what I wish people were saying about the UC Berkeley cupcake kerfuffle
GOOD MORNING INTERNET.
So I am an unpaid intern doing unpaid intern things and dreaming of designer apparel. Part of my duties entail writing blog posts and interviewing people and shooting videos of fun city things, but the other part entails editing and HTML formatting and posting news stories to my initiative's Facebook page.
It's because of this that I keep coming across stories about UC Berkeley's racist bake sale. In a nutshell: Gov. Jerry Brown is considering a bill that would allow UCs to consider ethnicity "among other factors" in the admission of students. UC Berkeley Republicans protested by holding a bake sale with a price gradient delineated by race. White? That cookie's two dollars. Latino? CONGRATULATIONS. You get the same cookie for a dollar! It's sort of exactly not at all like how affirmative action works!
My gut reactions are many, including the uncharitable only Republicans would make a bake sale racist, but fundamentally there are a few points that I wish people would address more explicitly and in greater detail. By 'people' I mean 'people on my side,' people who disagree with this bake sale and think it is terrible. I've seen a lot of outrage, but so far I haven't seen much of the following points:
1) Don't call something satire unless that shit is funny.
2) Don't use stupid metaphors unless you actually understand the real-life issue at hand.
Points one and two are actually intimately connected, and that's because what we recognize as satire-- as opposed to parody, goofiness, or douchebaggery-- contains elements of both wit AND social criticism.
I know that humor is subjective. But great satire points out the folly, hypocrisy, and plain silliness that people engage in based on real life things that are real. Something does not become satire simply because you make an assertion in an inflated or cartoonish manner. That's called many other things-- such as propaganda, lying, slander, or stupidity-- but without a solid foundation in the actual truth, it loses its satirical teeth.
Why do I think that the Berkeley bake sale isn't funny-- and, more to the point, isn't really satire? Because it's desperately out of touch with reality. It's not witty, clever, or funny to imply that the UC system unfairly hurts white people when it tries to reach out to students of other racial backgrounds. It's just a sad, ignorant echo of that kid in the playpen who wants EVERYBODY'S TOYS, even when you try to explain that no, he is not entitled to everybody's toys. Maybe he got to play with everybody's toys yesterday. But each kid deserves to have something to play with, and now it's your watch, and you're not gonna sit back while all the other kids stare at his pile of Tonka trucks wistfully, Jesus Christ stop crying, you still have the best toy in the sandbox anyway why can't you just be happy and let other people get on with their lives.
... Sorry, that metaphor kind of got away from me.
WHICH BRINGS ME TO.
Look, I hate to say it, but people who are wrong love stupid metaphors. Evangelical Christians. Republican Congressmen. The list goes on. And the reason that they love stupid metaphors is that there's a high level of correlation between people who are wrong and people who suck at nuance.
Let's examine some quotes:
As the president of the Berkeley College Republicans says, the bake sale is discriminatory in the same way that "considering race in university admissions is discriminatory." Another student, the son of Guatemalan immigrants, adds that "if you put the emphasis on education, you will get an education. Me and my two brothers are proof of that."
Both of these assertions reveal a misunderstanding of American history. To give an alternative, also more correct spin, let's stick with the stupid metaphor: bake sale.
So you have your bake sale. But let's say you price everything at two dollars even, no matter who wants to buy them. That's fair, right? Sounds pretty equitable and commie to me!
But let's say that if you're a black person trying to get to the cupcakes and pie, you have to walk there on a tightrope. And you're constantly beset by birds of prey. And there's a really strong wind. And somebody runs by and snatches your wallet, but you couldn't stop them because you were fighting off an osprey.
By the time you reach the freaking bake sale table, you have no money and your clothes have been ripped to shit by angry birds and you're really out of breath. You ask your white buddy for some money, who, I don't know, climbed some stairs to get to the table. It was pretty steep, but the view was nice. And he's like, "I don't know man, I'd love to help you get a cupcake, but my parents worked really hard so I could have my four dollars' allowance and I'm saving up for a jetpack." That's still totally fair, right?
Right?
Stupid. Metaphor. But the point is:
It's very easy to focus only on the immediate and apparent. When many people see an affirmative action or increased diversity policy, they do NOT see that the journey to higher education is, by and large, a vastly differing one between racial minorities/the underserved poor and the average college-bound white teen. They don't see the people who fell off the college track long ago due to circumstances outside their control: a fraudulent coyote bleeding them dry, a medical emergency, that one layoff, the absence of families who can support them financially. They really do not understand that for many Americans, "work hard" means "work hard, and make sure you never do a single thing wrong or have anything bad happen to you even if it's a total accident."
What they see is a rule. And the rule says, "We'd kind of prefer a black person."
So this entry is way too long, but that's what I'd like to see in the bake sale reactions: an emphasis on the real reasons affirmative action remains necessary to a progressive, just America. An emphasis on the journey. An emphasis on the dictionary definition of "satire." And maybe, just maybe, a gentle suggestion to Berkeley Republicans that they put down the cookies, pull their heads out of their asses, and learn a thing or two about history.
Soapbox concluded.
Also I'm hungry.
So I am an unpaid intern doing unpaid intern things and dreaming of designer apparel. Part of my duties entail writing blog posts and interviewing people and shooting videos of fun city things, but the other part entails editing and HTML formatting and posting news stories to my initiative's Facebook page.
It's because of this that I keep coming across stories about UC Berkeley's racist bake sale. In a nutshell: Gov. Jerry Brown is considering a bill that would allow UCs to consider ethnicity "among other factors" in the admission of students. UC Berkeley Republicans protested by holding a bake sale with a price gradient delineated by race. White? That cookie's two dollars. Latino? CONGRATULATIONS. You get the same cookie for a dollar! It's sort of exactly not at all like how affirmative action works!
My gut reactions are many, including the uncharitable only Republicans would make a bake sale racist, but fundamentally there are a few points that I wish people would address more explicitly and in greater detail. By 'people' I mean 'people on my side,' people who disagree with this bake sale and think it is terrible. I've seen a lot of outrage, but so far I haven't seen much of the following points:
1) Don't call something satire unless that shit is funny.
2) Don't use stupid metaphors unless you actually understand the real-life issue at hand.
Points one and two are actually intimately connected, and that's because what we recognize as satire-- as opposed to parody, goofiness, or douchebaggery-- contains elements of both wit AND social criticism.
I know that humor is subjective. But great satire points out the folly, hypocrisy, and plain silliness that people engage in based on real life things that are real. Something does not become satire simply because you make an assertion in an inflated or cartoonish manner. That's called many other things-- such as propaganda, lying, slander, or stupidity-- but without a solid foundation in the actual truth, it loses its satirical teeth.
Why do I think that the Berkeley bake sale isn't funny-- and, more to the point, isn't really satire? Because it's desperately out of touch with reality. It's not witty, clever, or funny to imply that the UC system unfairly hurts white people when it tries to reach out to students of other racial backgrounds. It's just a sad, ignorant echo of that kid in the playpen who wants EVERYBODY'S TOYS, even when you try to explain that no, he is not entitled to everybody's toys. Maybe he got to play with everybody's toys yesterday. But each kid deserves to have something to play with, and now it's your watch, and you're not gonna sit back while all the other kids stare at his pile of Tonka trucks wistfully, Jesus Christ stop crying, you still have the best toy in the sandbox anyway why can't you just be happy and let other people get on with their lives.
... Sorry, that metaphor kind of got away from me.
WHICH BRINGS ME TO.
Look, I hate to say it, but people who are wrong love stupid metaphors. Evangelical Christians. Republican Congressmen. The list goes on. And the reason that they love stupid metaphors is that there's a high level of correlation between people who are wrong and people who suck at nuance.
Let's examine some quotes:
As the president of the Berkeley College Republicans says, the bake sale is discriminatory in the same way that "considering race in university admissions is discriminatory." Another student, the son of Guatemalan immigrants, adds that "if you put the emphasis on education, you will get an education. Me and my two brothers are proof of that."
Both of these assertions reveal a misunderstanding of American history. To give an alternative, also more correct spin, let's stick with the stupid metaphor: bake sale.
So you have your bake sale. But let's say you price everything at two dollars even, no matter who wants to buy them. That's fair, right? Sounds pretty equitable and commie to me!
But let's say that if you're a black person trying to get to the cupcakes and pie, you have to walk there on a tightrope. And you're constantly beset by birds of prey. And there's a really strong wind. And somebody runs by and snatches your wallet, but you couldn't stop them because you were fighting off an osprey.
By the time you reach the freaking bake sale table, you have no money and your clothes have been ripped to shit by angry birds and you're really out of breath. You ask your white buddy for some money, who, I don't know, climbed some stairs to get to the table. It was pretty steep, but the view was nice. And he's like, "I don't know man, I'd love to help you get a cupcake, but my parents worked really hard so I could have my four dollars' allowance and I'm saving up for a jetpack." That's still totally fair, right?
Right?
Stupid. Metaphor. But the point is:
It's very easy to focus only on the immediate and apparent. When many people see an affirmative action or increased diversity policy, they do NOT see that the journey to higher education is, by and large, a vastly differing one between racial minorities/the underserved poor and the average college-bound white teen. They don't see the people who fell off the college track long ago due to circumstances outside their control: a fraudulent coyote bleeding them dry, a medical emergency, that one layoff, the absence of families who can support them financially. They really do not understand that for many Americans, "work hard" means "work hard, and make sure you never do a single thing wrong or have anything bad happen to you even if it's a total accident."
What they see is a rule. And the rule says, "We'd kind of prefer a black person."
So this entry is way too long, but that's what I'd like to see in the bake sale reactions: an emphasis on the real reasons affirmative action remains necessary to a progressive, just America. An emphasis on the journey. An emphasis on the dictionary definition of "satire." And maybe, just maybe, a gentle suggestion to Berkeley Republicans that they put down the cookies, pull their heads out of their asses, and learn a thing or two about history.
Soapbox concluded.
Also I'm hungry.