Fashion Choices of The “Stealth Racist”

You might have thought after the politicization of football and children’s library books there would be nothing left to politicize but you would be wrong. Robin Givhans has managed to make the case that even clothing is political – not to mention racist.

Before we get into the specifics, allow me to establish Ms. Givhan’s credentials. A Detroit native, she graduated from Princeton, holds a master’s degree in journalism from the University of Michigan and has been a fashion writer – for the Detroit Free Press, San Francisco Chronicle, Vogue, The Daily Beast, and currently the Washington Post - for nearly 30 years.

Author of Michelle: Her First Year As First Lady

In 2006 she received a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism, the first ever awarded to a fashion writer: “the Pulitzer Committee explained its rationale by noting Givhan's "witty, closely observed essays that transform fashion criticism into cultural criticism.”

Despite once having the audacity to criticize Michelle Obama for wearing shorts to the Grand Canyon ("Avoiding the appearance of queenly behavior is politically wise. But it does American culture no favors if a first lady tries so hard to be average that she winds up looking common," ) she otherwise checked every politically correct box out there.

Still, her column from last month seems to go beyond the norms of standard cultural political correctness: Neo-Nazis are using fashion in an attempt to normalize, and the fashion industry needs to speak up. It’s about the White Supremacists who marched in Charlottesville and what they wore. Her main objection is that the Neo-Nazis didn’t don the cloaks and hoods of the Klu Klux Klan and instead wore “ordinary” clothes. And she’s also upset that the fashion world has not vociferously condemned this cultural appropriation. Excerpts from her emotional column:

Fashion has been weaponized. And the fashion industry has been all but silent…

In the multitude of images from Charlottesville, the race-baiting protesters are decked out in white polo shirts and khakis. Others are wearing neat jeans, button-down shirts, cargo shorts. They are wearing jeans and striped pullovers that look like they could have come from the sale rack at a local Gap…

Trigger! Trigger! Trigger!

But the relevance of fashion in the conversation about racial hatred goes well beyond any particular brand. For an observer cognizant of the internal symbols and visual language of white nationalists, there was a lot to read: neo-Nazi, Proud Boy, skinhead, alt-right. But for the uninitiated, the style of dress was unremarkable. This wasn't a crowd filled with white robes and hoods…

Why wouldn’t fashion speak up? Especially now that fashion has become a stealth weapon for white nationalists. Neo-Nazis have bought into fashion’s ability to camouflage, distract, embolden, reassure, flatter and, quite simply, lie…

I’m not sure how Robin feels about the NFL but she clearly thinks the fashion industry needs to speak up against this existential racist, sexist, homophobic threat:

Not every industry needs to make a public statement with every turn of the news cycle…

Still, the fashion industry is anchored by large public companies that carry just as much cultural clout as any athlete or actor. Many fashion brands have built their businesses on the mythic melting pot of the American Dream. Fashion owes an especially large debt to those communities targeted by white supremacists: Designers regularly draw artistic inspiration from communities of color. Some of fashion's earliest and most influential merchants and editors have been Jewish. And the industry has benefited greatly from the creativity and ingenuity of those who identify as LBGT.

Thanks LGBTQ!

White nationalists are moving through communities cloaked in the most mundane, banal kind of fashion. Clothes that do not inspire a double-take. Clothes that are acceptable and appropriate. Clothes that make them look like they belong. And the fashion industry has yet to tell them that they do not.

Hey, I’ve got it! How about if we make the Alt-Right all wear pink pussy hats when they assemble?

Just what America needs, another industry telling us to check our privilege, stop with the cultural appropriation and just shut up.

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FLOTUS Friday: A Person’s a Person, No Matter How Small

Melania hosts opioid roundtable, September 28

I guess it’s official: everything is political now, even library books. All it takes to make everything political is one lunkhead who decides to take a knee or one lunkheaded librarian who rejects a gift of books from the First Lady because she doesn’t like her husband.  Way to go to bat for the kids, Liz.

Liz Phipps Soerio takes a knee against free books

Oh, I forgot; Liz is the librarian at an affluent Cambridge school where the kids are privileged and don’t need no stinkin’ books from the Trump White House:

"Why not go out of your way to gift books to underfunded and underprivileged communities that continue to be marginalized and maligned by policies put in place by Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos?"

Although that may all be irrelevant, as Ms. Soerio did not approve of the gift book selections either:

"You may not be aware of this," wrote Ms Phipps Soeiro, "but Dr Seuss is a bit of a cliché, a tired and worn ambassador for children's literature.

She also claimed that the illustrations are examples of “racist propaganda.”

Quick somebody tell Michelle, so she doesn’t ever read another racist cliché to children:

And I understand Liz didn’t approve of Where the Wild Things Are either.

I guess I see her point on that one

Oh well, you can’t win the hearts and minds of everyone. FLOTUS’ staff responded graciously to the snotty librarian:

"Mrs. Trump intends to use her platform as First Lady to help as many children as she can. She has demonstrated this in both actions and words since her husband took office, and sending books to schools across the country is but one example," said Stephanie Grisham, the first lady's communications director. "Turning the gesture of sending young school children books into something divisive is unfortunate, but the First Lady remains committed to her efforts on behalf of children everywhere.

Meanwhile, I see Michelle has insulted independent women across the country who dare think with their brains rather than their lady parts. It was a classic Lady M  putdown, expressed in that homey, semi-inarticulate way of hers:

As far as I'm concerned, any woman who voted against Hillary Clinton voted against their own voice in a way. To me, it doesn’t say as much about Hillary ― and everybody’s trying to wonder. Well, what does it mean for Hillary?  No, no, no. What does it mean for us as women? That we look at those two candidates, as women, and many of us said, ‘That guy. He’s better for me. His voice is more true to me.’ Well, to me that just says you don’t like your voice. You like the thing we’re told to like.

Sort of makes you wonder who she voted for in the 2008 Democratic Primary. And if it was Barack, I wonder who told her to?

Linked By: Larwyn’s Linx on Doug Ross@Journal, and BlogsLucianneLoves, and Free Republic, Thanks!

Everything’s Smaller in Utah (I Blame Diversity)

It’s true: SDS (Students for a Democratic Society) is alive and well and living in Utah. They organized the protest yesterday against Ben Shapiro’s speech at the University of Utah. I’m sure you all remember SDS’s most famous acolyte:

Bill Ayers, Vietnam era student activist, co-founder of the Weather Underground, bomber and Distinguished Professor of Education at the University of Chicago where he continued his revolutionary activity in clear sight by helping to turn education into a propaganda factory. Oh yeah, and he’s also known as Barack Hussein Obama’s ghost writer even though he was just some guy who lived in the neighborhood.

As it turned out the protest was small by Soros-backed event standards: it only cost the University $25,0000 in additional security, there were only 2 arrests, and only 300 protestors showed up. Although they did have representation,

apparently you can’t pay Antifa enough to come to Salt Lake City. However, the crowd that did show up looked mad:

Except for the counter-protestors that turned out to support free speech, they seemed to be rational and in good cheer:

And a few people showed up to just to enjoy the sunshine in the waning days of autumn:

Kyler Watson, left, and Matsu sing Hare Krishna songs in front of the Park building in protest of Ben Shapiro’s speech at the University of Utah

So all-in-all this was pretty much a bust as far as Antifa/BLM head-busting protests go. The moral of the story: Utah clearly needs more minorities.

Linked By: American Digest, and Larwyn’s Linx on Doug Ross@Journal, and BlogsLucianneLoves, and Free Republic, Thanks!

Rabbit Hole Wednesday, Communist version

Commies at West Point?

That’s not bad enough.

The Washington Examiner dismantles what they call the New York Time’s worst op-ed of the year (a constantly moving target, to be sure) on how beneficial the Communist Revolution in China was for women. Think of it as revisionist history with a Feminist twist:  

The main thrust of the article, which is little more than a shameful bit of apologia for Mao Zedong, who is personally responsible for more than 45 million deaths, is that Chinese women were liberated by the country's great and murderous Cultural Revolution.

I recall that Anita Dunn, Obama’s White House Communications Director, named Mao as her “favorite philosopher.” Mao, the man whose “Cultural” Revolution seized control of the country’s media and used it for propaganda purposes, seized private property for redistribution, imprisoned and/or slaughtered all those deemed to be counterrevolutionaries (landowners, professionals, intellectuals), destroyed much of China’s traditional culture and created economic chaos that resulted in the starvation deaths of millions of his people. A role model, apparently, because he banned female foot binding - which would render women useless in  the Red Army, but I’m sure that had nothing to do with it.

But I guess that makes sense. If you’re in the rabbit hole, or write for the NYT. The sage op-ed writer for America’s newspaper of record wraps up her praise of Mao’s Communist Cultural Revolution feminist bona fides with this:

"For all its flaws, the Communist revolution taught Chinese women to dream big."

Which seems to contain all the situational awareness and human empathy as the question “aside from that how was the play Mrs. Lincoln?” As The Examiner’s author, Becket Adams, notes:

We eagerly await the publication of similarly argued op-eds, including "For all its flaws, the Klan teaches young men about the importance of community" and "For all its flaws, sex slavery gives young people a chance to travel."

Linked By: Larwyn’s Linx on Doug Ross@Journal, and BlogsLucianneLoves, and Free Republic, Thanks!

Just When You Thought It Was Safe

Just when you thought it was safe to put your dog whistle away, up pops the Queen of the Whack-a-Moles to advise  otherwise.

Hillary also condemned his so-called attack on black athletes. “He [Trump] attacks black athletes..and he attacks them for protesting peacefully, for equality, for standing up for what they believe.” She claims it is his dog whistle and he’s trying to distract attention from what he is doing. – Independent Sentinel

This is clearly the interview of a psychotic woman –

She began the interview by saying the President doesn’t care about Puerto Rico, but don’t worry, she’s involved. “FEMA is down there. I’ve called on them to send the Navy, particularly the Naval hospital ship…,” she assured Hayes.

“Send the Navy?” I guess she thinks the consolation prize from last November made her Commander in Chief. She’s a scary, psychotic, delusional, race-baiting sore loser who obviously sees no reason to stop lying just because she lost.

Stick a dog whistle in ‘yer yap and blow

We are very fortunate indeed that this lunatic is on a fake book tour rather than further mucking up the country.

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MGPWW2GA! (Make Germany Post WWII Great Again!)

The Alternative For Germany (AFG) party? They are, literally, worse Than Hitler!

AFG campaign poster: ‘New Germans?’ Let's make them ourselves."

Wow, is that racist! And for a change we’re talking about somebody other than President Donald J. Trump. This time the Nazi tag is affixed to Germany’s own AfG “hard right” party that won dozens of Parliamentary seats in yesterday’s national election after already winning 13 of 16 state parliaments. They did so by running an openly anti-immigrant campaign.

And just like when Trump won, their betters turned out in force to object to the racists victory:

Hundreds of people gathered in front of a club where the AfD was celebrating in central Berlin, shouting "Nazis out" and "all of Berlin hates the AfD".

Mathias, who said he turned up after seeing a call on Facebook, said it was "important to show that it's not acceptable here in Germany for such a party to enter parliament."

He added that Germany's two biggest parties -- Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union and the Social Democratic Party -- "must reflect on how it can be that so many people voted for such racist politicians” – AFP

The audacity of it all is nearly incomprehensible to the politically correct German Establishment that has become accustomed to running the country as it sees fit.

But in a bombshell for the German establishment, the anti-Islam, anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) captured around 13 percent, catapulting it to become the country's third biggest political force.

Commentators called the AfD's strong performance a "watershed moment" in the history of the German republic. The top-selling Bild daily spoke of a "political earthquake".

AfD supporters gathered at a Berlin club, cheering as public television reported the outcome, many joining in a chorus of the German national anthem. - AFP

I think they want to Make Germany Great Again.

1935 Mercedes Roadster

Well, not too great, just post WWII great.

MGPWW2GA! (Make Germany Post WWII Great Again!)

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Not My NFL

Is there anything that progressivism can’t ruin?

Oh, the left will  blame President Trump and demand he be impeached.

But I’m so old that I remember when - before everything became political - nearly all Americans regardless of color or tone thought football players standing as the National Anthem was sung was pretty non-controversial. But that was BO (Before Obama); before the professionally orchestrated and funded antics of Occupy Wall Street, Black Lives Matter, #NotMyPresident and ANTIFA ruled the mean streets. Unfortunately for the NFL an awful lot of their fans still think it should be non-controversial. And the President had the audacity to say as much out loud, albeit in his typical not-so-tactful way.

While his comments further ruffled the feathers of the huffers and puffers, it simultaneously served to reinforce the belief of people who voted for him that he speaks for them. None of this is good news for the NFL. Or Democrats.

Let’s just say we all know who started this fight.

So thanks for making something else that used to be fun a victim of your version of “social justice.

Linked By: Larwyn’s Linx on Doug Ross@Journal, and BlogsLucianneLoves, and Free Republic, Thanks!