Tuesday, August 15, 2006

Senator George Allen: 'Macaca' Is Racist

During a recent campaign stop and stump speech, Senator George Allen (a hopeful 2008 Republican Presidential nominee) pointed out a young man who happened to filming the speech and called him a "macaca."

Like many of you, I'd never heard of the word and didn't think much of it, until I read what Jeffrey Feldman wrote in his Frameshop blog, "Yesterday, when the news broke that George Allen called someone at a campaign stop a 'macaca,' I did some Google searches to find out what it meant. As it turns out, the question is not if 'macaca' is a racist term, but which of the three definitions of the word 'macaca' did George Allen intend when he used it?"

It turns out that the word means the same thing in a number of languages:
  • 'Macaque' - French : racist slang; a dismissive epithet used by Francophone colonials in Africa for native populations of North and Subsaharan Africans, similar to the English word 'nigger.'
  • 'Macaca' - English : racist slang; similar to the word 'nigger', used to describe Arabs.
  • 'Macaca' - English : racist slang; used by American white supremacists in 'insider' talk about African-Americans.

I've posted a clip of the offensive speech here:

plez sez: While standing before a group of his ardent supporters, George Allen shows his true colors!

This is the same George Allen who stirred controversy as governor of Virginia by issuing a proclamation noting the South's celebration of Confederate History Month without the mention of slavery. Now, he goes on the campaign trail using a veiled and racist code word to refer to a person of color, basically calling him a nigger to his face.

Fifty years ago, it's obvious that George Allen would be leading a lynch mob. This isn't the type of man who should leading a state, or righting laws, or - heaven forbid - running this country. It is time for the people of Virginia to send this yokel back to where he came from!

3 comments:

Christopher King said...

Wow Plez, that is unreal. I'm going to link this in a minute on my blawg -- particularly because of what our esteemed Senator says at the end of his little racist tirade: "Welcome to America and the real world... we're in the midst of a war on terror."

Screw him. My black ancestry includes plenty of Cherokee Indian and I can assure you we were here before George Allen. And most of the terror I've dealt with in my life came from white men wearing black robes.

Meanwhile, here is another interesting racial slight regarding a certain 9/11 hero who ends up being depicted as a white man in the new movie, "World Trade Center."

Dig my comment on it.

http://christopher-king.blogspot.com/2006/08/911-hero-and-us-marine-jason-thomas-is.html

Peace.

Christopher King said...

Blawg entries while-u-wait:

http://christopher-king.blogspot.com/2006/08/kingcast-identifies-us-senator-george.html

I knew those editing and reporting skills honed in the MS-DOS heyday would one day come in handy!

Peace, Plez.

Arch City Expatriate said...

Amazing. And he said that without blinking or thinking.

I am never amazed by foolishness like this, but it being caught on tape - without blurs - without poor audio - is amazing. There's no, "slip of the tongue" issue here. This idiot revved up and just went for it.

Thanks for posting.