3-6 Homework #4 about “The Finkelstein 5” is due:
Homework for 3-11: For your next homework assignment #5, read “Zimmer Land” from Friday Black and write a 3-paragraph essay that explains the connection between entertainment and racism.
3-11 Homework #5 due about “Zimmer Land.” For Homework #6, read “Remembering History as Fable by Jamelle Bouie and “It’s Time for the Lost Cause to Get Lost” and write a 3-paragraph essay that explains how some people pervert American history by turning it into a pernicious myth.
3-13 Homework #6 is due about Jamelle Bouie’s “Remembering History as Fable” and Jack Schwartz’s “It’s Time for the Lost Cause to Get Lost.” No homework for 3-18 because that day is a peer edit.
3-18 Peer Edit for Essay 2
3-20 Essay #2 Due on turnitin. We will look at essay 3 options. We will read Cal Newport’s book excerpt from So Good They Can’t Ignore You and explore the dangerous features of the Passion Hypothesis. Homework #7 is to read David Brooks’ Atlantic essay “People Like Us” and provide 3 reasons people stick to their tribe in a 3-paragraph essay.
Essay #2 Due on 3-20-19 based on Friday Black by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah
Option One: Develop a thesis that connects the themes in “The Finkelstein 5,” such as code switching and racial injustice, to themes in the movie Sorry to Bother You.
Option Two: Compare the themes in “The Finkelstein 5” to the injustices rendered in the Trayvon Martin Case. You can consult the Ta-Nehisi Coates essay, “Trayvon Martin and the Irony of American Justice.”
Option Three: Develop a thesis that compares the themes in Donald Glover’s music video “This Is America” with the themes in “The Finkelstein 5” and “Zimmer Land.” Consult Glover’s video analysis in the following: Washington Post analysis, Time analysis, and Insider analysis.
http://time.com/5267890/childish-gambino-this-is-america-meaning/
https://www.thisisinsider.com/this-is-america-music-video-meaning-references-childish-gambino-donald-glover-2018-5#michael-jackson-also-dances-on-top-of-a-car-5
Option Four: Develop a thesis that compares the theme of white racist paranoia in the short stories “The Finkelstein 5” and “Zimmer Land” with the myriad news reports of white people making police complaints about innocent black people.
Option Five: In the context of Ta-Nehisi Coates’ essay “The First White President,” the film Get Out, and the stories “The Finkelstein 5” and “Zimmer Land,” develop an argumentative thesis about the role of racism in American history as it informs where we are with racism today.
Option Six: In the context of Debra Dickerson’s “The Great White Way” and Vox article “11 Ways Race Isn’t Real,” develop a thesis that evaluates the assertion that race is not an objective reality but a malignant fabrication designed to enable a history of American kleptocracy in order to give power to one group and take away power from other groups. I recommend you consult the online essay “The Case for Reparations” by Ta-Nehisi Coates.
Option Seven: Compare the theme of kleptocracy in Debra Dickerson’s “The Great White Way” with Jordan Peele’s movie Get Out.
Option Eight: In the context of Jamelle Bouie’s “Remembering History as Fable” and Jack Schwartz’s “It’s Time for the Lost Cause to Get Lost,” develop a thesis that evaluates the assertion that for many Americans the Civil War denies real history and replaces that real history with a pernicious mythology, often called The Lost Cause, that perpetuates the false doctrine of white supremacy.
“The Finkelstein 5”
Paris Review Interview on inspiration or genesis of "The Finkelstein 5"
Study Questions for “The Finkelstein 5”:
One. Why does Emmanuel “set the Blackness in his voice down to a 1.5 on a 10-point scale”?
Emmanuel has learned that his being black is perceived as a threat to white society, and white society has license to call the cops on him at their slightest sense of threat or their slightest desire to assert control over him. This threat can result in Emmanuel’s arrest or even death.
There are viral videos of white ladies calling the cops on black people for trivial reasons.
NBC News has a story on phony 9-11 calls, as does The Root online magazine.
A Vox writer reports her job as a 9-11 dispatcher she received racist 9-11 calls every day.
Rolling Stone has an article about white women making phony 9-11 calls on black people.
Navigating America as an African American has been so dangerous that black Americans used to consult the Greenbook Guide to Travel and Vacations in order to be as safe as possible, as seen in a documentary.
Two. Why was George Wilson Dunn acquitted of wrongdoing in his brutal killing of five black children?
A jury of his peers determined that the black children posed a threat that made Dunn’s violent reaction a “reasonable response.” In a society where blackness is perceived as a threat all violence against black people is justified.
The senseless killing of black people perceived as a threat is one of the story’s major themes.
We see this in the case of Renisha McBride.
We see this in the case of Brennan Walker.
We see this in the case of Emantic Fitzgerald Bradford, a military man.
We see this in the case of Stephon Clark who was killed in his own backyard.
We see black teens being harassed for no reason as shown in this viral video of a cop tackling a teen girl at a pool party.
We see this in the case of 11 police killings with “no justice served.”
We see this in the case of Trayvon Martin, which was the basis for this story.
Dog Whistle is coded language:
When Dunn’s defense attorney says, “The fact is, George Wilson Dunn is an American. Americans have the right to protect themselves,” he is using a dog whistle that says: White people have the right to kill black people anytime they want.
Code Switching
The short story addresses code switching, the act of a black person “toning down his blackness” by acting and talking white in order to assuage white anxiety and find acceptance in the dominant white culture.
Option One: Develop a thesis that connects the themes in “The Finkelstein 5,” such as code switching and racial injustice, to themes in the movie Sorry to Bother You.
Option Two: Compare the themes in “The Finkelstein 5” to the injustices rendered in the Trayvon Martin Case.
Option Three: Develop a thesis that compares the themes in Donald Glover’s music video “This Is America” with the themes in “The Finkelstein 5” and “Zimmer Land.” Consult Glover’s video analysis in the following: Washington Post analysis, Time analysis, and Insider analysis.
http://time.com/5267890/childish-gambino-this-is-america-meaning/
https://www.thisisinsider.com/this-is-america-music-video-meaning-references-childish-gambino-donald-glover-2018-5#michael-jackson-also-dances-on-top-of-a-car-5
You can also consult the Ta-Nehisi Coates essay, “Trayvon Martin and the Irony of American Justice.”
Excerpt from Coates' essay:
You should not be troubled that George Zimmerman "got away" with the killing of Trayvon Martin, you should be troubled that you live in a country that ensures that Trayvon Martin will happen. Trayvon Martin is happening again in Florida. Right now:
In November, black youth Jordan Davis, a 17-year-old Jacksonville resident, was the only person murdered after Michael Dunn, 46, allegedly shot into the SUV Davis was inside several times after an argument about the volume of music playing.According to Dunn's girlfriend, Rhonda Rouer, Dunn had three rum and cokes at a wedding reception. She felt secure enough for him to drive and thought that he was in a good mood. On the drive back to the hotel they were residing at, they made a pit stop at the convenience store where the murder occurred. At the Gate Station, Rouer said Dunn told her that he hated "thug music." Rouer then went inside the store to make purchases and heard several gunshots while she was still within the building.
Upon returning and seeing Dunn put his gun back into the glove compartment, Rouer asked why he had shot at the car playing music and Dunn claimed that he feared for his life and that "they threatened to kill me." The couple drove back to their hotel, and claim they did not realize anyone had died until the story appeared on the news the next day.
After killing Jordan Davis, Michael Dunn ordered a pizza.
When you have a society that takes at its founding the hatred and degradation of a people, when that society inscribes that degradation in its most hallowed document, and continues to inscribe hatred in its laws and policies, it is fantastic to believe that its citizens will derive no ill messaging.
It is painful to say this: Trayvon Martin is not a miscarriage of American justice, but American justice itself. This is not our system malfunctioning. It is our system working as intended. To expect our juries, our schools, our police, to single-handedly correct for this, is to look at the final play in the final minute of the final quarter and wonder why we couldn't come back from twenty-four down.
To paraphrase a great man: We are what our record says we are. How can we sensibly expect different?
Introduction:
Quote and analyze Ta-Nehasi Coates' essay and transition to the two stories in Friday Black.
Sample Thesis Template:
"The Finkelstein 5"and "Zimmer Land" are more than stories about a gruesome murder of five children and white hunger for violence against black people. These stories reflect an ongoing racism crisis in America. This crisis is evident in the Trayvon Martin case in which we see that stand your ground laws are part of "malfunctioning" legal system giving white people license to kill black people. The crisis is evident in Childish Gambino's "This Is America" music video, which intersects, like "Zimmer Land," white hunger for black entertainment and white hunger for violence against African Americans (white father who killed black children in "The Finkelstein 5" scapegoated his personal problems against those black kids). We see the crisis evident in reckless policing policies that result in the acquittals of those police officers who gunned down Stephon Clark and other black men. We see this crisis evident in a kind of white paranoia that forces black people to engage in code switching in order to calm down whites' unfounded fears.
Body Paragraphs
Racist codes in the form of dog whistles such as "stand your ground" laws
stand your ground laws are a continuation of Jim Crow-era violence against black people, illustrated in Childish Gambino (Donald Glover) video "This Is America"
unabated police shootings of black people such as Stephon Clark
white paranoia (all those viral videos of white ladies calling 9-11 on black children) that compels a lot of black people to protect themselves through code switching.
white people have a toxic relationship with black culture: whites depend on black culture for entertainment, and this entertainment is entwined with violence against black people dating back to minstrel shows and continuing through super star Michael Jackson. Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, author of Friday Black, explores this intersection of black entertainment as form of consumption for white people and black violence in his short story "Zimmer Land."
Option Three: Develop a thesis that compares the themes in Donald Glover’s music video “This Is America” with the themes in “The Finkelstein 5” and “Zimmer Land.” Consult Glover’s video analysis in the following: Washington Post analysis, Time analysis, and Insider analysis.
http://time.com/5267890/childish-gambino-this-is-america-meaning/
https://www.thisisinsider.com/this-is-america-music-video-meaning-references-childish-gambino-donald-glover-2018-5#michael-jackson-also-dances-on-top-of-a-car-5
https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2018/05/donald-glover-this-is-america-childish-gambino/559805/
Sentence Fragments
Sentence fragments are incomplete thoughts presented as dependent clauses or phrases.
A dependent clause or a phrase is never a complete sentence.
Types of dependent clauses:
Whenever I drive up windy mountains,
Because I have craved pizza for 14 months,
Unless you add coffee to your chocolate cake recipe,
,which is currently enjoying a resurgence.
Phrases
Enamored by the music of Tupac Shakur,
Craving pesto linguine with olive-oil based clam sauce,
Flexing his muscles with a braggadocio never seen in modern times,
Lying under the bridge and eating garlic pepper pretzels with a dollop of cream cheese and a jug of chilled apple cider,
To understand the notion of Universal Basic Income and all of its related factors for social change in this disruptive age,
Running into crowded restaurants with garlic and whiskey fuming out of his sweaty pores while brandishing a golden scepter,
Examples
I won't entertain your requests for more money and gifts. Until you show at least a modicum of responsibility at school and with your friends.
I won't consider buying the new BMW sports coupe. Unless of course my uncle gives me that inheritance he keeps talking about whenever he gets a bit tipsy.
I can't imagine ever going to Chuck E. Cheese. Which makes me feel like I'm emotionally arrested.
I am considering the purchase of a new wardrobe. That is, if I'm picked for that job interview at Nordstrom.
Human morals have vanished. To the point at which it was decided that market values would triumph.
No subject
Marie Antoinette spent huge sums of money on herself and her favorites. And helped to bring on the French Revolution.
No complete verb
The aluminum boat sitting on its trailer.
Beginning with a subordinating word
We returned to the drugstore. Where we waited for our buddies.
A sentence fragment is part of a sentence that is written as if it were a complete sentence. Reading your draft out loud, backwards, sentence by sentence, will help you spot sentence fragments.
Sentence Fragment Exercises
After each sentence, write C for complete or F for fragment sentence. If the sentence is a fragment, correct it so that it is a complete sentence.
One. While hovering over the complexity of a formidable math problem and wondering if he had time to solve the problem before his girlfriend called him to complain about the horrible birthday present he bought her.
Two. In spite of the boyfriend’s growing discontent for his girlfriend, a churlish woman prone to tantrums and grand bouts of petulance.
Three. My BMW 5 series, a serious entry into the luxury car market.
Four. Overcome with nausea from eating ten bowls of angel hair pasta slathered in pine nut garlic pesto.
Five. Winding quickly but safely up the treacherous Palos Verdes hills in the shrouded mist of a lazy June morning, I realized that my BMW gave me feelings of completeness and fulfillment.
Six. To attempt to grasp the profound ignorance of those who deny the compelling truths of science in favor of their pseudo-intellectual ideas about “dangerous” vaccines and the “myths” of global warming.
Seven. The girlfriend whom I lavished with exotic gifts from afar.
Eight. When my cravings for pesto pizza, babaganoush, and triple chocolate cake overcome me during my bouts of acute anxiety.
Nine. Inclined to stop watching sports in the face of my girlfriend’s insistence that I pay more attention to her, I am throwing away my TV.
Ten. At the dance club where I espy my girlfriend flirting with a stranger by the soda machine festooned with party balloons and tinsel.
Eleven. The BMW speeding ahead of me and winding into the misty hills.
Twelve. Before you convert to the religion of veganism in order to impress your vegan girlfriend.
Thirteen. Summoning all my strength to resist the giant chocolate fudge cake sweating on the plate before me.
Identify the Fragments Below
Identify the Fragments Below
I drank the chalky Soylent meal-replacement drink. Expecting to feel full and satisfied. Only to find that I was still ravenously hungry afterwards. Trying to sate my hunger pangs. I went to HomeTown Buffet. Where I ate several platters of braised oxtail and barbecued short ribs smothered in a honey vinegar sauce. Which reminded me of a sauce where I used to buy groceries from. When I was a kid.
Feeling bloated after my HomeTown Buffet indulgence. I exited the restaurant. After which I hailed an Uber and asked the driver for a night club recommendation. So I could dance off all my calories. The driver recommended a place, Anxiety Wires. I had never heard of it. Though, it was crowded inside. I felt eager to dance and confident about “my swag.” Although, I was still feeling bloated. Wondering if my intestines were on the verge of exploding.
Sweating under the night club’s outdoor canopy. I smelled the cloying gasses of a nearby vape. A serpentine woman was holding the vape. A gold contraption emitting rose-water vapors into my direction. Contemplating my gluttony. I was suddenly feeling low confidence. Though I pushed myself to introduce myself to the vape-smoking stranger with the serpentine features. Her eyes locked on mine.
I decided to play it cool. Instead of overwhelming her with a loud, brash manner. Which she might interpret as neediness on my part.
Keeping a portable fan in my cargo pocket for emergencies. When I feel like I’m overheating. I took the fan out of my pocket, turned it on, and directed it toward the serpentine stranger. Making it so the vapors were blowing back in her face.
“Doesn’t smell so good, does it?” I said. With a sarcastic grin.
She cackled, then said, “Thank you for blowing the vapors in my face. Now I can both enjoy inhaling them and breathing them in. For double the pleasure. You are quite a find. Come home with me and I’ll introduce you to my mother Gertrude and her pitbull Jackson. I’m sure they’ll welcome you into our home. Considering what a well-fed handsome man you are.”
“Thank you for the compliment,” I said. “I would love to meet your mother Gertrude and your mother’s pitbull Jackson. Only one problem. My breath smells like a rotting dead dragon. Right after eating spicy ribs. Which reminds me? Do you have any breath mints?”
“I don’t believe in carrying breath mints. On account of the rose-water vape. That cleanses my palate. Making my breath rosy fresh.”
“Wow. Your constant good breath counteracts my intractable bad breath. Making us a match in heaven.”
“I agree. Totally. You really need to meet my mother. Because she’ll bless us and make our marriage official. Since we really need her blessing. Agreed?”
“Agreed.”
“Now let me smell your breath. So I can identify the hot sauce.”
“Why must you do that?”
“So I can use the same hot sauce on our wedding cake, silly. To celebrate the first night we met. Capisce?”
“Capisce.”
She approached me. Affording me a view of her long, tired face. Covered in scales. Reptilian. Evocative of something primitive. Something precious and indelible from my childhood lost long ago. I wanted to run from her, but I could not. Some mysterious force drew me to her, and we inched closer and closer toward one another. Succumbing to a power neither of us could fathom.
Comma Splice Review
Identify the Comma Splices Below:
It’s not a question of will there be chaos or will there be destruction, it’s a question of how much?
MySpace was disruptive in its time, however, it’s a dated platform and to simply mention it is to make people laugh with a certain derision surely it’s a platform that has seen its time, another example is the meal replacement Soylent, its creator made a drink that says, “You’re too busy to eat,” so drinking this pancake batter-like concoction gives tech people street. I may laugh at its stupidity, instead I should admire it since the product has made millions for its creator. It’s proven to be somewhat disruptive.
To be sure, though, Facebook redefines the word disruptive, it has rapidly accrued over 3 billion users and will soon have half the planet plugged into its site, that is the apotheosis of a greedy person’s fantasy, imagine controlling half the planet on a platform that mines private information and targets ads toward specific personality profiles.
One of the scary disruptions of Facebook is that billions of people have lost their personal agency, what that means that people have unknowingly been manipulated by Facebook’s puppeteers to the point that many Facebook users suffer from social media addiction, moreover, these same users prefer the fake life they curate on social media to the real life they once had, in fact, their previous real life is just a puff of smoke that has faded into the distance, many people no longer even know what it means to be “real” anymore, having lost their agency, having succumbed to their Facebook addiction, they have become zombies waiting for their next rush of social media-fueled dopamine, what a sad state of affairs.
Sample Thesis and Outline Comparing "The Great White Way" to the Jordan Peele movie Get Out.
Jordan Peele's movie Get Out cogently helps us understand Debra J. Dickerson's connection in "The Great White Way" between race as a fantasy and white privilege as a kleptocracy. Through the lens of Peele's film, this connection is evidenced in four major ways including __________________, _________________, ________________, and _____________________.
Paragraphs 1 and 2: Using an introductory technique from today's lesson, explain the connection between race as a fantasy and how this racial fantasy fuels white privilege and its aim to conduct a kleptocracy in which black Americans are its victims. Or define the term kleptocracy, discussed at length in Ta-Nehisi Coates' essay, "The Case for Reparations," which can be used as a source for Works Cited. (Two 150-word paragraphs for 300 words)
Paragraph 3: Argue that Get Out builds on Debra Dickerson's idea as it pertains to the racist fantasy of the black male, in which the black male is perceived as "superior physical specimen" on one hand and servile dolt on the other, the subtle racist jabs or condescending microaggressions that reinforce this racist notion of the black male, the self-destruction that afflicts blacks who try to assimilate in white society, even liberal white society, the denial of racism that whites enjoy boasting about in a post-Obama America, and how white America's racist ideas lay the groundwork for justifying the kleptocracy of black America: the systematic state-sponsored stealing of every ounce of body, mind, and soul from black culture. (150 words for 450 subtotal)
Paragraphs 4-8 (five paragraphs at 150 words each would give us 750 words for a subtotal of 1,200 words)
Conclusion: Show the broader ramifications for a movie about the kleptocracy and its relevance in a post-Obama America (200-word paragraph for 1,400 total).
You can consult the following movie reviews for your Works Cited:
NYT review , The Guardian review, and the Variety review. For an even more in-depth essay about the kleptocracy against black America, you might consult Ta-Nehisi Coates' essay "The Case for Reparations."
Lexicon for Understanding "The Great White Way" and "Understanding Black Patriotism"
My sources for the following lexicon:
The Autobiography of Malcolm X
The New Jim Crow by Michel Alexander
We Were Eight Years in Power and Between the World and Me, both by Ta-Nehisi Coates
The satirical novel Black No More by George S. Schuyler
The satirical novel The White Boy Shuffle by Paul Beatty
PBS 6-Part Documentary by Henry Louis Gates: The African Americans: Many Rivers to Cross
One. American exceptionalism: America is the greatest country on Earth. America's moral superiority gives America the moral obligation to shine its light throughout the planet, to bear its influence everywhere, and to spread its superior democracy with pride and determination. Dickerson's analysis of American kleptocracy contradicts the myth--or chimera--of American exceptionalism.
Two. American kleptocracy: Through a system of race privilege, America stole its wealth on the backs of people of color and due to systemic racism, this kleptocracy, evident in America's history of slavery and Jim Crow, continues in more insidious ways: structural inequality in housing, healthcare, and education, The New Jim Crow in the form of mass incarceration, and racist, opportunistic politicians who rise to power using dog whistles, codes that stir racist anxieties in white people.
Three. Hiccup Narrative of American History: Yes, America committed the sin of slavery, these historians contend, but slavery was merely a case of the hiccups in a long, rich, glorious history of American exceptionalism in which unpleasant blemishes like slavery will soon be washed away (if they haven't been washed away already) as America shines like an innocent lamb.
Some contend that the Hiccup Narrative is legit and evidences the need for us to shut up about race. "Water under the bridge, dude. Stop inflaming your grievances and playing the victim. Whining about the sins of the past will get you nowhere."
Others contend that the Hiccup Narrative is a canard: a plastic, superficial Disneyland-like narrative in which many white people remain in love with their sense of mythical innocence while stealing from black people in the way of structural inequality (housing, education, healthcare).
Four. Systemic Racism Narrative of American History: Slavery was not just a side show of the great American narrative. Rather, slavery was the foundation of America's wealth and fast rise as a superpower.
The foundations of America's kleptocracy, born from times of slavery, continue to flourish in explicit and implicit ways as too many American whites continue to commit the sin of "whiteness idolatry," worshiping their race while stigmatizing others and maintaining systemic racist institutions to keep this idolatry alive. This narrative is most powerfully rendered in the works of Ta-Nehisi Coates.
Five. Racist sociopath: A businessman and a conman who has no emotional investment in race and is smart enough to know that race doesn't exist except as an arbitrary social construct, yet he uses race--slavery, for example--to make money knowing full well that the evils of slavery, Jim Crow, and other types of racism will afflict millions with great pain. As a sociopath, this type of racist has no empathy and no concern for anyone but himself. As an opportunist, this sociopath sees that the invention of race and slavery can make him rich and powerful, and that's all that matters. As an aside, if there is an afterlife called Hell, the sociopath will descend into its hottest chamber.
Six. Racist psychopath: Much different than the racist sociopath, the racist psychopath, historically a poor white farmer or laborer, is a believer in his racial superiority and others' alleged inferiority. He may have received these racist beliefs from his parents, his grandparents, the local barber, books he read, movies he watched, friends he hangs out with, or all of the above.
Unlike the sociopath who knows that race is a delusion, the racist psychopath has consumed the racist Kool-Aid. He is emotionally invested in ideas of race. His identity, status, sense of family honor, sense of social class are all tied to his belief in his white supremacy. Most racists are psychopaths.
Ironically, the authors of racism, sociopaths who saw the riches that could be made from slavery, did not believe in race. The sociopaths fed the lies of white supremacy to the dupes. If there is a Hell, dupes or psychopathic racists may find themselves there, but not as deep a chamber reserved for the racist sociopaths.
Introduction: Can You Write a Thesis That Stands Alone?
Three of the Essay Options Pertain to Race in America
You can write a thesis that stands alone.
You can write a thesis that is followed by mapping components.
You can write a thesis that is followed by a clarifying sentence.
Sample Thesis That Stands Alone:
Reading Dickerson's and Dyson's essays about race in America, it is clear that a great American patriot, in the tradition of Frederick Douglass, Martin Luther King, and Malcolm X, courageously provides resistance against racial injustice.
Sample Thesis with Mapping Components:
Reading Dickerson's and Dyson's essays about race in America, it is clear that a great American patriot, in the tradition of Frederick Douglass, Martin Luther King, and Malcolm X, establishes an unflinching view of the condition of racial injustice, the major causes of that injustice, and a vision for a future America purged of that injustice.
Three. Support, refute or complicate Debra J. Dickerson's argument that race in America is more of a social fantasy than a reflection of objective reality. The three best books I've read and/or taught on the subject of race, which I recommend: Autobiography of Malcolm X, The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander, and We Were Eight Years in Power by Ta-Nehisi Coates. The TV documentaries O.J.: Made in America by Ezra Edelman and The African Americans: Many Rivers to Cross by Henry Louis Gates are very helpful.
Sample Thesis That Stands Alone:
Dickerson's essay "The Great White Way" convincingly argues that race is not an objective reality but a social construction.
Racial Wealth Gap in The Washington Post
Sample Thesis with Clarifying Sentence:
Dickerson's essay "The Great White Way" convincingly argues that race is not an objective reality but a social construction. This fabrication has been made in the service of power so that race is constantly changing to fit the needs of the power structure, this chimerical thing we call "race" is constantly being used to procure privileges for one group while taking away those privileges from another, and this mythical thing we call race is still being fetishized and glorified today to defend structural inequality and the racial wealth gap that by any objective measure is criminal and evidence of a kleptocracy.
Body Paragraphs Might Address These Points:
One. Race is not based on science but a social construction.
Two. Race is arbitrary throughout history.
Three. Race has been used to justify the immoral kleptocracy.
Four. We can see the evil fruits of the kleptocracy today in the form of the racial wealth gap.
I'm using the word "fetishized" to mean a mental illness that causes one to have a delusional obsession about something. This racial obsession is related to primitive narcissism (self-idolatry of "whiteness") and rests, as Dickerson explains, on a chimerical delusion. As a source, you can use this John Oliver video from his HBO show Last Week Tonight:
Commas are designed to help writers avoid confusing sentences and to clarify the logic of their sentences.
If you cook Jeff will clean the dishes. (Will you cook Jeff?)
While we were eating a rattlesnake approached us. (Were we eating a rattlesnake?)
Comma Rule 1: Use a comma before a coordinating conjunction (FANBOYS) joining two independent clauses.
Rattlesnakes are high in protein, but I’d rather eat a peanut butter sandwich.
Rattlesnakes are dangerous, and the desert species are even more so.
We are a proud people, for our ancestors passed down these famous delicacies over a period of five thousand years.
The exception to rule 1 is when the two independent clauses are short:
The plane took off and we were on our way.
Comma Rule 2: Use a comma after an introductory clause or phrase.
When Jeff Henderson was in prison, he developed an appetite for reading.
In the nearby room, the TV is blaring full blast.
Tanning in the hot Hermosa Beach sun for over two hours, I realized I had better call it a day.
The exception is when the short adverb clause or phrase is short and doesn’t create the possibility of a misreading:
In no time we were at 2,800 feet.
Comma Rule 3: Use a comma between all items in a series.
Jeff Henderson found redemption through hard work, self-reinvention, and social altruism.
Finding his passion, mastering his craft, and giving back to the community were all part of Jeff Henderson’s self-reinvention.
Comma Rule 4: Use a comma between coordinate adjectives not joined with “and.” Do not use a comma between cumulative adjectives.
The adjectives below are called coordinate because they modify the noun separately:
Jeff Henderson is a passionate, articulate, wise speaker.
The adjectives above are coordinate because they can be joined with “and.” Jeff Henderson is passionate and articulate and wise.
Adjectives that do not modify the noun separately are cumulative.
Three large gray shapes moved slowly toward us.
Chocolate fudge peanut butter swirl coconut cake is divine.
Comma Rule 5: Use commas to set off nonrestrictive (nonessential) elements.
Restrictive or essential information doesn’t have a comma:
For school the students need notebooks that are college-ruled.
Jeff’s cat that just had kittens became very aggressive.
Nonrestrictive:
For school the students need college-ruled notebooks, which are on sale at the bookstore.
Jeff Henderson’s mansion, which is located in Las Vegas, has a state-of-the-art kitchen.
My youngest sister, who plays left wing on the soccer team, now lives at The Sands, a beach house near Los Angeles.
Self-Abnegation
Every morning Emmanuel must “make a decision about his Blackness.” He has to say to himself, "How black am I going to be today?" Modulating his personality becomes a survival adaptation mechanism that gets baked in to his personality. This modulation of the personality became a survival tool in times of Jim Crow when white society expected a certain type of "non-threatening" personality from the black community.
Jim Crow Laws in the Modern Age
We like to think we’ve emerged beyond the brutal racism of Jim Crow, but the story addresses the manner in which black people are brutalized by whites and how these whites face no accountability. A horrific murder has taken place, mass decapitation, and the five black children are said to have been a threat for loitering.
Black Lives Matter
The story is addresses crises being confronted by the Black Lives Matter Movement.
Cultural Divide
The murderer George Wilson Dunn drives a Ford F-150. This iconic Ford Truck is a symbol of “middle white America,” which is associated with wanting “America to be white again,” a xenophobic swath that fears diversity.
America is often seen as a division: “coastal elites” or the diverse cities vs. “fly-over America,” the huge fruited plain where whites live.
Stand Your Ground Laws and Trayvon Martin
George Zimmerman was acquitted for the murder of Trayvon Martin in the state of Florida, a state notorious for stand your ground laws, which allows people to shoot others under the excuse of “feeling threatened,” however nebulous such a claim may be. “Feeling threatened” is often white people having racist feelings toward black people.
The Trayvon Martin case is explained in Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Atlantic essay.
Media Tribalism and America’s Cold Civil War
The story shows the great media divide. Liberal stations like MSNBC would mourn the murder of these innocent black children. It is also implied that Alt-Right outlets like Alex Jones would side with the white killer George Wilson Dunn and while demonizing the black children. Using dog whistles and stopping short of using racist epithets would be Fox News.
Media tribalism represents the fraying of American society and portends what many believe may be a cold Civil War.
Two books chronicle this American tribalism in the media and politics: The Loudest Voice in the Room by Gabriel Sherman and The Red and the Blue by Steve Kornacki.
Black Frustration and Despair
The black community watches in terror and despair as innocent black lives get killed at a frequent rate. An egregious example is Stephon Clark, who was shot while holding a phone in his grandmother’s backyard. The police claim they thought Stephon was holding a gun.
Emmanuel, his family, and friends suffer a similar reaction upon seeing George Wilson Dunn get away with the murder of the Finkelstein 5.
Image, Code Switching, and Success in America
Emmanuel must transition from the innocent verdict to a job interview at a vintage clothing store and worry about his image. His outfit of Space Jams and black hoodie raises his Blackness to 7.6. He needs to get it down to a 4.2 for the interview.
There is an episode in Atlanta in which the character Tracy (played by Khris Davis) fails to code switch and in a job interview. Here is a short scene from the episode.
Code switching goes too far in an Atlantic parody in which a black man “turns white.”
Code switching is not just about success; it’s about not getting shot; it’s about survival.
Gaslighting
On page 5, George Wilson Dunn’s attorney spews a bunch of chaotic smoke, falsity, and confusion into the faces of his audience. This is called gaslighting, bullying and confusing your audience with chicanery and BS. This is what white America has been using to defend slavery, Jim Crow, and racism since the beginning of America. White Confederacy defenders, members of America’s “Lost Cause” cult, still use gaslighting to this day. Classic examples are when these white cultist deny that the Civil War was over slavery. To this day, they will say that the Civil War was the result of “Northern aggression” and “state rights.” But in truth, only one right mattered: the “right” to slavery.
The attorney says that Dunn is not a murderer. He is a white man who has the right to protect his family. He believed he was in danger. The attorney deflects from the actual facts under a smokescreen of hack rhetoric.
On page 14 and page 16, we see Dunn’s “defense”: it’s white rhetoric of gaslighting. The underlying message is this: Whites can never feel to safe around black people, and whites are entitled to use whatever means necessary to feel safe, even kill innocent black people.
This type of rhetoric, full of white virtue signalling, gives whites a sense of license to abuse the black community like this viral video of a cop tackling a teen girl at a pool party.
Cycle of Violence
After Dunn is acquitted of the killings, a cycle of violence ensues, which of course will be grist for the white racist media mill.
Vigilantism will breed more and more vigilantism.
Secret Sauce for Essay Option #4:
Option Four: Develop a thesis that compares the theme of white racist paranoia in the short stories “The Finkelstein 5” and “Zimmer Land” with the myriad news reports of white people making police complaints about innocent black people.
Focus on racial role-playing dance between whites and blacks and frame this dance in the tragedy of the zero-sum game.
Thesis Template:
"The Finkelstein 5" and "Zimmerland" show the perilous racial role-playing dance in America evidenced by _______________, _________________, ______________________, and ________________________.
Sentence Fragments
No main verb
Fragment
An essay with a clear thesis and organization.
Corrected
An essay with a clear thesis and organization has a stronger probability of succeeding.
Fragment
An education system based on standardized tests with no flexible interpretation of those tests
Corrected
An education system based on standardized tests with no flexible interpretation of those tests will inevitably discriminate against non-native speakers.
No main subject
Fragment
With too much emphasis on standardized tests targeting upper class Anglo students
Corrected
With too much emphasis on standardized tests targeting upper class Anglo students, No Child Left Behind remains a form of discrimination.
Fragment
With my fish tacos overloaded with mango salsa and Manchego cheese
Correct
With my fish tacos overloaded with mango salsa and Manchego cheese, they fell apart upon the first bite.
Fragment
Until you learn to not overload your fish tacos
Correct
Until you learn to not overload your fish tacos, your tacos will fall apart.
Examples of Student Fragments
People are never happy with what they have. Always trying to be something they're not.
Star Trek predicted what the future would be like. A world where an abundant supply of technology helps the human race.
Since being drawn to social media, we're together now more than ever. Not communicating with conversation but only connecting.
Don’t allow gerunds and participles to stand alone.
Having Facebook friends whose GoFundMe accounts that are always asking for money.
Babbling about the Presidential election.
Stuffing my mouth with cream cheese and bagels.
Examining the reasons for staying in college.
Running toward the buffet table.
Running toward the buffet table is dangerous. (gerund noun phrase)
Running toward the buffet table, Mo tripped and broke his wrist. (participle phrase modifies Mo, so it’s also called an adjective phrase)
Eating bucket-fulls of cashew and walnut pesto larded with Parmesan cheese.
Eating bucket-fulls of cashew and walnut pesto larded with Parmesan cheese can lead to a heart attack. (gerund noun phrase)
Eating bucket-fulls of cashew and walnut pesto larded with Parmesan cheese, Augustine was oblivious of his girlfriend who sat across from him at the table looking at his exhibition of gluttony with horror and disgust. (participle phrase that modifies Augustine).
Augustine dreams of eating a ricotta pound cake smothered with whipped cream and strawberries. (gerund noun phrase is the object of the sentence)
Faulty
Elliot was a vulgar philistine. Evidenced by a love of gold and sequin-encrusted toilets.
Corrected
Elliot was a vulgar philistine evidenced by a love of gold and sequin-encrusted toilets.
Don’t let prepositional phrases stand alone.
A prepositional phrase starts with a preposition.
Under the bridge, the Red Hot Chili Peppers rock star contemplated the emptiness of his life and wrote “Under the Bridge.”
In "Growing Up Tethered" by Sherry Turkle is talking about why more teens are more focused on their phones than real people.
In the above, get rid of the preposition "In."
Faulty
I enjoyed my run. In spite of your choice to abandon me and leave me to run alone in the rain. (prepositional phrase can’t stand alone)
Corrected
I enjoyed my run in spite of your choice to abandon me and leave me to run alone in the rain.
Don’t let an appositional phrase stand alone.
An appositional phrase is a the use of phrase to rename a noun.
My father, a military man, speaks in a loud, bombastic voice.
I listen to the loud voice of my father, a military man.
Faulty
Bo Jackson, the most freakish physical specimen of the last century, suffered a career-stopping hip injury. That sent his fans into mourning.
Corrected
Bo Jackson, the most freakish physical specimen of the last century, suffered a career-stopping hip injury, which sent his fans into mourning.
Faulty
My favorite athlete is Bo Jackson. The most freakish specimen of the last century.
Corrected
My favorite athlete is Bo Jackson, the most freakish specimen of the last century.
Faulty
I dreamed last night that I was sitting behind the wheel of a Lexus GS350. One of the greatest cars ever built.
Corrected
I dreamed last night that I was sitting behind the wheel of a Lexus GS350, one of the greatest cars ever built.
Faulty
In 1969, I swooned over my third grade classmate Patty Wilson. A pulchritudinous goddess from another planet.
Corrected
In 1969, I swooned over my third-grade classmate Patty Wilson, a pulchritudinous goddess from another planet.
Don’t let an infinitive phrase stand alone. An infinitive phrase is a “to verb,” which is not a real verb.
To know me is to love me.
Faulty
Working in his lab for ten years, Dr. Kragen was obsessed with creating a new type of Greek yogurt. To see if he could create a yogurt with 100 grams of protein per cup.
Working in his lab for ten years, Dr. Kragen was obsessed with creating a new type of Greek yogurt to see if he could create a yogurt with 100 grams of protein per cup.
Don’t let an adjective clause stand alone.
An adjective clause is that or which followed by a subject and a verb.
I like cars that feel like they’ve been built with care and precision.
Spotify, which I joined last year, has kept me from spending money on iTunes.
Faulty
I spend most of my listening time on Spotify. Which costs me ten dollars a month and saves me from spending up to $100 a month on iTunes.
Corrected
I spend most of my listening time on Spotify, which costs me ten dollars a month and saves me from spending up to $100 a month on iTunes.
Faulty
People who lard their salads with candied nuts.
Corrected
People who lard their salads with candied nuts have to admit they can only eat salad if they make it taste like pecan pie.
Faulty
People who cut you off and then drive really slowly as if they're trying to enrage you on purpose.
Corrected
People who cut you off and then drive really slowly as if they're trying to enrage you on purpose are passive-aggressive miscreants.
Faulty
People who sign up for community college classes and then ignore the syllabus.
Corrected
People who sign up for community college classes and then ignore the syllabus are more in love with the idea of going to college than actually going to college.
Faulty
People who think marriage will cure them of their immaturity and give them instant status as winners in society.
Corrected
People who think marriage will cure them of their immaturity and give them instant status as winners in society are delusional charlatans who are on the road to divorce.
Don’t let an adverbial clause stand alone.
An adverbial clause modifies a verb.
I like to do my kettlebell workouts when my twins are in school.
When it’s too hot to exercise, I slog through my kettlebell workouts.
Faulty
I tend to inhale gallons of rocky road chocolate chip ice cream. As a depressive reaction to “Lonely Night Saturdays.”
Corrected
I tend to inhale gallons of rocky road chocolate chip ice cream as a depressive reaction to “Lonely Night Saturdays.”
Don’t let any long phrase or clause be confused with a complete sentence.
Faulty
Although I studied herpetology and kinesiology during my stay in the Peruvian mountains while keeping warm in the hides of Alpaca and other mountain-dwelling bovine creatures.
Corrected
Although I studied herpetology and kinesiology during my stay in the Peruvian mountains while keeping warm in the hides of Alpaca and other mountain-dwelling bovine creatures, I feel I didn’t retain much information during my two-year stay there.
Find Fragments and Comma Splices
The other night I consumed a tub of Greek yogurt with peanut butter and honey so I'd have enough energy to watch a documentary about world hunger.
I wasn't really hungry, I was anxious. Whenever I get anxious; which is all the time, I eat like a demon.
Anxiety propels me to stuff my face even when I’m not hungry. The mechanical act of eating. Using my greedy hands to lift food to my mouth and then hearing my mandibles and molars crunch the food matter into mush, has a soothing effect on my anxieties—like giving a teething biscuit to a baby.
Anxiety compels me to engage in the practice of “preemptive eating.” The idea that even though I’m not hungry in this moment, I might be “on the road” inside my car far away from nutritional resources so I had better fill up while I can. In truth, I’m not “on the road” that often evidenced by the fact that my nine-year-old car has only 33 thousand miles on the odometer. Clearly, then, my impulse for preemptive eating is indefensible.
But you see, my anxieties exaggerate the circumstances, so that I have ample food reserves in my car—cases of high-protein chocolate peanut butter bars and a case of bottled water. All that unnecessary weight in the trunk compromises my gas mileage, but my anxieties are a cruel tyrant.
Anxiety is the reason that, in spite of my hardcore kettlebell workouts, I am a good twenty pounds overweight. Being twenty pounds overweight makes me anxious, and these anxieties in turn make me want to eat more.
Contemplating this vicious cycle is making me extremely anxious.
Good food makes me anxious.
Just thinking about good food can make me so anxious I’ll obsess over it in bed, so I’ll toss and turn all night. Like a heroin addict.
When I was in my early twenties, I ate donuts that were so good I wanted to drop out of college, give up on relationships, and hole myself up in my mother’s basement. Where I’d spend the rest of my life eating donuts.
I suffer from food insomnia. Meaning that fixating at night on a certain delicious meal I once had can prevent me from falling asleep.
There’s one food in particular that keeps me up at night—chocolate brownies.
Chocolate brownies are the best delivery system for sending an explosion of chocolate into the brain’s pleasure centers. Chocolate brownies saturate my brain with so much dopamine that after eating a brownie platter it’s not safe for me to drive or to operate heavy mechanical equipment. When I was a kid, I took cough medicine laced with codeine, and there was a warning label on the back: “Not safe to drive or to operate heavy mechanical equipment.” Chocolate brownie mix should have the same warning on the back of the box.
The best brownies mix I’ve ever had are Ghirardelli Triple Chocolate Chip Brownies from Costco. I’ve purchased the same brand from other stores, but the Costco version is the best. Costco apparently uses its special powers to have Ghirardelli make an exclusive proprietary formula that is far superior to other versions, this fact has been corroborated by conversations I’ve had with Orange County housewives.
I don’t live in Orange County, and I don’t normally have conversations with housewives. That I talked with them about the superior quality of the exclusive Costco version of Ghirardelli Triple Chocolate Chip Brownies mix attests to the severity of my unhealthy dependence on food.
Costco does a good job of making you think about food. Before you even walk inside Costco, you smell the freshly baked cinnamon rolls, chocolate chip cookies, and cream Danish. The smell makes you run inside the store.
Chronologically speaking, I am supposed to be an adult, but like a kid I’m running toward the Costco entrance while pushing an empty shopping cart. I must be a scary sight. This 240-pound middle-aged bald guy aggressively pushing his battering ram into a giant food larder. Where he will pillage the spoils. I’m like an Old Testament warlord about to ransack a defeated city.
Sentence Fragments
Sentence fragments are incomplete thoughts presented as dependent clauses or phrases.
A dependent clause or a phrase is never a complete sentence.
Types of dependent clauses:
Whenever I drive up windy mountains,
Because I have craved pizza for 14 months,
Unless you add coffee to your chocolate cake recipe,
,which is currently enjoying a resurgence.
Phrases
Enamored by the music of Tupac Shakur,
Craving pesto linguine with olive-oil based clam sauce,
Flexing his muscles with a braggadocio never seen in modern times,
Lying under the bridge and eating garlic pepper pretzels with a dollop of cream cheese and a jug of chilled apple cider,
To understand the notion of Universal Basic Income and all of its related factors for social change in this disruptive age,
Running into crowded restaurants with garlic and whiskey fuming out of his sweaty pores while brandishing a golden scepter,
Examples
I won't entertain your requests for more money and gifts. Until you show at least a modicum of responsibility at school and with your friends.
I won't consider buying the new BMW sports coupe. Unless of course my uncle gives me that inheritance he keeps talking about whenever he gets a bit tipsy.
I can't imagine ever going to Chuck E. Cheese. Which makes me feel like I'm emotionally arrested.
I am considering the purchase of a new wardrobe. That is, if I'm picked for that job interview at Nordstrom.
Human morals have vanished. To the point at which it was decided that market values would triumph.
No subject
Marie Antoinette spent huge sums of money on herself and her favorites. And helped to bring on the French Revolution.
No complete verb
The aluminum boat sitting on its trailer.
Beginning with a subordinating word
We returned to the drugstore. Where we waited for our buddies.
A sentence fragment is part of a sentence that is written as if it were a complete sentence. Reading your draft out loud, backwards, sentence by sentence, will help you spot sentence fragments.
Sentence Fragment Exercises
After each sentence, write C for complete or F for fragment sentence. If the sentence is a fragment, correct it so that it is a complete sentence.
One. While hovering over the complexity of a formidable math problem and wondering if he had time to solve the problem before his girlfriend called him to complain about the horrible birthday present he bought her.
Two. In spite of the boyfriend’s growing discontent for his girlfriend, a churlish woman prone to tantrums and grand bouts of petulance.
Three. My BMW 5 series, a serious entry into the luxury car market.
Four. Overcome with nausea from eating ten bowls of angel hair pasta slathered in pine nut garlic pesto.
Five. Winding quickly but safely up the treacherous Palos Verdes hills in the shrouded mist of a lazy June morning, I realized that my BMW gave me feelings of completeness and fulfillment.
Six. To attempt to grasp the profound ignorance of those who deny the compelling truths of science in favor of their pseudo-intellectual ideas about “dangerous” vaccines and the “myths” of global warming.
Seven. The girlfriend whom I lavished with exotic gifts from afar.
Eight. When my cravings for pesto pizza, babaganoush, and triple chocolate cake overcome me during my bouts of acute anxiety.
Nine. Inclined to stop watching sports in the face of my girlfriend’s insistence that I pay more attention to her, I am throwing away my TV.
Ten. At the dance club where I espy my girlfriend flirting with a stranger by the soda machine festooned with party balloons and tinsel.
Eleven. The BMW speeding ahead of me and winding into the misty hills.
Twelve. Before you convert to the religion of veganism in order to impress your vegan girlfriend.
Thirteen. Summoning all my strength to resist the giant chocolate fudge cake sweating on the plate before me.
Identify the Fragments Below
Identify the Fragments Below
I drank the chalky Soylent meal-replacement drink. Expecting to feel full and satisfied. Only to find that I was still ravenously hungry afterwards. Trying to sate my hunger pangs. I went to HomeTown Buffet. Where I ate several platters of braised oxtail and barbecued short ribs smothered in a honey vinegar sauce. Which reminded me of a sauce where I used to buy groceries from. When I was a kid.
Feeling bloated after my HomeTown Buffet indulgence. I exited the restaurant. After which I hailed an Uber and asked the driver for a night club recommendation. So I could dance off all my calories. The driver recommended a place, Anxiety Wires. I had never heard of it. Though, it was crowded inside. I felt eager to dance and confident about “my swag.” Although, I was still feeling bloated. Wondering if my intestines were on the verge of exploding.
Sweating under the night club’s outdoor canopy. I smelled the cloying gasses of a nearby vape. A serpentine woman was holding the vape. A gold contraption emitting rose-water vapors into my direction. Contemplating my gluttony. I was suddenly feeling low confidence. Though I pushed myself to introduce myself to the vape-smoking stranger with the serpentine features. Her eyes locked on mine.
I decided to play it cool. Instead of overwhelming her with a loud, brash manner. Which she might interpret as neediness on my part.
Keeping a portable fan in my cargo pocket for emergencies. When I feel like I’m overheating. I took the fan out of my pocket, turned it on, and directed it toward the serpentine stranger. Making it so the vapors were blowing back in her face.
“Doesn’t smell so good, does it?” I said. With a sarcastic grin.
She cackled, then said, “Thank you for blowing the vapors in my face. Now I can both enjoy inhaling them and breathing them in. For double the pleasure. You are quite a find. Come home with me and I’ll introduce you to my mother Gertrude and her pitbull Jackson. I’m sure they’ll welcome you into our home. Considering what a well-fed handsome man you are.”
“Thank you for the compliment,” I said. “I would love to meet your mother Gertrude and your mother’s pitbull Jackson. Only one problem. My breath smells like a rotting dead dragon. Right after eating spicy ribs. Which reminds me? Do you have any breath mints?”
“I don’t believe in carrying breath mints. On account of the rose-water vape. That cleanses my palate. Making my breath rosy fresh.”
“Wow. Your constant good breath counteracts my intractable bad breath. Making us a match in heaven.”
“I agree. Totally. You really need to meet my mother. Because she’ll bless us and make our marriage official. Since we really need her blessing. Agreed?”
“Agreed.”
“Now let me smell your breath. So I can identify the hot sauce.”
“Why must you do that?”
“So I can use the same hot sauce on our wedding cake, silly. To celebrate the first night we met. Capisce?”
“Capisce.”
She approached me. Affording me a view of her long, tired face. Covered in scales. Reptilian. Evocative of something primitive. Something precious and indelible from my childhood lost long ago. I wanted to run from her, but I could not. Some mysterious force drew me to her, and we inched closer and closer toward one another. Succumbing to a power neither of us could fathom.
Comma Splice Review
Identify the Comma Splices Below:
It’s not a question of will there be chaos or will there be destruction, it’s a question of how much?
MySpace was disruptive in its time, however, it’s a dated platform and to simply mention it is to make people laugh with a certain derision surely it’s a platform that has seen its time, another example is the meal replacement Soylent, its creator made a drink that says, “You’re too busy to eat,” so drinking this pancake batter-like concoction gives tech people street. I may laugh at its stupidity, instead I should admire it since the product has made millions for its creator. It’s proven to be somewhat disruptive.
To be sure, though, Facebook redefines the word disruptive, it has rapidly accrued over 3 billion users and will soon have half the planet plugged into its site, that is the apotheosis of a greedy person’s fantasy, imagine controlling half the planet on a platform that mines private information and targets ads toward specific personality profiles.
One of the scary disruptions of Facebook is that billions of people have lost their personal agency, what that means that people have unknowingly been manipulated by Facebook’s puppeteers to the point that many Facebook users suffer from social media addiction, moreover, these same users prefer the fake life they curate on social media to the real life they once had, in fact, their previous real life is just a puff of smoke that has faded into the distance, many people no longer even know what it means to be “real” anymore, having lost their agency, having succumbed to their Facebook addiction, they have become zombies waiting for their next rush of social media-fueled dopamine, what a sad state of affairs.
“Zimmer Land”
Feed Racist Fantasies
An amusement park enacts racist fears and fantasies for white patrons. White patrons want to defend their “safe space.” This satire connects to a lot of stories in the news in which white women are calling the police to arrest black adults and children for trivial reasons like the woman who falsely claimed a black child “molested” her, as we see in the NYT.
We see another Vox article, “Babysitting While Black.”
There is an epidemic of 9/11 calls complaining against innocent black people, as we see reported in CNN.
Rolling Stone has an article: “Why White Women Keep Calling the Cops on Black People.”
The NYT has article: “When White People Call the Police on Black People.”
Here’s a CNN report of the “crime” of not waving.
Here’s a YouTube video of white man calling police on black woman at swimming pool.
Here’s YouTube video of black father at soccer game being unfairly harassed.
Here is a 10-minute PBS video of white people making these racist calls.
White Patrons Hit Black Actors in Amusement Park: Violence Merges with Entertainment
There is a history of black people being hit for white people’s amusement. There were carnivals in the Jim Crow south where a sick game called “The African Dodger” was played. This is part of a long tradition of minstrel shows in America.
Comparing the themes in Black Friday to Donald Glover’s “This Is America.”
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