White men don’t have to reach a bar of excellence; the bar will find white men wherever they already are.

Before you read the excellent article below. Let me explain a two things that happened last week. 

I

A white co-worker of mine said something to me not long before Trump's speech that I've heard other white people say about him. These white people look sad then say "He has no filter." What these white people are inadvertently telling me is, "I am like Trump. I don't say it out loud. And I think all white people are like me and Trump. We just know better than to say it out loud." 

And these white people are comfortable saying this to my black face because they think protesting racism and simply mentioning race at all is the same as the racism they have against THOSE PEOPLE in their own heads.

So I think I understand what "Trump sounds more presidential" means when it comes out of a white face. And I don't know what Van Jones or his black face was thinking when he praised Trump for being "presidential" during what truly was an excellent piece of political theater...but Jones has walked that praise back now. 

II

Trump managed to keep much of his white ethnoracism behind his teeth for a whole 20 minutes, whatever the duration of his first speech to congress was.  He was able to do it because he was reading it and did not deviate (sounds like)

After that one speech he was applauded and called "more presidential" by white run news outlets everywhere. The press's retreat into normalizing that thing in the White House made my stomach contents start to rise...had to cover my mouth and run to the bathroom. 

Believe me. I understood that the bar for white men is low before this year. But now I know understand that bar to be on the ground, below sea level, buried in dog crap and mud.

III

Trump, Affleck, ‘La La Land’ And The Unendingly Low Bar For White Men

by David Dennis Jr. at StillCrew.com
via
LATINA FEMINISTA  https://www.facebook.com/LatinaFeminista/

• "Here’s what the La La Land crew, Casey Affleck and Donald Trump have in common: they found the most basic ground-levels of human decency and are waiting for society’s bar to take the elevator down to meet them."

 

I’ve spent the last eight years pretty confident that George W. Bush would be the dumbest president I’d see in my lifetime. His sartorial blunders, which seem pretty tame now, were legendary and pop culture cornerstones for years. The “fool me once” bit or the “put food on your family” quotes struck America as much as, oh, say, faking reasons to start a disastrous war or ignoring floating black bodies in New Orleans.

Bush, however, resurfaced last week with some quotes about the current administration, lambasting Trump for his racist policies, Muslim ban and attacks on the media. One quote, however, stood out to me the most:

“I consider the media to be indispensable to democracy.”

One word stayed with me.

Indispensable....

This caused me to go back and look at George W. Bush’s speeches. And for as dumb as we’ve pretty much accepted him to be, he sounds infinitely more qualified to be president than Donald Trump. The same Donald Trump who, on Tuesday, blamed former President Obama for current White House leaks, Jews for anti-Semitic abuses and soldiers for their own demise...  

I read this whole thing thinking. "Yes. Yes. Yes. Me too."

So read more
 https://stillcrew.com/trump-affleck-la-la-land-and-the-unendlingly-low-bar-for-white-men-3027225600bb#.7awifcsq2