December 20, 2016
So many people have taken the bait and made MTV's "New Years Resolutions for White Males" viral...
I'm not going to point at the eager virus-carriers who typed predictable snark like What if a video told black women what New Year's resolutions to make?
I've just got 3 little side issues.
1. Sure, go ahead an have a big kitten popping out of your chest. Kitties are helping people right now. They're hacking their own computers to replace Donald Trump with kitties.
2. There's an apostrophe in "New Year's." Come on, MTV. Help the new generation get punctuation right. We're only talking about one year that's new. It's not a plural. It's a possessive, even when you omit the "Day" or "Eve."
3. There are way too many people who think it's cool or cute to say something "isn't a thing." Here, I've clipped out the few seconds in the lamely cutesy-cool video where the guy says "isn't a thing":
I'm proposing the New Year's resolution for everyone: Stop saying "isn't a thing." Isn't a thing is too much of a thing. Don't do that thing! Okay? Now, let's dance:
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87 comments:
Not seeing what these resolutions are, I'd say it depends on the context. What's so wrong about telling black women what resolutions they can make? I'd start with not being the sassy audience member on talk shows who tells that girl to "check herself before she wrecks herself!" My resolution for white women is enough with the high waisted pants! Anything too extreme is going to look silly in just a year or two. My resolution for everyone who isn't a white guy to stop calling all white guys "bro". Only a very specific sort of dude is a "bro"!
Speaking as a White male...Fuck off!
White males have created the world's greatest civilization, greatest economic system and the modern world.
And then were generous enough to share it with everyone else.
And if you aren't happy, there is no law preventing you from leaving...there are millions more waiting to take your place.
These attacks on white men are paradoxically telling white men they are great. It's implicit. That's why you're not really offended. If you are... are you really?
These attacks on white men are paradoxically telling white men they are great. It's implicit.
Close.
It's telling White men that they are bad people who have accomplished great things by exploiting everyone else.
I'm not offended because I don't care enough about these people to get offended. I can't be hurt by those I don't respect.
But I can't help rolling my eyes at the relentless cluelessness and hypocrisy. It gets summed up well at the beginning with the shout out to " fellow white guys" by a group of mostly non-white guys. This video is racist to the core but I don't really care about them any more than I care about the KKK.
I guess being a white guy is kinda like being a Patriot fan or even Tom Brady.
I guess judging WASPs by the content of their character is ancient history. So forgive us, or not. That's your choice. And we will keep stocking up on guns and ammo for the big day you turn from using cheap slander attacks to using violence.
What message are they giving to young white boys who are growing up?
What message are they giving to young white boys who are growing up?
Submit.
The good Doctor has a preternatural memory for the obscure. After viewing the "Gimme Dat Thing" (or was it Ding?) vid I was compelled to look up the Pipkins, an entity I had no consciousness of 12 minutes ago. It they (there were two of them, neither one named Pipkin) were a one hit wonder way back in 1970.
Weird.
Please ignore the superfluous It. Too early in the morning for clear thinking.
The Pipkins were smaller than The Pips.
"'What message are they giving to young white boys who are growing up?' Submit."
Oh, bullshit. The young people in the video are so mild and beta. They're only begging for a little respect. If you're intimidated by that, you've pre-submitted.
The Pipkins were smaller than The Pips.
You mean they were midgets?
Weird.
So millennials are already working on getting Trump re-elected in 2020? Just double-down on the hectoring identify politics. It's got to work eventually, right?
Oh, bullshit. The young people in the video are so mild and beta. They're only begging for a little respect. If you're intimidated by that, you've pre-submitted.
Really? If a bunch of White men put out a video directed at women and minorities with the message "stop whining and get your shit together" would that play on MTV?
This video is the passive-aggressive tip of the iceberg, and I'm not surprised you can't see that...you've never shown any empathy for us splooge stooges.
Respect is earned, not given as reparations.
It's got to work eventually, right?
If the elevator doesn't come when and how you want it to, just keep pressing the button.
PS Is MTV still a thing?
1) Continue not to care about MTv. Is that even a thing anymore? I am 50 and I was the original MTv generation. This would be like Perry Como trying to give teenage me advice in 1984.
2) Continue not to care about black celebrities, whether they support Obama or Trump. That sounds racist, I'll continue not to care about celebrities.
3) Come home after work and enjoy my time however I want to.
4) Try and be polite to everyone I meet. Even if they are trying to tell me how to live my life.
5) Oh yeah, go another 50 years without saying "Woke."
It's concerning because this is where all the soul sucking hate, dysfunction, and threats to liberty are coming from in our time - information and education aimed at young people. I hear it all the time from twenty somethings delivering enlightenment that is often contrary to fact, dangerous, discriminatory and self-justifying. It is a cancer on our culture and society trying to undo centuries of progress in liberty and equality. It needs to be faced down for the bigotry it is. It's not any relief that it admits the targets are superior. So did the communist purges of the educated and successful in the past. This is how those started, and it's ironic since these are the same people thinking it's the "Make America Great Again" people who are the threats to tolerance. The blindness is blinding.
If Black Lives Matter isn't the opposite of All Lives Matter why did BLM supporters claim ALM advocates are racist? We know it isn't actually the opposite, that was our point which you objected to. How is it you're so unaware of reality you're placing your revealed racism on us?
The problem isn't the existence of these "resolutions", it's the total ignorance and racism of the content.
If America was never great for anyone but whites why did you support someone who attacked that statement by saying America already great? If that is an admission the speaker only cares about whites (which it would be were the speaker not of the left) why didn't you make that point during the election? Why do you only apply standards to people you oppose? Is it because no one can ever meet your standards and applying them to everyone reveals how inappropriate they are?
The collar around the cat's neck gives the illusion that he has breasts.
I am Laslo.
The Charleston is hard to do, but the fat guy split? Phenomenal!
Watch the dancing, commenters, it will dispel the funk and start your day right.
Why does the left respond to condescending know it alls by claiming all men need to shut up? Is it because their identity politics framework requires racial and gender conflict and they understand this will create it? Or are they simply idiots?
"You can be racist with black friends".
a) You can be racist with black skin too.
b) The only people I ever hear say this are so called allies. Those who reject identity politics don't bother. I guess we hey're scraping the bottom of the barrel already.
"You can do a little better in 2017".
Resolutions are about examining yourself. This shows you all have plenty of work on that subject.
The video is refreshing, a glimpse into adolescent minds, nothing to argue with. Rush Limbaugh makes the brilliant observation such manipulation arises from the misguided assumption one speaks for the majority. That one is right about everything. When in truth and consequence, one really has a limited world and political view. It is childish thinking, unable to produce tangible results. They are not the majority, especially in rural and Midwest areas, and nobody is answering to them. Within lives that know how to produce mature concrete results, they are just children talking. Of course, the last president spent all his time talking on college campuses. Maybe this allowed college students the false impression they are more important than they really are. They are simply students. They are nothing to fear. Truth becomes evident. Ways that work work, and the ways of the young is rubbish and talk, or maybe I am underestimating them for they now protest at the drop of a dime. Let them rant. I love the Kissinger quote. There is substance. I am convinced President Trump is going to do fine. There is no need to get upset or been drawn into arguments with people of immaturity. Defeat them with mature results. Keep marching forward as adults. It will be startling and refreshing to see politics return to adult arenas, the focus removed from pop culture and college campuses. No matter how many zinger skits SNL or MTV produces, the adults advance upon their mission.
Yes David is right, the dancing was wonderful.
The simple point beyond race is that it's rude to tell me, or anyone for that matter, what to resolve. Resolutions are about introspection. Self-examination is what is proper, here not arrogant instruction. Nothing guarantees long term failure more surely than the failure to look honestly at ones weaknesses. You would think that after a brusing election (subjectively) leftists would be more inclined to be introspective. Blame is always much easier that self correcton.
For example I need to work on my spelling
""'What message are they giving to young white boys who are growing up?' Submit."
Oh, bullshit. The young people in the video are so mild and beta. They're only begging for a little respect. If you're intimidated by that, you've pre-submitted."
To be employed at a modern American University and not get the threat of this stuff is embarrassing. It's not these lame people. It's that these lame ideas are dominating places like colleges. In fact, I know you know it, but you dismiss the bias that assumes you can do whatever you want to young men, especially white ones without having to be fair about it. You can accuse them, control them, ban them, or shut them up with impunity, always with the self-assured mentality that it's fair becuase they have white male privileged that somehow makes them immune to intolerance, and deserving of it anyway. It's bigotry plane and simple - you're just convinced it's OK anyway.
"I'm proposing the New Year's resolution for everyone: Stop saying "isn't a thing." Isn't a thing is too much of a thing. Don't do that thing!"
Is it to late to add "I know, right?" or it's even lamer abbreviation "IKR?" to the list?
Another question: is it really okay for anyone to suggest that "white guys" get to "have" Kanye West? I get that it is an attempt at humor, and I don't want to become the humorless scold that I hate.
But if we are to the SJW to their own rulebook, isn't "I don't like this particular black man so white guys get to 'have' him" about as ugly a joke that one could imagine?
The small, weak animals pose the greatest risk because they are predisposed to proactive [over]compensation.
It takes great confidence to suggest resolutions for an entire race.
Maybe confidence is an insufficient explanation. Maybe arrogance, or rudeness? No, I think just plain stupidity is what this is, and with a strong odor of racism wafting about.
Dumb racist is a bad look outside of school.
Not to worry, only a teeny tiny bit of America listens to this silly stuff. MTV is not for young white people any more.
But my resolutions, my racial resolutions, are to listen to more J.S. Bach in the new year. To read more Dickens and Shakespeare. To go again to the Prado and the Metropolitan and to the great Cathedrals of Europe and the UK. I intend to be more diligent in my attendance at Church in the new year and to keep a foot firmly planted in Rome and a foot in Canterbury.
I have tried to be open minded and have read novels by actual Africans and African Americans and I must say they are not that good. I rank jazz way behind classical. My trips to Africa have not revealed any architecture of significance, no music of any complexity or beauty. I have been let down by the multi culti lot.
And all this race talk has me looking at the unbelievably deep and wonderful culture of Western civilization. And being grateful for it.
The video right now has 290 likes to 20,000 dislikes. Great job!
Get Up Offa That Thing!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDwOFThiNnA
Is it racist for a Black guy to be telling White folks what to resolve for the New Year?
They're only begging for a little respect.
I don't think that's right - they're disrespecting the way white guys do thing ("mansplaining", "blue lives matter"). That approach is as ineffective as your kindergarten teacher suggested it would be.
Well here is a New Years resolution for Black Males, especially younger ones.
1) Get a job
2) Marry your 'Baby Moma'. Be monogamous (fancy word for not sleeping around.)
3) Get off dope, quit gangs.
4) Stop blaming others for your failures.
Happy Holidays!
"It's not a plural. It's a possessive..."
The resolution of Hammond's is to give up double possessives.
No more "A friend of John's said the book on the plan of Napoleon's was in the cab of the truck's with the sweater of the girl's."
No more "a cousin of his."
If "a friend of him" chokes on the tongue, I'll go with just "his friend." More economical of space, and therefore more respectful of the reader.
Ann Althouse said...
These attacks on white men are paradoxically telling white men they are great.
The Nazis so loved the Jews who were "disproportionally" successful in science/business/law/etc that they invented affirmative action as one of the first steps in expressing their admiration. I forget what happened next.
Ann Althouse said...
They're only begging for a little respect.
Begging might work for spare change and perhaps mercy, but not much else.
'Eager virus-carriers' is a fantastic insult. I say again, FANTASTIC. Much respect.
Also, there are quite a few majority -brown, or whatever, countries that are corrupt, backwards, poverty-stricken shitholes. I'm guessing it's not entirely related to geography.
First, this thing was probably produced by "White Males".
Second, the whole point is to further divide the country based on race and send the message to immigrants and people of color to ally themselves (aka be a Democrat/leftist) to the fight the awful white males (aka Republicans/conservatives)
Had the MTV and its white male producers been around 60 years ago the whole thing would been about "New Year's resolutions" for Rich Bourgeois .
" They're only begging for a little respect. "
It's earned. Not doled out.
My news year resolution is to give even less of a shit about the feelings of liberals.
It's telling White men that they are bad people who have accomplished great things by exploiting everyone else.
Truth...and this has started to lead to something I'm hearing more and more. It's usually some form of: "If you're a white man and you're not rich, you're a failure." This goes hand-in-hand with John Scalzi's "being white and male is playing the game on easy mode."
Hmmm....
First, we saw the video of celebrities telling us not to vote for Trump.
Then, we saw the video of celebrities telling all the Electors not to vote for Trump.
Neither worked.
I give credit for MTV not using celebrities in this video (Those people aren't celebrities, are they?). But it's the same lecturing paradigm that doesn't work.
Oh, bullshit. The young people in the video are so mild and beta.
Maybe in that particular video, but the message in the culture at large is for white men to shut up and sit down.
Stop trying to make stopping "isn't a thing" happen, Professor.
HoodlumDoodlum said...
Stop trying to make stopping "isn't a thing" happen, Professor.
"Isn't a thing" is a thing because things.
Ann Althouse said...These attacks on white men are paradoxically telling white men they are great. It's implicit. That's why you're not really offended.
No time to be offended--too busy enforcing the patriarchy, expanding colonial oppression worldwide, supporting rape culture...pretty full schedule, really.
Ann Althouse said...The young people in the video are so mild and beta. They're only begging for a little respect. If you're intimidated by that, you've pre-submitted.
Yes with a but. They're pathetic, laughably so--we can all agree on that. (Togetherness!) BUT. They're not really begging. It's whiny and passive aggressive here, sure, but this isn't a beg and this isn't really the true face of PC Leftism--and again I think we all know that. These are the ones the marketers decided should air--the real face of PC Leftism is the twisted rictus calling for "a little muscle over here," the smug sneer at a closed-door administrative meeting where punishment is handed out, budgets are set, and curriculum is set...etc.
Let's not pretend that just because these kids are dopey and present their demands in a non-threatening way that they're not part of a large, powerful movement that should be opposed. That movement certainly does have the capability of oppressing, certainly does use intimidation and power (up to and including threats of violence, using the State to impose fines, going after people's livelihoods, etc), and certainly does demand submission.
I have to say, though, that it's really great in a way that these Leftist geniuses can't seem to get past their rigid identity-politics way of thinking. You'd think they'd take Trump's win as a lesson that when you tell "white men" or "white America" that they should think of themselves as a group that the consequences might be...other than what the PC Left brigades want...but their inability to grasp that (or possibly to even be ABLE to think in any other way) probably means they won't learn that lesson for a long, long time.
Also, just to point out: pre-submission is the entire goal. Pre-submission is why owning the Media and the Academy (well, schools) is so important to the Left, and why they're so militant about stamping out any dissent in those areas (no-platforming contrary speakers, banning offensive ideas, labeling any opposition as racist/sexist/homophobic/hateful, etc).
It's 1984 stuff, baby. Pre-submission is their endpoint--they don't want to argue or even allow that an argument (or disagreement) is possible; anything not part of their program is by definition intolerable (because racist/sexist/homophobic).
Hmmmm. Kanye West goes under the bus.
Fernadinande said..."Isn't a thing" is a thing because things.
Check your language privilege, bro. Wiki: Thing (assembly)
Yeah, from the Norse/Germanic/Viking term for meeting or assembly...of WHITE MALES (mostly).
Wiki: Althing.
Yeah, Iceland's national parliament, one of the oldest parliaments in the world...and historically made up mostly of WHITE MALES. Outrage!
2016: Iceland Elects Historic Number of Women to Parliament
Well, but still. Words have origins, and those origins are sometimes based around things that were exclusively male and/or exclusively white...so you should know that, and feel bad about that, and apologize for that.
I' feel certain the 3 guys in the video have shared a hotel room together.
The 3 women fail to understand why no one has invited them to share a hotel room.
Everyone is upset by their sexual identity......save the white guys that are grabbing all the pussy, and loving it!!!
Oh, bullshit. The young people in the video are so mild and beta.
So is President Obama in many ways*. Of course this is expressed as No Drama Obama, or he's so cool.
But, given positions of power like POTUS or Title IX Coordinator, even Betas (especially Betas) can do a lot of harm.
* As just one example, Alphas don't draw red lines then disclaim them.
HoodlumDoodlum said...
Yeah, Iceland's national parliament, one of the oldest parliaments in the world...and historically made up mostly of WHITE MALES. Outrage!
That must be the result of colonial oppression because dark skin absorbs sunlight and heat better than pasty unhealthy white skin.
Speaking of things, observe just above a yet-to-be published comment - "...and don't do that thing of putting in a lot of extra line breaks."
Blogger Jupiter said...
'There's an apostrophe in "New Year's"'.
New Year's Day is the Day of the New Year, and the 's forms the possessive case, indicating that the Day belongs to the Year. But the Resolution is for an entire Year. Given the common English practice of using nouns as adjectives, a Resolution associated with a New Year could be called a New Year Resolution. Since that's what you wanted to talk about.
And just out of courtesy, I do resolve to stop bragging about how I am "woke". But what would I want with Kanye West? I don't own any cotton fields.
So I watched it and it was just as bad as I thought it would be.
The "message" is that if you voted for Trump over the sick old white woman, then you are a racist.
I think we can expect the Democrat party to continue to be increasingly irrelevant for at least two more presidential election cycles.
They lack adult leadership and are not going to get it anytime soon.
I also expect conservative state legislatures to start inquiring into why exactly is the state funding all these people and programs at state universities that don't equip people for a job or engender respect for the institutions and history of the US. Couldn't that money be better spent on vocational training?
Dear stupid black guy in the video:
We won.
Fernandinande said...Speaking of things, observe just above a yet-to-be published comment - "...and don't do that thing of putting in a lot of extra line breaks.
Completely acceptable--that's just prevent SOME people from doin' that thing [they] do.
Blogger Ann Althouse said...
"'What message are they giving to young white boys who are growing up?' Submit."
Oh, bullshit. The young people in the video are so mild and beta. They're only begging for a little respect. If you're intimidated by that, you've pre-submitted.
Some of us have white male offspring and we aren't thinking of ourselves, but our progeny.
Only a fool would dismiss this threat to our children.
Have you not seen the white people being beaten up for being white? Not so bad because people around the world are beaten for all sorts of reasons. The scary part is the, "Well, they had it coming" mindset of the in crowd. How about bearings of Trump supporters? Also, they had it coming. Or the abuse of Trump supporters because they had it coming.
Again, none of these things by themselves matters. People treat people like crap around the world for all sorts of reasons.
But only fools would ignore what's on the horizon for white people in this country, because they deserve it.
This is just another step in normalizing the behavior.
Because white people, white men in particular, deserve it.
Althouse: "These attacks on white men are paradoxically telling white men they are great. It's implicit. That's why you're not really offended. If you are... are you really?"
I would appreciate it if you would think about how this is woman-splaining....and then stop it.
(But keep blogging, of course)
"Come on, MTV. Help the new generation get punctuation right."
The new generation doesn't get punctuation. Period.
In fact, I know you know it, but you dismiss the bias that assumes you can do whatever you want to young men, especially white ones without having to be fair about it.
The only person it is legal to discriminate against, if fact often mandated to discriminate against, is a White male. I would love it if trump and the Republicans in Congress got rid of Affirmative Action.
Drago: "... woman-splaining"..."
Ha, that's funny. It would make an awesome name for a female law professors blog.
Regarding progeny, our children's formation is complete once they arrive at college age. The only formation possible occurs from infancy through high school. I am proud of my son, independent and strong thinking while living in Ann Arbor, Michigan. I think of something Althouse said about an appointee of Trump she went to school with. He took pride in going against the herd mentality polluting the college campus.
This is just a silly version of the constant message stream going to all kids through all media, much of it far more hard edged and overbearing and directly from actual authority figures. If you haven't had kids in middle-high schools recently you may not be aware of the full impact. Its also uniform, so much so it seems coordinated.
This is a significant influence on kids - I have seen it work on teenagers. It helps destroy self confidence and ambition in many cases. Part of getting to a successful outcome is inspiration, to persist through difficulties. This is a message not to bother, that one is worthless and evil anyway, that persistence is futile because you deserve failure, and that your interests (should they not fall within the generally fashionable among black people) are worthless. This affects even kids who explicitly reject it and rebel against it. Many kids will persist and triumph anyway, but many, often talented, won't.
The attitudes and values expressed in these environments can seem idiotic, absurd, to us in the real world, but they are real in their artificial context and can negatively affect kids in their formative years and will haunt them as adults, perhaps crippling them for life. Too many people are ruined because of being stupidly programmed as teenagers. Its absurd and pathetic but it happens.
Humans are a social species and the idea of individual agency or responsibility can be taken too far.
"Oh, bullshit. The young people in the video are so mild and beta. They're only begging for a little respect."
--
Yes, bullshit.
But I like this idea we can assign "resolutions" to others...really takes the difficulty out of it.
That video has 20,000 dislikes and a few likes - meaning it is being followed by those it attacks. The elections of 2016 showed a lot of people - white people, white men, Christians, black Republicans, black Christians, Hispanic Republicans, Hispanic Catholics, workingmen - that they are not alone. It showed liberals nothing whatsoever as far as I can see. They still think that their mockery is sacred mockery and that the Others are othered when they other them. But now the Others are following otherings and posting them as examples of othering thus othering the Other othering. Or as we used to say: "I'm rubber and you're glue. Whatever you say, comes to me, bounces back and sticks to you."
Go ahead, MTV, keep it up. Just don't be surprised when whites start voting as a block. And I don't mean a 55/45 split. I'm talking about 75/25 or 90/10 like we see amongst Hispanics and blacks. This stuff isn't just insulting to white men. Plenty of white women have white husbands, white fathers, white brothers and white sons.
"These attacks on white men are paradoxically telling white men they are great. It's implicit. That's why you're not really offended. If you are... are you really"
No, not really. God knows there's been a heap of evil perpetrated by pukka sahibs, robber barons, and Scots-Irish crackas, but they're also responsible for about 95% of the good things in the world.
I always laugh when I hear some privileged, Asian-American, SJW daughter of an orthodonist prating about the evils of white men. Without my ancestors, Xiang, you'd be a domestic farm animal in some rural Asian shithole.
The injustices - brutal mistreatment - of black people in America makes one want to weep. It was unbelievable in ways large and small. And other groups were also, albeit less so, terribly treated. That is undeniable.
But I have no empathy towards these spoiled people. They haven't suffered in America. They've been given opportunities that billions of people can only dream of. To claim the mantle of victimhood is risible, simply risible. When they go to a store a clerk watches them suspiciously? Please, cut it out.
I'll listen - and grieve with - their parents and grandparents. But not with them. Not a bit.
They're only begging for a little respect.
Respect is something that you earn, not something you beg for like asking for quarters to be dropped into your tin cup.
You earn respect by respecting yourself, by living a life that is worthwhile, by putting other people first, by being an upright person, by setting good examples, by living with your principles, by the charitable works you do, by how you treat others, by showing tolerance and forgiveness.
Hectoring other people and telling them how "they" need to act and think is not a way to earn respect.
Eric said...
"But only fools would ignore what's on the horizon for white people in this country, because they deserve it.
This is just another step in normalizing the behavior.
Because white people, white men in particular, deserve it."
Unless, of course, they're armed. Which, for some reason, more and more of us are.
An interesting point made on local radio here in Cleveland, Ohio was that whites founding and building this nation were not an evil unified group hell-bent on screwing minorities. Truth and history is more elaborate than that. The Irish, Italians, and others were subject to prejudice. I go back even further to Biblical times. The Israelites did not escape slavery from the Egyptians by whining, demanding to be understood. One of them rose amongst the ranks, Joseph, and took control in order for everyone and everything to be rectified.
Was that a young Yoko Ono? Taking the bait? If they want to make fools of themselves, I will help spread the word.
"White guy resolution 2017 / What could white guys do better in 2017?"
Be president, duh! Doing better than the black guy from 2016 is not a high bar.
Oh, you meant what they could do better than they're doing now, not what could they do better than the black guy doing it now! Then why didn't you say so? It's always worth spending a little extra time polishing your prose to avoid unfortunate ambiguities, especially the kind that leave you wide open for obvious jokes.
Scripture: 'Now Moses was a very humble man, more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth'
From RealClearPolitics: Update: MTV took down the video after less than 48 hours following an intense backlash from online commentators.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2016/12/20/mtv_news_tells_white_guys_what_they_could_do_better_in_2017.html
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