PLEASE! Contact the MDA right now to urge them not to take the curious george racist's money

[mythyc]

I'm sure you all have heard about the Georgia Bar owner's racist curious george T-shirts. In an interview with CNN yesterday, he said that he intends to donate the proceeds from his sale of those t-shirts to the MDA (Muscular Dystrophy Association).

I IMPLORE you to email them right now to tell them you do not approve of what he's doing and that they should not approve of how his this money was raised by taking this donation.

Here's their email address: [e-mail]
And their contact page: http://www.mda.org/contact.html
And their phone number: 1-800-572-1717

I'm pasting my own email to them below as a reference, though recommend you write your own. Thanks so much!

If you did not see the youtube clip, a link is at the bottom of this page.

.................................

Dear MDA,
On CNN yesterday Mike Norman, owner of the Mulligan's Bar in Marietta Georgia, said that he is planning to donate the money he earned from selling T-Shirts which liken presidential candidate Barack Obama to a cartoon monkey. This is a highly racist and offensive thing to do, and I urge you not only to reject this donation, but to publicly denounce any contribution rooted in such hate and bigotry. The Muscular Dystrophy Association has always been an upstanding humanitarian organization, and should not let "dirty money" of this kind taint its integrity and honorable reputation. I would very much appreciate a reply to this email informing me of your plans in this matter. Thank you very much for your consideration,
Jude Morris
Oakland, California

CNN Interview where Mike Norman says he's donating this money to the MDA:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yL3mTBe-E-o

[avenger64]

1. Geez, some people can't take a joke.

It looks like he realizes he stepped over the line, and is doing some good with the money. Chill out.

[mythyc]

2. these were jokes too. funny huh?

.

.





(for a little comic relief to shake off the disgust the above images give rise to)

.

dirty money is dirty money. would you accept a klan donation, or an al qaeda one? :banghead:

[avenger64]

3. Ever listen to Dave Chappelle or Chris Rock?

They don't have the kindest words for some of their fellow african-americans. Like I said, chill.

[mythyc]

4. all the time, not even close

are you actually comparing social humor by a black professional entertainer and cultural commentary to derision and condescension by a white bar owner who posts neo-conservative signs outside his bar and says about the T-shirts (direct quote) "He (Obama) has huge ears and a huge smile, which is absolutely disarming"?! He said this not once, but three times in that interview. Give it up :eyes:

your comparison is both a red herring and apples and oranges, and you know it.

[TLM]

24. ""He (Obama) has huge ears and a huge smile".... but, he does.

If Chris Rock said that Obama looked like Curious George, he'd get huge laughs.

If some cracker says it in a bar, it is a hate crime.


Racism is not determined by who is saying the words, but rather by the hate that inspires the words.

And humor is not always tasteful or silly, sometimes it is dark and inappropriate. Sometimes it takes humor to hit on subjects, that are otherwise taboo. Is making fun of a stereotype a means of undermining it or propagating it? That's why Chapelle says he quit, in part because he wasn't sure which side of that line he was on.

"cultural commentary" They're comedians telling jokes about what they see in their lives. There's not a whole lot of difference between being on stage and in a bar. In fact a lot of comedy clubs are just bars with stages.

[mythyc]

46. well geez whiz....

If Chris Rock said that Obama looked like Curious George, he'd get huge laughs.

If some cracker says it in a bar, it is a hate crime.

it's not so black and white as you're making it out to be.

First, no one's said anything about a hate crime, so you're being hyperbolic. this delfates the real issue in my opinion.

Second, Chris Rock would not say Obama looks like Curious George. Actually that's besides the point. Intent and context are everything. Were he to, Chris Rock is an established and well-respected and LEGITIMATE cultural and social commentator, particularly on matters of race. I'm not going into his credentials---that would be ridiculous and if you contest this we're on different pages. His intention would not be to make fun of, to express fear (I don't buy your argument above about the t-shirt maker's "which is absolutely disarming" comment--- it's in the tone, it's in the need to repeat, and it's in the absolutist way of dismissing even the possibility that people should be offended by this. do you have any black friends? play them the clip and tell them they don't have the right to hear that man fearing and deriding them), or to creat strife against the other. Maybe Norman's original intent wasn't either (gee, really, sell 100 t-shirts to be worn publicly all over Georgia?), but the moment he saw there was strife he not only refuse to acknowledge the offense he caused to others, but became more adamant that his point of view was not only the only right one, but the also the only one that mattered.

Third, a comedian on a stage does not equate to a cracker in a bar. I've read your other posts and know you're a reasonable person and thinker, and both logical and ethical for that matter, so either you're playing devil's advocate here or you're too insistent in your opinion to acknowledge the severe apples and oranges here. Besides the fact that this guy is the owner of this bar, and uses its message board outside to voice neoconservative taunts, he is not a professional comedian, and nor does he have a grain of cultural, social, political, or street cred to make this kind of statement equate anywhere in the same universe as the term "commentary" -- Chris Rock's domain. What you've done with your life measures immensely into the messages you make, the opinions you voice, and ESPECIALLY, how you publicize these. You want to argue on other grounds, like his ignorance, his superciliousness, his maladjusted sense of humor, his misplaced good intentions (donating the money), maybe even not as harmful intentions meant, you'd have a little bit of ground to stand on here, but there is no comparison to chris rock. none. it's an absolute fallacy to assert one, and i know your reasonable and conscientious enough to be above that.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

52. DO NOT EMAIL MDA: MDA lawyers drawing up letter to bar owner - stop using MDA's name!

But MDA officials said they do not want Norman's money. Further, they don't
want this slob using their name to promote his filth.

Bar Owner's T-Shirt Offends Obama Faithful

NBC 11 Alive

Norman said he has sold out of his stack of 50 t-shirts. He was planning to donate the money from the shirts to the Muscular Dystrophy Association. But MDA officials said they do not want Norman's money. They said that their attorneys were drawing up a letter asking him to stop using the name of the MDA in connection with sales of the shirts.

[mythyc]

54. Thanks for this link--- I'm really glad to hear this

Has the MDA published a press release to this effect? I'd love to see that asshole's response to the fact that they don't want his dirty money....

It's unfortunate for the MDA that he insinuated them in this, but because lowlifes often drag good names into bad contexts in order to make a facetious attempt to validate their malevolence, it is all the more essential for groups and companies like the MDA to make it immediately explicit that they do not condone this kind of hate and bigotry.

Responses such as this will do more to treat and one day cure the disease in my opinion. The unequivocal rejection of racism will only become standard cultural discourse when every implicated party joins in solidarity with the individuals and civil rights groups protesting the offender in order to send a clear, swift, and united message that this kind of behavior will not be accepted and will not be tolerated in this day and age.

It's for this reason that I don't think people who call MDA and make this mandate clear are tarnishing its name, but are rather upholding principles and guaranteeing that the implicated institutions hold bozos like this accountable. It upholds the MDA's reputation and good moral standing when they join the civil rights community to denounce racists like Norman.

On another note, all the news outlets that gave him time to spew his bile should give equal time to publicizing his own charity's denouncement and prosecution of him. I hope they do, and am going to email that CNN anchor next to ask if this is his plan.

[mythyc]

5. & do you think Kramer's outburst was humor?

:eyes:

[avenger64]

6. Yes. though perhaps failed humor.

That guy is just loose in the head. I'll concede the point - I apologize if you find it offensive.

[theboss]

9. Screaming "Nigger" is humor?

It may have been performance art, but I need the joke explained.

[TLM]

32. Richards wasn't trying to be funny.... his words were hate based.

That guy in the crowd said something that hurt Richards, and he grabbed for the first thing he thought would hurt that guy back, and that was the n bomb. He lashed out with hateful anger... not at the whole race, but at that one guy. He wanted to use that word to cause that man pain in retaliation.

Now I don't think that makes Richards a racist, but he did use racism as a weapon to try and hurt the guy that heckled him.

[habitual]

43. lol. what you just posted is funny

you are equating a BAR OWNER with professional comedians, as if the two are comparable.

your understanding of this situation is funny. :rofl:

that has to be one of the weakest attempts at justification i have ever seen... thank you!

[AllentownJake]

7. A joke?

Are you serious. Calling African American's monkeys or Apes has been a racial slur dating back to slavery times. It was a way to suggest they were less than human. This isn't politcal correctness this is an actual racial slur on a T-shirt.

MDA should not be associated for that type of behavior. They are an organization with a great history of helping people regardless of race or class.

It would be the equivalent of someone to start selling Iron My Shirt Bitch T-shirts with Hillary on them and donating it to Cancer Research.

[walldude]

22. Well if he had meant it as a joke...

it would still be bullshit. But this guy wasn't joking. And your defense of him is just sad.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

51. MDA isn't going to take the money, that was on the news the other day

so no need to worry about that.

Lets hope instead that the owners of the Curious George copyright DO sue this bar owner.

[bicentennial_baby]

8. I absolutely will...They are doing wonderful things for my Mom who has

ALS. I'm on it.

:)

[Barack_America]

13. .

I'm very sorry to hear that. She's certainly very lucky to have such a great woman for a daughter, however.

:hug:

[bicentennial_baby]

14. Thanks babe...One day at a time...

She's very sick, but she's a fighter. :)

And, :blush:

:hug:

[mythyc]

10. UPDATE: I called the 800 number

and got a guy named Dave at my local regional office. I guess the 800 number re-routes you to your locality. He was shocked and appalled, and said he would pass on his own disapproval as well as mine. If they get calls from every region, this will make a difference, so please call everybody! We must not let this stand.

:thumbsup:

[Ron Green]

11. Here's my email:

To the MDA:
I ask you refrain from accepting contributions from Mr. Norman of Marietta, GA, who has put the likeness of a monkey as one of our candidates for US President on T-shirts for sale. As a member of boards and a partner with organizations who raise funds for MDA and other recipients, I strongly urge you to reject such inappropriately-gained support.

Sincerely,

[mythyc]

18. thanks Ron!

:patriot:

[FrenchieCat]

12. I called that number, but the girl told me that I had reached the wrong office....

so I told her the story, and she said that if I would email her the letter that I am sending, that if I forward it to her, she would forward it to the legal department and let them know what was going on. I told her that maybe many Obama supporters would be willing to donate a dollar to the cause as long as the charity doesn't accept this individual's money.

Others should write to her too. I did leave her my name. Her email address is [e-mail]

[mythyc]

16. Tell her that you called the national number and ...

Tell her that you called the national number, this is the one that's listed on the website (the 800 # i put up), but that this automatically re-routes you to whatever your regional office is. If anyone gets a number that goes through directly to the national office, please post it here.

thanks Frenchie, great work :thumbsup:

[msongs]

15. and vicious t shirts slamming hillary clinton are ok though to the obama crowd nt

[mythyc]

17. what t-shirts??? can you also explain how this is a campaign issue anyway?

This is not about the election-- it's about disgusting racist B.S. that anyone of any party or candidate should not accept. do you think the t-shirts are ok, or the comments he made about obama (posted above)---which were not campaign comments but racist identity ones?

(and besides that, no one here has said anything about any kind of attack t-shirt being ok)

[AllentownJake]

19. If there was an asshole selling

an Iron My T-Shirt Bitch shirt with a picture of Hillary on it and the asshole was trying to disguise his sexism by raising money for breast cancer, 95% of the Obama supporters would be up in arms over it and you know that.

[TLM]

25. Lets be fair now and come up with an accurate comparison....

There's no slurs on that curious gorge shirt... just the image.


Say someone put Hillary 08 on a shirt with an unflattering picture...




Like that one, but did give the money to a worthy cause?

Would you say it was sexist and they should refuse it?

[FloridaJudy]

48. This same cretin is selling

"If only Hillary had been married to OJ" T-shirts. Let's make jokes about murder and domestic violence! It's a laugh riot.

Nice guy. :sarcasm: (Oh, if only I didn't need that smilie!)

[goclark]

20. I can't recall seeing any Obama supporter

taking the time to wear a Clinton shirt of any type.

We are way to busy wearing our OBAMA shirts! :bounce:

[walldude]

21. That's what you got out of this?

That Obama supporters are wearing "anti-Hillary" shirts? No wonder this asshat is able to make money.

[habitual]

44. of course, as usual, words are so easy to say without backing them up

please provide an example of what you are refering to that compares to this:



otherwise, nice try, but you FAIL.

[TLM]

23. I support Obama, and even i have to admit.....

He does look a little like curious george.

Just like James Carville looks an awful lot like gollum.


I also have to say that Bush has been compared to a monkey a lot, especially with his ears. There are whole websites dedicated to comparing bush to a chimp. I've done it, and I think most people here have done it.

So is this a case of something that's only racist if done to a black person, but is perfectly acceptable to do to anybody else?
It seems to me racism would be racist in any context... not conditional. I would agree the shirts are racially insensitive and in bad taste... but there's a missing element of hate.


Oh, and I don't care if the MDA gets donations from the KKK, the NRA, or the DMV... as long as they are getting money to help folks, I say good.

[mythyc]

26. at least Judas threw his 30 pieces of silver to the ground in disgust.

and i guess you have every right to "not care", just as I and others have every right to care. If you're going to go with that argument, why try to derail the same prerogative here???

on the issue of monkey imagery you're decontextualizing way too much (not to mention weighing apples and oranges and throwing in your occasional red herring) with each one of your qualifications. to address them, I'll just paste responses from this thread: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x133450 . It's mostly dealing with the comparison of W to chimps, but they points these other DUers are making are highly relevant to your own issues:

#7 (by calmblueocean):

Context makes a difference.

Whites don't have a history of being demeaned as a race by being compared to monkeys, so comparing GWB to Curious George doesn't carry the same cultural baggage or have the same meaning.

The implied jibe with GWB would be that he himself is chimplike. It's an insult, but its locus is strictly GWB. It doesn't go beyond that.

The implied insult with Obama does. It plays on a history of racial insults and prejudice. Its message is more like, "Obama may be running for president, but he's still a nigger, and will always be less than a white person."

Part of the insult is the ability for the wearer to claim that they're just making an innocent comparison of Obama and the face of a children's book character.

and #12 (by Lautremant) :

Let's compare:

The history of comparing black people to monkeys in a derogatory fashion (as if there could be a complementary fashion): hundreds of years old.

The history of comparing rich jerkoff quasi-Yalie draft-dodging cokehead fundy numbskulls who look like chimps, to a chimp: approximately eight years old, and restricted to one specific worthless individual.

There it is, buddy, with sugar on top and just for you.

and #14 (by L4TRUTH) :

I'm black, and I'm perfectly comfortable being a descendant of ape ancestors in terms of evolutionary thought; but I'm not okay with someone comparing me to an ape as a means to demean me in racial terms. Unfortunately, that is the history of blacks in the country. That was one of the justifications for slavery, jim crow, etc., that we were "sub-human" (akin to apes) and therefore the act of racial oppression was justified.

I will say that GWB should not have ever been called a chimp, no matter what the reason. It's just disrespectful.

[TLM]

29. I understand your point.... I simply do not see this as being so hateful.

As I said, it is certainly insensitive and in bad taste, but I think a lot more is being made of this than there is.

I worry that overreacting to any hint of racial insensitivity as if it were a klan rally is going to numb people to the issue, so when it shows up in a substantial context it will be more easily dismissed because, "they say everything is racist."


This amounts to making fun of how obama looks... we can't say that's off limits because of his race, or that plays into the right wingers' liberal white guilt BS.

[mythyc]

31. explain "absolutely disarming" then

I'd *maybe* have a grain of salt, but this settles it

[TLM]

34. Explain what? That doesn't sound like an insult to me....

Having a smile that is, "absolutely disarming" sounds to me like a good thing. A smile that evokes positive feelings.


What do you see in this that is so hateful?


Frankly I think what was said about a gun being pointed at Obama was 100 times worse.

[AllentownJake]

27. Calling an African American a monkey

Is never taken lightly

Ask Howard Cosell if he was alive.

[TLM]

30. I see this as being about as serious as the sweetie comment...

It is insensitive, but not hateful. Frankly I think there was far more hate and anger in the comparisons of Bush to a chimp.


I just don't think we should get into the habit of screaming every little insensitive thing is racist hate mongering. This guy sold shirts making fun of how obama looks, and people react like he just lit up a cross on the Obama's front lawn.

[AllentownJake]

35. The LAPD

Around the time of Rodney King used to call African Americans NAGAs or North American Ground Apes.

I take this very seriously.

[TLM]

36. What's that attack on a a whole group of people have to do with making fun of how one guy looks?

This guy isn't someone in a state or federal office or position of authority.

He's a bar owner.

He's not attacking an entire race. He's making fun of one guy's looks.


The fact you have to use OTHER examples of racism to try and play up the emotional impact of this shirt thing, should tell you that this shirt thing is dumb and simply doesn't carry the weight to justify such a reaction.

[AllentownJake]

37. This guy

knows what he's doing and he's a right wing bar owning asshole and karma is a bitch.

[TLM]

38. Maybe he is.... maybe he's a total dirtbg. Maybe he beats his wife and kicks his dog too.

All I know is what he said in his interview and what the shirt looks like... and to me it just looks like a joke about how Obama looks.


Do you have some inside knowledge of the man from personal experience?
Or perhaps something that would provide additional context?

[AllentownJake]

39. He has one of those message boards

outside his bar. I don't have the link and I'm going to be and not finding it but this is actually mild compared to the normal shit he spews from there.

[TLM]

41. I read it was mostly neo-con type stuff...

I do not doubt the possibility this guy could be a racist.... like i said i just don;t see this shirt as some hateful attack on all black people being inferior or less than human.

I see someone saying that Obama has big ears and a big smile and looks like curious george.

The outrage over this seems to be to be misplaced and a waste of energy.

[AllentownJake]

42. Its a warm up

and a shot against the bow of people that this will not be tolerated.

Curious George is going to be mild compared to what this race is going to turn into by November.

[TLM]

45. Curious George is going to be mild compared to what this race is going to turn into by November.

I agree.... which is part of why I think it is silly to waste energy and outrage over a dumb shirt.

[mythyc]

53. or.... make a stand that we will not accept even the ("so-called") lesser incidents

which this is not. it's honestly unsettling to me how "silly" you're making the portrayal of an African American as a monkey out to be. it's one thing to hold this opinion, another to use it to discount all others who judge it to be seriously less facile....

[Raineyb]

55. Are you always this daft or do you work at it?

Black people have been compared to monkeys and apes in order to dehumanize us. Some redneck moron gets the idea in his head to sell Obama t-shirts with a picture of a monkey on it. (The only reason for the cutesy Curious George imagery was because he couldn't figure out how to use a graphics editing program on the computer.)

Obama, is a black man. (Okay half black but that's a distinction that racists won't bother to make.)

Now you're telling me you don't see the insult here?

What exactly would this imbecile have to put on the t-shirt for you to figure out that he's being insulting? A noose?

If the picture on the t-shirts were that of a giraffe we wouldn't be having this conversation. That is the bloody difference.

Regards

[Cha]

40. Oh yeah

[Donkeykick]

28. Got your message.

Done!

[DU GrovelBot]

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[Donkeykick]

50. I clicked on it.

The establishment isn't going to tell me what to do. Down with the man! :silly:

[prairierose]

47. Thanks, mythyc for posting this...

I just sent off an email to them. I hope that many people send letters.

No matter what this man does he can wash away the bigotry and hatred that those shirts represent. I especially like the fact that Curious George's publisher is watching what goes on since this is a case of copyright infringement and the bigger publishers are usually willing to go after people who violate that law. This "joke" may end up costing him much; as it should. There should be no place left for hatred and bigotry.

[mythyc]

49. thanks prairierose!

yeah, it looks likely he will get prosecuted for copyright infringement. serves him right. I want to keep this post kicked for a couple days to make sure enough people see it and contact MDA. please post here if you do or have! thanks DU :)