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Politics : View from the Center and Left
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From: epicure11/2/2005 12:08:41 PM
  Read Replies (1) of 541791
 
I find this an interesting issue:

Black Democratic leaders in Maryland say that racially tinged attacks against Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele in his bid for the U.S. Senate are fair because he is a conservative Republican.

Such attacks against the first black man to win a statewide election in Maryland include pelting him with Oreo cookies during a campaign appearance, calling him an "Uncle Tom" and depicting him as a black-faced minstrel on a liberal Web log.

washingtontimes.com

..........
my response:

That is such a hard issue. I've discussed that elsewhere on SI. It seems to me that the issue of "Uncle Tomism" is a valid issue- and the words "Uncle Tom" are valid words, just as the book Uncle Tom's Cabin, has valid things to say about oppression. When the oppressed buy in to the oppressor's power structure, there is really no better word for that than "Uncle Tom". That said, it's always hard to know, for those of us IN the power structure (as most of us are) who are the truly oppressed, and who are not. In a vigorous political debate, I think you cannot let race stop you from articulating ideas that happen to include race, but I don't think you need to call names either.

I think you could raise valid issues about someone's political positions being akin to the behavior of Uncle tom without having to pelt that person with oreo cookies. In other words, I think there is a valid issue there, but it needs to be carefully explored- not that American politics is really conducive to the careful exploration of things, which is too bad.
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