Lymph Nodes, Detoxing and Lancing the Boil of Institutionalized Racism: The Daily Nooner (EST)!
Awesome Video Of The Day
Shirley Q. Liquor Goes To K-Mark
WARNING: Today’s video IS not FUNNY in any way, shape or form. It portrays hurtful racist stereotypes, and although it does so in an entertaining voice I can assure that it IS not FUNNY. I can’t speak for my fellow bloggers (I’m pretty sure that Swaim is a card-carrying Klan member), but I can tell you that I personally DOn’t THINK THIS VIDEO IS FUNNY.
Okay? Okay.
Shirley Q. Liquor is a character that was created by Chuck Knipp, a drag comedian who is also an ordained chaplain, registered nurse, and active member of the ACLU and Libertarian Party. On top of all this, he somehow manages to find the time to caricature southern black women and put it up on YouTube. Impressive!
His live performances have been protested several times, apparently, but I can’t figure out why. Maybe they’re picketed by people who hate the ACLU, or people who really hate drag comedians. Or maybe it has something to do with the fact that he PERFORMS IN BLACKFACE. I don’t know. People can be so touchy.
While his critics call him a bigot, Knipp defends himself by saying he’s “lancing the boil of institutionalized racism.” I know I’m playing with fire by putting this question forward, but here goes nothing: What do YOU think?
The Worst Of “As Seen On TV”
The Product: Sole Detox Pads
The Ad Copy: “Sole Detox Pads absorb toxins including heavy metals, cleanse the lymph system (the only thing that heals the body) and makes the painful areas of your body feel life’s energy and become more comfortable… by absorbing toxins through the soles of the feet while you sleep.”
Price: $59.95 plus $6.95 shipping & handling (for a box of 30 pads)
Target Demographic: Morons who don’t feel good
Why It Sucks: So let me get this straight - you put these pads on your feet, go to sleep, the pads get dirty, and the dirty stuff is toxins, right? Well why, might I ask, do the toxins come out of your feet? And why only at night? When my socks get dirty throughout the course of the day, is it from the toxins seeping out of my soles, and if so, shouldn’t I be wearing some Detox Pads to prevent it? If I’m really ambitious about detoxing (and lord knows I am), shouldn’t I be wearing them all over my body 24 hours a day? I want to believe in this system, but I’m pretty sure I have too many toxins in my body for it to work for me in its present state. Which is too bad, really. I feel terrible pretty much all the time.
Stupid Factor (1 to 10): 9
December 5th, 2007 at 12:19 pm
I think people need to stop being so sensative about race. That was hilarious. At the heart of it, it just sounded like a female version of “The Ladies’ Man” without all the sex jokes.
December 5th, 2007 at 1:07 pm
After watching that video, I think I need some Soul Detox Pads.
December 5th, 2007 at 1:08 pm
I don’t see how that’s any more hurtful to the black community than the shit that Tyler Perry pumps out.
Also it’s funnier.
December 5th, 2007 at 1:21 pm
I think the proof is in the pudding, he’s portraying an Aunt Jemima caricature without a hint of irony, for no real reason but to make stupid white people laugh. There’s nothing funny about this, just stupidity in the air.
December 5th, 2007 at 1:22 pm
It actually isn’t that funny. I don’t find it offensive or anything, but most of the jokes were lame, except for the “Constitution of K-Mart.”
December 5th, 2007 at 1:35 pm
Ren, if you liked his act, you might also enjoy the ones where Germans dress up in fake hook-noses and make fun of Jews. All in good fun!
December 5th, 2007 at 2:18 pm
Aside from the weak humor, there is a place for racial humor, which can attack and mock the flimsy ideas of race and racism. However, dressing up in blackface is NOT funny under any circumstances. There is a difference between using racial humor in a self-conscious attack on racism, and mining racial humor for cheap laughs, and thus risking the continuation of racist ideas. Dressing up in Blackface has a long and vicious tradition in America and no matter what his intentions are, it is offensive and cruel. From that brief comedy clip he is not mocking racism, nor commenting on the stereotypes that effect black people, he is simply making a racist joke, and putting a flimsy excuse on it because he can’t think of anything more intelligent to say. There is a place for racial humor. This is not it.
December 5th, 2007 at 2:51 pm
So, according to the before and after picture on the box, I just stick the brown doo-doo covered sole pad on my feet and afterwards it becomes clean? Hmmm…I have to say I’m still skeptical.
December 5th, 2007 at 3:27 pm
Yeah… blackface is pretty much never funny.
December 5th, 2007 at 4:57 pm
Flub your comment is too damn lame. Could you please realize that Germans aren’t antisemitic.
December 5th, 2007 at 5:11 pm
If you really want to drop some bread, spring for one of those aqua foot detoxifiers. It’s a footbath with an electric current running through it (sounds good, huh?) and it’s supposed to suck all the nasty toxins out through the soles of your feet. It will only set you back 3 grand. Like the footpads, it’s also bullshit.
December 5th, 2007 at 6:29 pm
Well doesn’t Dave Chapelle dress up in white-face when he si doing his newsman? Or am I pointing out double standards here?
December 5th, 2007 at 6:46 pm
Flub, It’s not at all that I approve of blackface (which I really, really, absolutely don’t) and I’ll admit, I didn’t watch the whole video. It was really just a sad, lame, excuse for me to rip on Tyler Perry because I don’t think that fucker is funny at all. I didn’t mean that this guy WAS funny, just that being funnier than Tyler Perry doesn’t take a whole lot. Shyeah. Lame joke.
Annnnnd whatever I’m defending myself on the internet. No one wins.
December 5th, 2007 at 7:12 pm
Tyler Perry isn’t funny but for completely different reasons. The point here is that the only “comedy” i see this guy putting forward is hinging completely on people laughing because “he’s talking just like them!” Bad imitations aren’t funny. Comedy that you don’t perceive as having any truth in it isn’t funny. I didnt’ laugh once.
This is just someone attempting to be as racist as possible at the expense of a group of people -overweight black women- who are seen as fair game. There is nothing insightful or progressive to even hint at why he sees this as socially progressive. I’m sick of people excusing racism as free speech (Kramer), comedy (Mencia), or somehow acceptable for any number of reasons. Cartoons and hate driven humor have been used for years to desensitize people to bigoted thinking. There were caricatures of Jewish people with large noses or money grubbing ways in Germany not long before the camps began. You can’t separate racist humor from racist actions. They always go hand in hand. It is Not something to “lighten up” or “Get a sense of humor” about. This is serious. Check up on it if you don’t believe me.
December 5th, 2007 at 8:01 pm
I’ll agree that Tyler Perry sucks and essentially makes the same jokes as Chuck Knipp, the difference is you’re allowed a free pass when you’re making fun of your own race. This is why everyone laughs when Mel Brooks make jokes about Nazis or The Boondocks has Sam Jackson talking about “niggah technology.”
Dave Chappele in white face is more a joke about black face than a genuine attempt to imitate the white man.
It’s also worth pointing out that drag queens have a habit of confusing “edgy” and “offensive.” I recently saw a drag show where a white man dressed as Margaret Cho and proceeded to do ten solid minutes of his ching-chong-chin-chinaman schtick before someone in the audience threw a tiny disco ball at him.
December 5th, 2007 at 9:18 pm
While I feel guilty about imposing a double standard, I would say that Chappelle is very conscious of race, and if you look at his comedy, he is saying some very good things. His dressing up in white face I found to be an ironic comment on racism. That being said, I found the Wayans brother’s “Hot Chicks” completely insulting. That being said, there is not a history of blacks dressing up in “whiteface” to mock and degrade white culture, nor were white folks every slaves, or subject to Jim Crow laws
On another note, might I postulate that Tyler Perry and the Wayans brothers were born out of some unholy union between the Devil and Ellen Degeneres? It would explain a lot, and would give us all hope, as one day, someone might invent a time machine, go back in time, and remove Degeneres from the gene pool before she has time to procreate with Satan.
December 6th, 2007 at 1:49 am
I’m pretty sure this takes place in New Orleans
December 6th, 2007 at 1:56 am
And you people (predominantly white, I presume) are really getting up-in-arms about this thing. It isn’t neccessarily a belittling of a race. You wouldn’t be hard-pressed to find a woman just about anywhere in America who would tell you a story like this. There’s no flashing disclaimer on the bottom reading “ALL BLACK PEOPLE ARE LIKE THIS” or anything. Chill out. Comparing this is nazi propaganda against the jews is ludicrous…I never heard this character say anything to imply she was of a race that is ruining a country. Also, to say that you find Dave Chappelle dressing up in white face to be an ironic comment on racism is a new level cognitive-dissonance resolving justification. Not that I have anything against him doing it or am insulted by it as a white person. But then again, I’m not a big pussy.
December 6th, 2007 at 3:24 am
“There were caricatures of Jewish people with large noses or money grubbing ways in Germany not long before the camps began”… kat, you must have no understanding of European history do you.
The Dave Chappelle white guy act is usually followed by the most negative black stereotypes and is used as a tool to underline the fear of reinforcing the negative stereotypes that pertain to your particular race, he is also FUNNY. Don’t confuse bad comedy acts or jokes and actual racism ( Imus, Michael Richards(Kramer), and Mencia ). This guy aside from being not funny is most likely a big ass racist, unless the joke was on the audience, if he took down their addresses and mailed them to the modern equivalent of the Black Panthers, that would be hella funny! Black face can both be funny and misinterpreted see Ted Danson.
December 7th, 2007 at 6:49 pm
Calling Imus’ Nappy-headed Ho comment is just completely, bat-shit, toad-fucking, asshole-licking retarded.
Fucking whiner.
December 7th, 2007 at 6:50 pm
Um, calling it Racist. Shit. I hate calling folks retards before I’ve managed to proofread my text. However, you’re still a cock-slurping retard.
December 8th, 2007 at 2:17 pm
If you were from the deep south like I am, you would probably think this is hilarious. If you’re from Boston, Vermont, or New York like I am sure some of you are, then you might not find this so funny.
December 8th, 2007 at 4:50 pm
Didn’t see the Jemima video—nothing personal, just busy. I must point out however that anyone that would either a) purchase Detox pads, b) use them, or c) believe in their efficacy deserves to be robbed of every cent by every charlatan and scam artist in the world and left outside, broke and naked, to be eaten by coyotes and/or feral dogs. Good Christ, didja grow up in an ice cave on Mars?
If this worked, then why aren’t people who wear white sweat socks and/or have naturally sweaty feet the healthiest people in the world (hint: they’re not)?
Love to chat, but gotta go—I have to check the astrology chart in today’s paper to see if I’m going to have a good day…
January 25th, 2008 at 7:45 pm
“Well doesn’t Dave Chapelle dress up in white-face when he si doing his newsman? Or am I pointing out double standards here?”
You’re kidding, right? There is no history of white face being connected with literature justifying white slavery, segregation and apartheid against whites or vicious caricatures of whites. Dave Chappelle’s criticism of white people?
June 4th, 2008 at 2:38 am
Race relations is a sensitive issue and we all need to understand its nuances. I don’t know how Chuck feels about large, southern, black, elderly females, but I would expect that he knows something more than you do. Is he playfully imitating a manner of speech from someone or someones that he himself has known well and thinks of fondly, or mean-spiritedly mocking people he considers beneath him? I don’t know. Is the word turlet-paper funny? I think so, but for the same reason I think its funny when my grandmother says “warsh” instead of wash, or supper instead of lunch. Not all white people are necessarily outsiders to black culture. Skin color means NOTHING. There are racist white people and racist black people. Neither is morally superior to the other. Though it’s easier now for a black comedian to speak badly of whites, main-stream movies and T.V., politics, and sanctioned economic practices that are being largely ignored remain areas where subtly institutionalized white to black racism continues to exist.
I’m sleepy.
July 1st, 2008 at 8:07 pm
Video is definitely not funny not because of blatant racist, but because it plain not funny to see another person perpetuating idiotic stereotypes. For those of you saying Dave Chappelle is pulling a double standard; his sketches in which he does his white face a quite hilarious and he isn’t just going for some stupid easy racial giggles. I think people need to stop going to crazy over all the racist comedy out there. It not going away because idiots find it funny but that doesn’t mean you have to start some crusade about fighting the good fight against racism unless of course your all for no freedom of speech because regardless of how you look at it it is there opinion to hold.