Gems like 'Henry Jones, Your Honeymoon is Over', racist

[BwanaJoe]

Now this is an interesting thread.

So the question I have, and don't know the answer to, is if the words in question were derogatory at the time this music was new. For instance, if you call a mentally handicaped person (or is it mentally challenged now, I've lost track) retarded or a retard, it is considered politically incorrect and in bad taste. However, retarded took the place of prior terms like idiot and moron because those were considered insulting. Which of course had also taken the place of other terms!

Context is everything.

[bhmack71]

Now this is an interesting thread.

So the question I have, and don't know the answer to, is if the words in question were derogatory at the time this music was new. For instance, if you call a mentally handicaped person (or is it mentally challenged now, I've lost track) retarded or a retard, it is considered politically incorrect and in bad taste. However, retarded took the place of prior terms like idiot and moron because those were considered insulting. Which of course had also taken the place of other terms!

Context is everything.

I think that's the appropriate question. I'm reminded of when I was living in DC in my twenties and was dating a girl from Massachusetts who went to Catholic University. My girlfriend and her circle of friends had a big time talking about me being the first "Mick" any of them had ever dated. To their parents the Irish were considered "other" and this was passed down to them. There was no offence meant and none taken. I was, in fact, her first Irish descended boyfriend. Today many would call her and her friends racist and insensitive for their choice of terms and line of thought if seen in a vacuum. But of course they weren't. Obviously. They were very progressive in their time. As were the artists on these records. That was the point I was making in my rant a few posts back. We have to recognize the progress not judge the terminology.

Context IS everything. And somehow we've lost the ability to apply it.

[phonogfp]

We have to recognize the progress not judge the terminology.

Context IS everything. And somehow we've lost the ability to apply it.

Once again, very well stated.

I would take issue only with your contention that "...we've lost the ability to apply it [context]." This thread happily demonstrates that there are plenty of people who understand and apply historical context. Unfortunately, there is an industry devoted to creating "victims" and inciting their resentment, anger, and hatred. As long as these panderers have an uninformed constituency to exploit, I fear that things will not improve. Hopefully, those who "recognize the progress" (and continue to build on it) will someday have a voice in pop culture. I'm a believer that the Truth will eventually become known (again), but the interim misery is upsetting to observe.

Thank goodness for antique phonographs and records!

George P.

PS: When I began my career in adult developmental disabilities in 1977, the folks living in the developmental center where I worked were called "patients." Someone decided to take offense, so we received an edict that thenceforth they were to be called "residents." Pretty demeaning, I guess, because eventually we were instructed to call them "clients." Still no good. We went through "Individuals" and "People" by the time I retired in 2009. (Those last two caused a lot of confusion. I referred to them as "the people we serve.") The umbrella agency in New York State was OMRDD: Office of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities. Within a few months of my retirement, the name was changed to OPDD: Office for People with Developmental Disabilities. I've heard recently that "disabilities" is becoming a hateful word, so I expect more change (always for the better of course!) is coming, and with it, many hundreds of thousands of dollars of expense.

[alang]

I also agree that context - especially historical context should be the key. I think it is also important to understand that people who take offense in such songs do not necessarily have the historical context and therefore judge the words in the only context they know, the present. They may mean well and try to defend specific groups (African Americans, Jews, Native Americans, etc) from being mistreated. Instead of taking a swing at all of them I would suggest to educate them in a positive way, so they have the historic context and can have a more differentiated view going forward.

Unfortunately this topic is very complex and there are no easy answers or solutions. I think nobody would disagree that it was right to abandon the derogative and demeaning names African Americans and other groups were called in the early 1900s. But the first "replacements" of these names were not much better, so there were several waves of trying to come up with acceptable and respectful names. But where do you stop, what is good enough and acceptable? There is no good answer for that.

But back to the historical context and why many people nowadays don't seem to have it. History often has painful and shameful lessons to teach, and one approach to change behavior has often been to "wipe it out", not speak of it anymore. Teach people the new ways instead of the old. An understandable and honorable approach with relatively fast results (one generation or so). Unfortunately it has the side effect that people loose the historical context and cannot learn from the past anymore. Examples would be the enslavement of African Americans, or the treatment of Native Americans in this country.

I would like to go into more detail with an example from Germany, where I grew up. I was born long after WWII, so Nazi Germany was only history for me. After the horrors of the Nazi regime the allies had decided to make sure that this would never happen again. All Germans, especially the children were "re-trained", many books, movies, etc from the previous 30 years were banned, only carefully crafted history lessons of the Third Reich were allowed to be taught. War as a means of solving political disagreements was taught as unacceptable and despicable. Peaceful coexistence is the highest goal. That is how all baby boomers and other generations after them grew up in Germany. The goal was a peaceful Germany and that no war should ever start from German soil again. An unexpected side effect of this was that very few people in Germany joined the military anymore, because conflicts are not supposed to be solved that way. This caused some interesting challenges after the re-unification, when Germany was supposed to join peace keeping missions with their allies. But the bigger challenge exists now that the complete historical context of Nazi Germany is missing. Many young Germans simply think everything and everyone was evil back then, because that's what they have been taught. Others react to immigration or asylum issues with pretty extreme views and are vulnerable to propaganda, because they are missing the full historical context of how the Nazi ideas slowly and innocently grew a hold in the Twenties and Thirties. In both cases young people have been robbed of their ability to look at an issue from all sides in the proper context and make good educated choices.

So from my point of view it is the responsibility of all that know the historical context to educate our younger generation and help them understand that there is never a black and white simple answer. Even many of our records can be misused if provided without or in the wrong context. Playing an old KKK record during a civil rights demonstration is probably not a good idea, while it may be acceptable as a discussion topic during an American History class at a University. This may be an extreme example, but we must understand that a song that is a historical document for us may be hurting someone else who has not the same historical context.

Sorry about the long post
Andreas

[phonogfp]

I fully agree with you, Andreas, especially with regard to teaching history.

Instead of taking a swing at all of them I would suggest to educate them in a positive way, so they have the historic context and can have a more differentiated view going forward.
Andreas

I must not have expressed myself well enough; sorry. The only people I'm "swinging at" are those who deliberately ignore history so that others may not learn it. I don't necessarily blame what I termed an "uninformed constituency" as much as their teachers, the mass media, and modern-day demagogues. Today those powerful groups seem more focused on what makes ethnicities, nationalities, genders, and economic classes different from each other, rather than those aspects of the human condition that make us all brothers and sisters. And, as you describe in Germany, critical thinking is sacrificed to indoctrination - - sometimes even well intentioned indoctrination.

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” - George Santayana

Okay - I'm going back to antique phonographs now, where the sun is always shining and the birds are singing!

George P.

[alang]

George, I wasn't swinging at you either. I'm sorry if you felt that I was criticizing you. I just followed this thread for a while and today I felt compelled to finally respond. Just a coincidence that it was right after your post. Not targeting anyone, just voicing my thoughts.

Sorry
Andreas

[phonogfp]

George, I wasn't swinging at you either. I'm sorry if you felt that I was criticizing you. I just followed this thread for a while and today I felt compelled to finally respond. Just a coincidence that it was right after your post. Not targeting anyone, just voicing my thoughts.

Sorry
Andreas

No problem, Andreas. You Germans are all alike...!

(I'm part German too!)

Seriously, this thread, including your post, gives me some hope that large numbers of people are no longer believing the ugly things being reported about people and groups of people who are not admired by the media in general. Oops... Back to that sunshine and birdsong!

Best regards, my friend - -

George P.

[CarlosV]

Concerning context, When it's Sleepy Time Down South, Louis Armstrong's theme song, written by two Afro-American composers, had in its original lyrics "darkies singing", and this is how Armstrong recorded it in the early 30s. Later he modified it for "folks singing".

Duke Ellington composed Creole Love Call and Creole Rhapsody in the 20s, and the word Negro was the politically correct way to address Afro-Americans from the 40s to the 60s, when it was put in disgrace and replaced by "Black", now thrown to the incorrectness bin as well.

Now concerning blatant typecasting, stereotyping and overt discrimination, there's plenty of examples, like:

Limehouse Blues, Chinatown My Chinatown and others like these were hits in the 20s.

Moving from color to sexual orientation discrimination, Josh White recorded Sissy Man Blues, and Ma Rainey Sissy Blues.

In the radio and movies, then... (Amos'n Andy, Steppin'Fetchit, Charlie Chan, Tarzan, etc etc)

[bhmack71]

Concerning context, When it's Sleepy Time Down South, Louis Armstrong's theme song, written by two Afro-American composers, had in its original lyrics "darkies singing", and this is how Armstrong recorded it in the early 30s. Later he modified it for "folks singing".

Duke Ellington composed Creole Love Call and Creole Rhapsody in the 20s, and the word Negro was the politically correct way to address Afro-Americans from the 40s to the 60s, when it was put in disgrace and replaced by "Black", now thrown to the incorrectness bin as well.

Now concerning blatant typecasting, stereotyping and overt discrimination, there's plenty of examples, like:

Limehouse Blues, Chinatown My Chinatown and others like these were hits in the 20s.

Moving from color to sexual orientation discrimination, Josh White recorded Sissy Man Blues, and Ma Rainey Sissy Blues.

In the radio and movies, then... (Amos'n Andy, Steppin'Fetchit, Charlie Chan, Tarzan, etc etc)

Which reminds me of some of the current stuff. I'm not a big fan of the "Stupid White Guy" routine in all the commercials today. But, hey, it gets a laugh, right?..... our great grandkids will probably label us for that too.

[52089]

In the radio and movies, then... (Amos'n Andy, Steppin'Fetchit, Charlie Chan, Tarzan, etc etc)

My personal "favorite" is Mickey Rooney's supremely racist portrayal of a stereotypical Japanese man in Breakfast at Tiffany's. Makes me cringe every time he comes on screen...