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re: Happy Talk racist?
Posted by: Michael_Portantiere 02:58 pm EST 02/20/19
In reply to: re: Happy Talk racist? - andyboy 02:48 pm EST 02/20/19

*****Personally, I find "You've got to be taught / To be afraid / OF PEOPLE WHO'S EYES / ARE ODDLY MADE" pretty cringeworthy. Yes, Cable is without a doubt arguing AGAINST racism -- but with (yikes) a pretty racist attitude in that phrase...*****

That never occurred to me! But now that you've brought it up, I would say one could easily interpret that phrase as Cable making the point that white racists think Asian people have eyes that are "oddly made" -- not that he himself would ever use that term.
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re: Happy Talk racist?
Posted by: keikekaze 05:37 pm EST 02/20/19
In reply to: re: Happy Talk racist? - Michael_Portantiere 02:58 pm EST 02/20/19

I've always read the entire lyric of "Carefully Taught" as Cable generalizing (correctly, I think) from his own upbringing to the universal. He isn't singing about any particular group, neither as the subjects of the racism nor as the objects of it; he's singing that ***everybody*** does this. So the "oddly made" bit isn't a slur on any particular ethnic group's eyes; it could be Asian people thinking European people's eyes are "oddly made." It doesn't matter. The point is that fear of "the other" is universal.
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re: Happy Talk racist?
Posted by: andyboy 03:04 pm EST 02/20/19
In reply to: re: Happy Talk racist? - Michael_Portantiere 02:58 pm EST 02/20/19

And that thought never occurred to ME, haha. But yes, you could! I feel slightly better about that now.
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re: Happy Talk racist?
Posted by: Michael_Portantiere 03:33 pm EST 02/20/19
In reply to: re: Happy Talk racist? - andyboy 03:04 pm EST 02/20/19

:-)
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