McCain joins the “tar baby” crowd.
ALSO: Do you get the sense that McCain had a “senior moment” here?
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“tar baby” is a racial epithet? Is it as bad as “articulate.”
What is the world coming to?
What’s funny is that you’re actually old enough to remember the use of tar baby as a regular racial epithet, Frank.
A friend of mine used ‘tar baby’ in a meeting the other day. I told him afterwards that it was considered offensive, but honestly, I couldn’t tell him why, just that he should watch the usage.
So, what, exactly, is wrong with using the metaphor of the ‘tar baby’ to reference a problem that gets worse the more you tangle with it?
I’m old enough to remember the tar baby’s being a cartoon character. I had too many black friends as a child to even think of using a racial epithet.
It’s probably more racially charged over there, but McCain didn’t use it in any racial sense, like against Obama or something.
Why mutht we be tho then-thi-tive??
Political correctness is nothing by censorship practiced by those with far too much time on their hands.
Oliver, I am afraid this is exactly the kind of unthinking enforcement of politically correct rules on what people are allowed to say that allows convervatives to dismiss actions that are fights against real racism as liberals just being politically correct. The use of tar baby here is not racist at all. It is a metaphor, as I am sure you know, for a baby that is sticky because it is made of tar so that if you grab it, you can’t let go. In other words, a situation that once you get into, you can’t get out of. Hmmm… it seems to me it would be hard to come up with a better description of the Bush Administration.
Kindly explain to me how McCain’s use of it in this situation is a racist statment.
Counterfactual: Liberals are absurdly politically correct
Italics, be gone!
Wow, do you guys not remember the flap with Tony Snow just, what was it, 5 months ago?
I find it interesting that this term “tar baby”, while meant to convey a sticky situation, a) is viewed as racially insensitive and b)has come back into the lexicon almost 60 years after it first appeared.
There are better expressions to use. But I agree with Rory.
It’s a shame. Tar-Baby is such a wondefully evocative phrase, from a great work of dialect literature–J. C. Harris’s Brer Rabbit stories. In its original use, it is, indeed, a problem that becomes stickier.
But unfortunately, the term’s been co-opted by racists, largely in the south, where Harris’ stories were most popular, so, unfortunately, anybody literate enough to understand and use it should also be aware of its more benighted connotation, and thus steer clear of it.
McCain isn’t a name-calling racist. Much as I despise the two-faced motherfucker and wish he would just quit public office and go open mail for Rev. Falwell, I am at least willing to concede this.
Tony Snow on the other hand? Something tells me he’s used the “n” word when among friends.
FD: You’re confusing uneducated with politically correct.
But that’s okay, because I often confuse stupid with politically INcorrect….
jimmmm: Uneducated AND stupid go well with political correctness, as you have demonstrated.
Frank, you hit it on the nose again. Those uneducated and stupid liberals use their “political correctness” nonsense to limit our language. You can’t call someone a “tar baby” anymore because of them. I remember the old days when you could call a Mexican a “wetback” and a homo a “fag” and a crossdresser a “shim”. These liberals don’t respect the English language.
Ah, yes, where we would be without Beans?
Besides comfortable and … happy
“s” is dead, long live Beans!
BTW, is anyone on this blog aware that Toni Morrison wrote a novel called Tar Baby, and that page after page of Googling refers not to an offensive term, but the story from African folklore relayed to Americans by J.C. Harris’ stories?