years and continues to rage un­
abated across the land, devastating
the middle class
Yet it took two months and end-
less compromises this summer for
Senate Democrats to woo the few
Republican votes needed to pass
even a weak and meek jobs bill to
help deter mass firings o f school-
teachers and firefighters by local
governments. Pious, purse-lipped
Republicans—who have eagerly
backed Wall Street bailouts, need-
less wars, and other budget-bust-
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Charles H. Washington
E ditor : Michael Leighton
D istribution M anager : Mark Washington
C reative D irector : Paul N eufeldt
tinged battering o f First Lady
M ichelle O b am a by the endless
pack o f w ebbers, bloggers, and
right w ing talk show jo c k s for
ev ery th in g from her appearance
to her trips is sad p ro o f that black
fem ales are ju s t as su scep tib le
to racial m ugging as black m ales.
T he S torrro d eb acle show s
that m uch o f the p ublic still sees
crim e through narrow racial lens.
But even that's not the end to this
sorry story. A fter Storro's hoax
cam e unraveled, she still got sym ­
pathy in som e quarters.
T here w as the o b lig ato ry m ea
culpa from her, a litany o f friends,
acq u ain tan ces and h er p arents,
said how teary ey ed rem orseful
she w as. A nd p o lice o fficials
and p ro secu to rs for th eir part
seem ed g en u in ely stum ped o r at
least hesitan t o v e r w hat if any
c h a r g e s th e y 'd f ile a g a in s t
Storro.
Is it an y w o n d er th en that
O prah and ev ery o n e else sw al­
low ed Storro's lie that a black did
to stereotype since blacks co m ­
m it the m ajority o f street crim es.
T he Penn S tate study found that
even w hen blacks didn't com m it
a sp ecific crim e; w h ites still
m isid en tified the p erp etrato r as
an A frican-A m erican.
The bulging num bers ofblacks
in A m erica's ja ils and prisons
rein fo rce th e p e rc e p tio n th at
crim e and violence in A m erica
invariably com es w ith a young,
black m ale and increasingly fe­
m ale face. A nd it d o esn't m uch
m atter how prom inent, w ealthy,
o r celeb rated the black is. T hat
stereo ty p e is an idée fixee in it
m u ch o f A m erica's psyche.
Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an
T he relentless, n o n -sto p race author and political analyst
Slashing Food Stamps Senseless
H AIRW EAVERS A DESIGNERS
47 4 7 NE Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd., Portland, OR 97211
said that they 1 iked him, and would
vote for him , and m eant it. R e­
searchers still found public atti­
tudes on crim e and race u n ­
changed. T he m ajority o f w hites
still o v erw h elm in g ly fingered
blacks as the m ost likely to co m ­
m it crim es, even w hen they didn't
com m it them . T hat's especially
im portant to say, since the fall
back line on racial stereo ty p es is
that to link race and crim e is not
Americans relying on food stamps.
In the coming months, more and
more people—including school­
teachers and firefighters-are going
to lose their jobs, and many o f them
will need the helping hand that Con­
gress has now so stupidly and cal­
lously withdrawn.
Instead o f stealing funds from
o u r c o u n tr y ’s e s s e n tia l fo o d
stamp program , Congress should
get the m oney for its jo b s bill by
taxing the m ultibillion-dollar bo­
nuses that Wall Street bankers
are paying them selves. And if
that's not enough m oney, cut the
pay, pensions, and health-care
freebies that C ongress critters
give to them selves—m ost o f them
need to go on a diet anyway.
Jim Hightower is a radio com­
mentator, writer, and public
speaker.
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created des.gn d.splay ads become the sole property o f the newspaper and cannot be used in other p u b lic a t io n s personal usage without the written consent o f the general
™
F
ing e x p en d itu re s—d e ­
manded that other pro­
grams be cut as the price
o f saving these essential
public-service jobs.
So, what program did
our stalw art sen ato rs
choose to loot? Food
stamps!
Yes, even as millions o f Ameri­
cans are stuck in long-term, relent­
less unemployment, thus increas-
ing the urgent need for family assis
tance, our w ell-fed, big-butted
Solons grabbed nearly $12 billion
from the supplemental nutrition as-
sistance program. This puts the
"dumb" in dumbfounding,
Because o f the economic col-
lapse caused by the reckless greed
o f Wall Street bankers, there has
been a 50 percent increase in the
past two years in the number o f
d d
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PUrc
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