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JuicyLesson 205: Fear & Loathing: A History of Racism in Boston … Music is from Brad Paisley’s beautiful country number feat. LL Cool J entitled “The Accidental Racist” …


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Pictured above are rapper LL Cool J and country music artist, Brad Paisley. Their song has drawn the ire of many but I still like it. So there.

Featured today is a short clip which presents a Jewish teacher who teaches/taught in Boston recalling the racism and anti-Semitism she encountered in her early career as a high school social studies teacher there. For example, when Martin Luther King was assassinated in April 1968, this woman’s Department Head actually said to her: “Your boyfriend got it today.” Find out what prompted that remark by having a gander at this clip. Ya, sure. Boston Strong. My butt.

Boston strong? My freaking ass. It’s a racist town; the Red Sox were the last Major League Baseball team to integrate which happened, finally, in 1959, although, and this is positive, the Bruins were the first in the NHL to integrate their hockey team.

Remember 2010 when African-Canadian Joel (Thanks, Darren Rosen) Ward scored the goal for Washington that eliminated the Bruins from the Stanley Cup play-offs and the racist invective in the wake of that, not from Twitter as was the case with the slurs directed against P.K. Subban in the aftermath of the Habs’ win as a result of P.K.’s over-time goal in Game 1 of this conference semi-final series, but from media in existence four years ago – social and otherwise.

Cam Neely, the Bruins’ GM, disavowed any knowledge of the racist tweeters or in this case, TWITters, and by doing this, and only this, he didn’t go far enough. In my humble opinion, Neely should have stated, unequivocally, that every effort would be made by the team’s administration to identify the racist TWITters who would then be refused entry to Bruins’ games in perpetuity, possibly.

Why he didn’t is obvious: he was afraid of repercussions. The question is why should he care what racists think or do, unless, of course, there are a lot more of them in Boston than we are being led to believe and if that is the case, the GM of the Bruins was scared that taking decisive action (of the type suggested above) would have had a seriously detrimental effect on the team’s bottom line. Shame on him but as we constantly make excuses for people like that by saying things like “he was only doing his job” just like a good little Nazi during the period of WWII.

By the way, in reference to Twitter, I was not that surprised to hear that identifying the source of all Tweets is certainly a realistic possibilty.

There are other manifestations of Boston’s racism not the least of which was the stoning – by white opponents of racial integration – of buses carrying Black kids to schools in White areas of the city. Also, homes owned by African-Americans were firebombed and Blacks were attacked in the streets of Boston. This occurred in the Boston of the 1970’s although, from what is happening there right now, it would appear that this little hotbed of racism hasn’t changed that much since that time, about forty years ago.

Please don’t take this wrongly but maybe karma had a role to play in the the selection of the Boston Marathon as the site of that bombing a little more than a year ago.

Further, we in Quebec should not be so quick to cast aspersions at Bostonians for their racism, when we have racist problems of our own. Have we already forgotten the reaction among some people, no doubt from among the uneducated masses, to Muslims and their attire in the wake of the unveiling of the PQ’s secular charter (Bill 60) not really that long ago? People in glass houses … as is said. On second thought, maybe they were not uneducated given the experience of the teacher in our featured video.

What else is going on in Amhairica? The racist, Donald Sterling, reacting to the outrage sparked by his remarks about ten days ago, states that he should have paid her (V. Stiviano) off. Therefore instead of apologizing and doing a little soul-searching which I know would be difficult for a man of his age and background at the best of times, he comes out with a totally inappropriate and irrelavent remark. As far as Clipper ownership goes, he still has possession of the team which, by the way, was able to rise above the furore and distraction caused by their owner’s surreptitiously recorded remarks to defeat the Golden State Warriors yesterday 127-121 which means that the Clippers won the series and avoided having their season come to a premature conclusion.

Good things come to those who wait. Remember.
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Peace and harmony are good. Hypocrisy sucks. Badly.

A demain friends.

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