A Tentative Demur on a Last Bastion of Still-Acceptable Stereotyping (1 March 2014 / 20 March 2015)

In March of 2015, "migrating" my blogs from OpenSalon, now closed, I had the choice not to repost this one, which is a defense (or sorts) of fraternity men: a group most recently disgraced by some drunken Sigma Alpha Epsilon louts of Oklahoma U and the racist persuasion. Still ... I'm going to repost this since I'm convinced the fraternity issue is often a subset of youth-bashing, which is often a subset of scapegoating. In the background here is the idea that by our late teens most of us are pretty much who we are going to be for the rest of our lives, and if late teens and young adults are fairly often horrible, this is because they are a normal more-or-less adult population, but with special circumstances. And, to apply an old idea, specific "besetting sins." More specifically, the young tend toward the gross and bodily sins, while their elders get more sophisticated and intellectual in evil. The "besetting sin" of youth is Lust; the more deadly besetting sin of age is Greed. Etc. If the SAE's of OK U were obnoxious in their racist singing — and indeed they were — they were less dangerous in their evil than genteel racists who would never, ever say "nigger," not even in private, but who prevent African-Americans from getting loans or having a chance for contracts or, sometimes voting. So I will damn to humiliation the punks of the Oklahoma SAE, but would remind people to look to quieter but far more dangerous, respectable older folk of the Lost Cause Old Confederacy and new model Southern Strategies.

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            A friend sent me a copy of an op-ed piece from The New York Times of 27 February 2014, wherein Greg Hampikian, identified as "a professor of biology and criminal justice at Boise State University," raises the question, increasingly pressing given recent increases in the right to keep and bear and openly carry arms — sometimes including on college campuses — "When May I Shoot a Student?"

            This is a fine article, but I find myself troubled by one phrase even Professor Hampikian seems to find problematic. 

"Knee-jerk reactions from law enforcement officials and university presidents are best set aside. Ignore, for example, the lame argument that some drunken frat boys will fire their weapons in violation of best practices. This view is based on stereotypical depictions of drunken frat boys, a group whose dignity no one seems willing to defend."

             As a fraternity alumnus myself, I will not defend any obnoxious drunks but must deplore the use of the stereotyping and juvenalizing phrase "drunken frat boys." If one insists on denigration — and we writers of wise-ass punditry often so insist — I tentatively recommend the more exact, neutral, and gender-and-living-unit-inclusive formulation "obstreperous frat rats, inebriated sorority chicks, and indies."

            Partly here, I follow the example of an apartment mate I had in graduate school who wouldn’t go to a restaurant on Sunday evenings because the dormitories and independent houses on campus usually didn't serve Sunday dinner, so, "The dormies are out! The dormies are out!" He despised undergraduates of all varieties, but found those from the dorms most annoying. He was not a fraternity alum himself but a student of sociology and undoubtedly developed his views only after diligent research.

            As one might know if one has studied Elizabethan usage — and sure as hell knows if one is a Black man — "boy" is a traditional insult, but nowadays not as much as it should be.

            Given the generally suckiness of adult life for many Americans (if not 99%, still a fair number), and given how pleasant "campus life" can be if one takes care to avoid the "College is for Grownups" shit of class work, it is understandable than many young Americans use college as what one of my students called, "The Four-Year Vacation" and another called, more relevantly here, "College: Half-Way House to Adulthood."

            So arrested development among young Americans is understandable, but it is not to be encouraged. And following from that principle, professors, parents, politicians, and pundits — and administrators and other nonalliterating classifications — should risk the occasional appearance of delusion and talk of "college men" and "college women," "sorority women" and "fraternity men" and, "students in the residence halls and independent houses."

            Pressing further, I would note that abuse of alcohol and other drugs is hardly limited to young people; it is just that youths tend to be loudest and most irritating about it, and certainly more apt than their elders to piss on your lawn or puke on your shoes. These problems, however, are often more a product of inexperience and some cultural/legal perversities than of youth, and America's young would do better if older members of their extended families would bloody well teach the little punks how to hold their liquor like civilized folk.

            CAUTION, however: serving liquor to even one's kids is illegal in many jurisdictions. The American rule is "Old enough to drive, be drafted, vote, and bring guns to class, but much too young to learn, even at home, how to use, not abuse, booze."

            But I digress; the topic here is language usage, about which I have some authority (we spoke English at my home). The topic here is usage and trying to talk inclusively rather than stereotyping. So avoid both overgeneralization and targeting an often-privileged minority group, but still a minority group. The problem isn't limited to "drunken frat boys," and my final advice is that one take care to slur more carefully, generally, and decorously: "obnoxious drunken assholes." 

About that Second Amendment ... (30 Oct. 2014)

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What TV news I watch is from an elliptical trainer, and I work hard to avoid commercials — every time you listen to a commercial the hucksters win — so I skip channels a bit and set the TV to mute fairly often and listen to an audio book. So I'm often confused about who said what on which program, but I got the clear message that my fellow Libs Stephen Colbert, Jon Stewart, Chris Hayes, and/or Rachel Maddow got fairly shocked by the idea of a Republican candidate for office addressing gun enthusiasts and bringing up potential use of firearms to defend oneself against — i.e., shoot at with intent to wound, kill, or maim — various folk in the Federal government.

Uh, yeah. That goes with a reading of the Second Amendment that I heard from the 1960s on. The logic is straighforward. The Second Amendment is second only to the First — free speech and all that — in that the Right to Bear Arms ensures the other rights against the threat of a tyrannical government.

After all, Tom Jefferson and the guys held as self-evident axiomatic "that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights [...] That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

Under the Bill of Rights that we eventually got from the Revolution (or Counter-revolution, if that's your theory), citizens of the Republic could exercise our rights and peaceably assemble and shoot our mouths off "to petition the government for a redress of grievances." But let's say there's no redress: not this time, not for a long time. Let's say the newfangled Federal government, or "any Form of Government" starts destroying rights rather than protect them? Well then it is our right, nay, our duty to try "to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as  [...] shall seem" to us "most likely to effect [... our] Safety and Happiness" and renewal of The Tree of Liberty.

Governments, however, don't like to be altered or abolished, and they fight back, with guns. (Mr. Jefferson was clear as to just what would water/manure the figurative Tree of Liberty.)

Now as a practical matter, the real revolutionary parts of revolutions are often pretty bloodless in the initial takeover. The fighting back comes after a bit, and what decides it isn't usually the weapons the peasants and revolutionary pros have but, instead, which way the troops finally decide to point their weapons. When the soldiers refuse to fire on the crowd and shoot instead their officers — or when military leaders join the rebels — that's when the revolution wins, at least for a while (until it gets betrayed ... and eventually the cycle starts all over again).

Still, at least in the initial stage of the revolution and maybe in the following guerilla warfare, it helps to have a well-armed populace to secure The Right of Revolution.

Which "Right," unfortunately, usually means some hotheads or fanatics gunning down cops or a standoff like Ruby Ridge and the siege at Waco leading to a skirmish and death. Or Shay's Rebellion. Or leading up to something as major as the US Civil War.

Which leads to the side of the Second Amendment coming from the other side of Tom Jefferson's life and that of a goodly number of the Founders and Framers: The need for well-armed White folk to put down any "servile insurrection" (or Indian attacks), or, later, just "uppity n*ggers." "[T]he right of the people to keep and bear arms," except for brief periods, meant the right of White folks to keep firearms, while you can — or more likely I can — get arrested for "open carry" of a knife.

(The joke is that a Liberal is the guy who brings a knife to a gun fight; in terms of "home defense," I live the joke.)

Anyway, Jon or Stephen or Chris and/or Rachel shouldn't be surprised at gun fans indicating a willingness to shoot agents of the Federal government: Federal Marshals, FBI, ATF — whatever. That's part of the theory. It's also close to rebellion, insurrection, or treason, and the Federal government can be expected to shoot back. Maybe not Sherman's march to the sea this time, or even a drone strike, but far heavier shit than dreamt of by people who hold such theories.

And if they keep talking that way and arming themselves quite so assiduously, then we can expect even more militarization of our police forces and the irony of the Second Amendment working not to preserve the Republic but to put it in danger.