Jay Smooth Continues to Amaze

Or, a brief history of the Stonewall Riots and the start of the Gay Rights Movement:



This kind of reminds me of how "pansy" is thrown around as an insult, when in the Real World, the pansy is one tough flower. Which is kind of the opposite of what "pansy" as an insult is supposed to connote.

Jay Smooth on Caramel

Just because:


Plus, the face he makes when looking back at the drug spot/candy store is all sorts of funny.

"That's All The Money I'm Gonna Save When I Never Go To The Movies Again"

In case anyone had any doubts, I still friggin' love Jay Smooth:



You know, videos about child rape aren't really supposed to make me this happy. But hearing Jay Smooth's passionate articulation of the ins and outs of the whole Roman Polanski saga/scandal makes me insanely happy. Because he is so right. And so wonderful while being right - especially with his bit about the switch from "victim" to "accuser"/"survivor" and how Roman Polanski's not facing the law isn't as much a problem for him as it is for the survivor.

There are so many examples of straight up awesomeness that it really makes sense to just watch the entire video; but in case anyone is interested in my favorite bit of absolute awesomeness, it is this part:

Point number 2:
Let's be clear about why he got to plead to that vague, ambiguous thing. If you watch that documentary that came out last year, which was a very slanted pro-Polanski documentary, even in that film they make it clear that this plea bargain was set up by the family and their attorneys, because they saw no other way to protect this girl from the trauma of a trial that would take away her anonymity and subject her to an endless media frenzy. They did not set up that plea bargain because they had any doubts about being able to prove her original charges. They set up the plea bargain because they saw a system that could not adequately protect this child, so they felt they had no other choice but to compromise and settle for something less than justice.

Bold is all mine. Seriously though, chills down the spine to hear it laid out so clearly.

The Ending of a Career

Yesterday, after I posted a quote from Eugene Robinson's Washington Post op-ed, I began to revisit it. There was another line in Robinson's piece that bothered me when I first read it, and continued to niggle at me through the night. It was this one:

But when he brought up the "wise Latina" remark, as the GOP playbook apparently required, Graham said that "if I had said anything remotely like that, my career would have been over."

That's true.

The reason the line, and Robinson's acquiescence regarding its truthiness, bothers me is because I don't really think it is true. Senator Graham's career may have been over had he uttered a similar line. I'd be willing to bet his senatorial career would have suffered. But I'm not entirely sure if Senator Lindsey Graham would actually lose his Senate seat, or if his career would be over. And the reason why is because of Senator Jeff Sessions. Sessions has said some pretty boneheaded things. I would be willing to step away from the rule I generally follow, the rule outlined by the incredible Jay Smooth, of pointing out racist behavior without calling the person in question an out and out racist. I'm willing to lay it down that Jeff Sessions is, in point of fact, a racist. I'm willing to lay it down because due to his comments about the NAACP and the ACLU, and the comments he allegedly made regarding a white civil rights attorney being a "race traitor". And while Jeff Sessions didn't get the federal judgeship he was nominated for because of his comments, he has hardly become a pariah in society. His career has not been destroyed.

That is the problem with the outrage over Sonia Sotomayor's "wise Latina" comment. It is that it is all too easy for those who are already privileged to move beyond a kerfuffle like being outed as a racist in the Senate. That is the problem with Graham making such an assertion when his colleague is very much someone who has made statements "remotely like" Sotomayor's, except his statements were couched in a history and carried a power Sotomayor's words aren't and don't have - because, as Eugene Robinson alludes, Latinas haven't been running the world for the last millennium. And to ignore how many white men get away with racist and biased and prejudiced statements, to ignore how many minorities have been beaten or killed or harassed for daring to even assert equality, is to ignore the world as it is and as it was. 

Edited for accuracy, via mikhailbakunin's corrections.

A Patriarchal Metaphysical Conundrum

I love this Jay Smooth video:

And as much as I love Miss Congeniality (and I do - I watched it Wednesday night instead of writing a blog post; I know, I know), I was also in agreement with this:

Watching this clip raised a lot of questions for me. Questions such as: Why do beauty pageants still exist? This whole ritual just seems so out of place to me in 2009. It feels like watching a Renaissance Faire. My twitter friends pointed out that beauty pageants are a leading source of scholarship money for young women, which is something - but I mean, if that scholarship's coming along with such crazy messages about how women are supposed to be valued, that's kind of like we're pulling you up as a reward for letting us push you down. Do you really come out ahead at the end of that? It's like a patriarchal metaphysical conundrum.

I'm sure there are women out there, like Gracie Hart from Miss Congeniality, who do find pageantry to be a freeing and wonderful experience. I'm sure there are a lot of women in the pageants, like Cheryl Frasier from Miss Congeniality, who are in highly complex fields of study. But that doesn't really change the fact that the scholarship opportunity is built upon conforming to certain standards of feminine beauty, that the beauty in question almost always equals white or close to it, and that looking good in a swimsuit is mandatory. I'm sure that all of these contestants do want to bring about world peace and are, as Gracie Hart put it, just trying to make a difference in the world. That really doesn't change, as the wonderfully insightful and funny Jay Smooth puts it, the "patriarchal metaphysical conundrum" of it all.

"As Long As We're Human, There Will Always Be More Work To Do"

Jay Smooth always makes me smile:

And also? Manages to sum up the whole thing. He's just so damn articulate.

Holy Crap!

Jay friggin' Smooth (aka Ill Doctrine) has a podcast. It is really just his videos, but I think it is the awesomest of awesome. I wish I could link it, but it was prominently displayed in iTunes' podcast section. So if you love iTunes, podcasts, and Jay Smooth like I do, go to iTunes and search Ill Doctrine's podcast out!

A Message To The Youth Vote

Just in case someone has been living under a rock and subsequently has been missing out on Jay Smooth:


My cyber-crush on this guy continually grows.

"Don't You Know What STAT Means?"

"I don't know what STAT means." -Jay Smooth makes my day just a little bit brighter.

Seriously, watch this. I defy you not to laugh, especially when he goes all ER.