Your Morning Dish

The Blue Bus takes the time out to remember today is the 10th anniversary of the Oklahoma City terrorist attack.

With a little help from satire, Moxie reminds her fellow Republicans that April 22 is Earth Day. She says:

Traditionally, Republicans do a line of coke off Condi's ass -- but as I understand it, she's not able to make the requisite trip though red states due to her new responsibilities as Secretary of State (Sorry Barbara Boxer, but you lose).

Heart of Canada comments on women in academia, particularly women at Harvard.

Lily White Girl writes an interesting post on sexism and racism:

For MNF's management, most of whom are white, adding a black face to the line up is important, but when there's an underlying hope that that blackface will fill a quota without alienating the aging white liberals who make up the core of their listener-sponsor base with controversial and radical politics, there's something wrong here that's indemic of deeper social problems within the white liberal community.

Most people don't mean to be racist. WMNF's decision-makers didn't fire Connie because she's black. They fired her because she's black and talks about racism. Anyone who thinks quotas in and of themselves sufficiently addresses contemporary racism is fooling themselves about the nature of the world we live in today, a world where the effects of slavery are still being felt and struggled with.

I agree, I don't think most people mean to be racist. I think they do really dumb things that are racist in nature.

Elaine Meyer writes on the exploitation of ethnic groups for entertainment:

Using a Native American symbol for mere entertainment is similar to the use of African American actors or actors who donned "blackface" as pure entertainment in old-time minstrel shows. Maybe the audience of the minstrel show gained a greater knowledge of the existence of African Americans this way, much as Tolles claims Illinois fans gain a greater knowledge of Native Americans because of the Chief. But is exploiting an ethnic figure for pure entertainment value really the best way to gain such knowledge?

Technorati Tags: racism; sexism; politics; education