Said Ted Danson, on a podcast recently, quoted in "Ted Danson Apologizes for Blackface Roast of Whoopi Goldberg in 1993" (NYT).
How do you come up with the idea that because you're not a stand-up comedian, you can go even farther over the line? It's the stand-up who has the most reason to think he ought to seize the power of offensiveness.
If the answer to my question is he thought pull it off because "There’s no one that’s been whiter than me in the world," then he's openly embracing white privilege. I'm not calling for another apology. He's apologized enough. I'm just examining an enigmatic perplexity.
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Was it a black face or a black-black face? A carbon roast, perhaps, which is equitable and inclusive.
Someday we might not care about rubbishy stuff like this. I think that day came over 100 years ago.
They must not let racism die.
If racism is no longer a problem then a lot of people will have to get real jobs.
"... he's openly embracing white privilege."
Help me out here. Do you mean that "white privilege" is a concept you take seriously? I suppose you also have to be careful to avoid "cultural appropriation", don't you. I mean, when you're getting dressed in the morning. Wouldn't want to put on any insensitive clothing.
While we are on the subject of inanity, is it OK if Grok uses the N-word, like the N-words do? Or is Grok white? Let us know, professor, you're an educated white woman and you understand these things.
I understand these things too. But not the way you do.
Yesterday I asked Grok to write a short story using the title "Hierarchy of Victimhood" as the only prompt. It was quite entertaining.
If all of the white men leave the United States the country becomes Ethiopia or Mexico in a year.
White privilege is given to others.
Don't care about these people. Just posting to read the comments that are often highly entertaining
"If racism is no longer a problem then a lot of people will have to get real jobs."
Can't we hand the racism over to A.I.? It's doing everything else.
Relax, Ted, and ignore the racism pimps. You've done worse things than wearing comedic black face at a comedy event - far worse things. In fact just about anything "bad" that you've ever done is worse.
I don't get the horror of "black face". I mean, if black people say "don't do it", fine, I won't do it. But it seems to be right up there with murder or rape.
Oh come on. It's simple. He thought it would be funny. It just wasn't forever for everyone. How is he supposed to know that? That happens with any edgy comedy. Race has just gotten so stupid in the culture. It was handled much more honestly in the past. You can't even answer questions about race honestly anymore. It has to go through your inner lawyer, agent, and human resources department first. Just stupid and dishonest.
Ted Danson is a comedian?
But it is OK when men dress up as women?
When will Patti Gonia, RuPaul et al apologize for their minstrelsy?
How about Bruce Jenner and Senator! Tim McBride?
John Henry
Ted is traumatized by his time with Whoopie. Even I'm traumatized when I think of it, so I try not to.
Ted's an actor of very little brain. He should talk less.
"There’s no one that’s been whiter than me in the world," then he's openly embracing white privilege.
I think in his mind he’s asserting ‘clueless white guy stereotype/comedic absurdity’ privilege.
Imagine how funny comedy would be if you had to edit out everything that might not be funny to someone sometime in the future. You might as well find some other work. Good comedy is courageous.
So, this happened 33 years ago, and the NYT's still thinks its important. Guess Genocide in Gaza, the SAVE act, Henry Nowak, the Ukraine War, open borders, inflation, and Epstein files are all just so unimportant to the NYTs. Lets talk about Ted Danson and Whoopi ! At least there was no Emmett Till reference.
"But it is OK when men dress up as women?
When will Patti Gonia, RuPaul et al apologize for their minstrelsy?"
Excellent analogy.
I dunno what's wrong with Ted other than he's dumb as a post. Why was he dating Whoopi in the first place? Couldn't he get someone better looking?
There was only one reason why Ted Danson was famous.
It wasn’t because he was funny.
Very very few men get to experience pretty privilege.
If I remember right -- this was 30 years ago -- he had a lot of jokes with the N word and he didn't want to do it. And so that's why she painted his face black, so he could say the N word. And now that's all people remember, the blackface. But I think the jokes themselves were in bad taste? Anyway, he was cancelled for a while, and then he came back.
Why are they bringing it up now? Weird.
Levi, are you one of those $500m AI Prompt engineers I mentioned in another thread? What a terrific idea. I just tried it in Claude (Which I have open designing a PowerBI Dashboard, my newest skill). I was a bit more elaborate than you: My prompt was:
write me a short story, 500 words or so, about the hierarchy of social victimhood (Race, sex, gender, age etc)
It gave me a wonderful little story about a monthly meeting of the monthly "Intersectionality Coordination Committee"
This leaped out at me but the rest was equally good:
"Then came Tyler, who was white, male, cisgender, and twenty-three years old — a demographic catastrophe by committee standards. He'd been invited as a "learning participant," which everyone understood meant scapegoat-in-residence. He brought donuts, which helped."
I think everyone should try it see what you get.
John Henry
Why are they bringing it up now?
…because podcasts? Who’s with me?
Now do kimmel behar mr katy perry
It's a measure of how beloved Ted Danson must be that this never stuck to him. I confess that I have a lot of residual affection for Whoopi due to her Star Trek work. Her political stuff on the View seems like shitposting, and I just pretend it doesn't exist.
Somebody wrote the jokes for him. AI is saying Whoopie wrote the jokes. He's an actor. People write lines for him all the time. And these jokes were racist, making fun of her that way. That's why he did the blackface, so he could be racist without being punished. The whole thing was stupid.
I dont find it particularly humorous but dont get on yoir high horse
One suspects ond of the moviee whoopi did around that time was due to a conversation with gordon liddy aboit genetics
Thanks Levi. Now you have me writing short stories while I should be developing a manufacturing dashboard. Or at least supervising Claude.
I just tried my prompt in Grok, free version. Great story. I defy anyone to read this and say it is not as good as 75% of the published or collected short stories you've read in your life.
====
The Hierarchy
In the fluorescent glow of the Community Justice Center, the weekly Oppression Circle convened every Thursday at 7 p.m. sharp. The room smelled of burnt coffee and moral certainty. A large chart dominated one wall: The Hierarchy of Lived Experience, a rainbow pyramid of intersecting identities. At the top, glowing in gold leaf: Trans Black Disabled Non-Binary. At the bottom, faded and scribbled over: Cis White Hetero Male, Age 18-45.
Elena arrived first, clutching her soy latte like a talisman. As a half-Puerto Rican, half-Jewish, bisexual, neurodivergent woman in her thirties with mild fibromyalgia, she occupied a comfortable middle rung. Not apex, but respectable.
(Cont)
(Continued)
Tonight’s facilitator was Marcus, a tall Black man who identified as a “two-spirit demiguy” after last month’s workshop. He wore a pronoun pin the size of a coaster. “Let’s begin with check-ins,” he said. “Who holds space this week?”
Jamal raised his hand. Dark-skinned, gay, HIV-positive, and recently diagnosed with long COVID. The room murmured approval. Points added. Then came Priya: Indian, trans woman, wheelchair user, vegan. The pyramid seemed to shimmer in her direction.
A new attendee shuffled in late. White. Male. Mid-forties. Balding. He wore an ill-fitting “Ally” shirt and clutched a notebook. His name tag read Brad – He/Him – Trying.
The circle stiffened.
“Brad,” Marcus said, voice flat. “What brings you?”
Brad cleared his throat. “I, uh… lost my job. Affirmative action restructuring. My wife left me for her yoga instructor who’s non-binary. My son came out as a cat last week and now I’m supposed to use litter pronouns. I’m… struggling.”
A polite titter rippled through the room.
Elena leaned forward, sympathetic but firm. “Brad, I hear you, but we need to contextualize. Your pain exists within systems of privilege. As a cis man—”
“Actually,” Brad interrupted, pulling out a crumpled paper, “I did 23andMe. Turns out I’m 0.4% Indigenous. Cherokee, maybe? And my great-uncle had depression, so mental health—”
The room erupted.
Priya’s eyes narrowed. “You can’t just claim Indigeneity like that. That’s extraction.”
Jamal crossed his arms. “My ancestors survived the Middle Passage. You had a DNA test and a sad divorce.”
Brad’s shoulders slumped. “I’m just saying, maybe I’m not at the absolute bottom?”
Marcus consulted the chart. “Cis. White-passing. Male. Age: peak privilege bracket. Your score is… negative seventeen. You’re taking up oxygen that could go to higher-need voices.”
Elena felt a strange twist in her stomach. Last month she’d been praised. This month, after a doctor questioned her fibromyalgia diagnosis, whispers began: Maybe she’s not that disabled. Priya had already started a subtle campaign, noting that Elena’s skin was “light-adjacent.”
The meeting dragged on. A young person in a skirt and beard claimed they were the most oppressed because they were “temporarily able-bodied” but planning top surgery and identified as autistic and Palestinian-adjacent through online solidarity.
Brad sat silently, watching the pyramid. It wasn’t static. Someone always fell. Someone always climbed by discovering new traumas or subtracting old ones. A Black lesbian had dropped two rungs last week after admitting she liked men sometimes. “Internalized heteronormativity,” they called it.
When the circle ended, Brad lingered. “Does anyone ever win?” he asked Elena quietly.
She looked at the chart, then at Priya wheeling out triumphantly, Marcus nodding in deference. “Winning isn’t the point,” she said. But her voice lacked conviction. For the first time, the pyramid looked less like justice and more like a ladder made of knives—everyone slicing the rungs below them while clutching for the next one up.
Outside, the city lights flickered indifferently. Brad walked home alone. Somewhere behind him, new emails were already circulating: We need to recenter the most marginalized voices. Brad’s presence was… disruptive.
The hierarchy endured. It always did.
Bravo john henry
Althouse wrote: "I'm just examining an enigmatic perplexity."
Examining myself, for argument's sake:
(1) Blackface was in poor taste in those days, but it it hadn't achieved the taboo/third rail status, and because it hadn't achieved that status, a well meaning person could still think doing it did not inflexibly equal being offensive.
(2) Absurdity is a species of comedy. The "whiter" a guy is (or the perception of the guy as a white stereotype), the more absurd it is for him to appear in blackface.
(3) If the comedian leans into his "whitest guy" stereotype while doing blackface (I have no recollection of whether Danson did), it is still racial humor -- but it is self-deprecating -- it is making fun of his stereotypical whiteness. That might be funny and acceptable -- even at the height of sensitivity about racial insensitivity, making fun of yourself or your group has always been well within the Overton window.
Seems to me that if you're looking for racism in this story it's right here --
“Well, if I were Black, I could say all these outrageous things,” he said. “I’m not. Then, my mind went, well, I will do it in blackface. That will be funny or not, but it’ll, like, be — oh, I have license to.”
That's an assumption of the acceptance of inferiority of Blacks by Danson.
The white privilege of being banned from wearing dark make-up? That makes no sense.
The claim that "blackface' is pers se racist is a lie cooked up pretty recently. I like Ted Danson, but I wish he would have had the balls to say that--the idea that blackface is racist hadn't been invented yet so he has nothing to apologize for.
Blackface, white privilage, and tearful apologies = ultimate boomer bait.
Has some professor written a book on this yet?
While in the restaurant in Los Angeles, Nancy Lee asks Hank (Woody Harrelson), "Isn't that a star?" He replies, "No, that's Ted Danson." - Doc Hollywood
"At the time I thought it was a good idea. Or maybe I thought it would at least be funny. It wasn't, the gag didn't work, and I regret my decision."
That is all he should say or ever say about it. I keep that one around for those unfortunate occasions when I stray into backface pantomime.
That's blackface.
Just a thought nails it.
The left saw it all slipping away. Outrageous humor was okay until it wasn't. What Danson did was the opposite of that idiotic concept we've come to know and loathe as "white privilege."
It was a joke. I can't stand Ted Danson or Jimmy Kimmel, but the idea that makeup is no laughing matter is one that should have been retired a long time ago.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_LeJfn_qW0
it’ll, like, be — oh, I have license to. I thought I could pull this off.
My guess is he thought he had license because he was with a black woman, thus proving he wasn't racist.
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