I’m going to ask you a couple questions about the demographics in Gilpin Court. You guess in the comments, and then I will tell the correct answers. If you get win I will mail you one of these two CD’s I got in the mail randomly. No fair if I’ve already told you or if you use the internets. Know this before we start: there are 753 households in Gilpin Court.

• What is the average household income?
• What is the average length of occupancy?
• How many of the households are a minority?
• How many households have married parents?
• How many of the heads of households are female?
• How many households have employment income?

Get to it!

We all know that I love Lee-Jackson day. It is a holiday uniquely Virginian and maybe my second favorite holiday (next to Thanksgiving, duh). Obviously that makes me a raving racist right? RIGHT?

Anyway. For today’s Lee-Jackson day celebration the Sons of Confederate Veterans had a small gathering at Lee Circle with some speechifying and general Robert E. Lee fanboyism. There were a couple of re-enactors, a Robert E. Lee look-a-like, and kids decked out in the Battle Flag of the Confederacy (creepy).

Also joining the celebration was a group of protestors presumably from the Virginia Anti-War Network (watch out, the site’s hosted on tripod.com). Because, you know, Lee was known for his love of war and going to war and such. This woman also decided to come out:

Sooooo true. You know who else was a racist? GEORGE WASHINGTON. He is practically the father of all racists — literally. Like he spawned all future racists from his evil loins. Honestly, I read it on the internet once.

From Wired via ZillaSays:

The actor Damon Wayans has been engaged in a 14-month fight to trademark the term “Nigga” for a clothing line and retail store, a search of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s online database reveals.

I feel like the “is-it-ok-to-say-’nigga’-even-if-you-are-black” controversy has popped up a bunch of times for me lately. The first was the infamous Oprah Crash episode (no homo), which included such hilarious quotes from the audience as:

If I say “yeah I will just jew down the price a little for you” is that racist?

Um yes. Anyway the panel — the actors from the movie Crash — chatted for a bit about calling each other “nigga.” Everyone on the panel was black except Sandra Bullock, who like most white people, kept out of the discussion. Also discussed was the “Nigga vs. Nigger” conundrum. I tell you, it was a good show (no homo).

I think using the word “nigga/er” is a similar situation to flying the Battle flag of Northern Virginia. There are lots of people who fly various Confederate flags as a message of hate and racism. Just like there are a lot of people who use the word “nigger” with hate and racism. But there are people who fly the flag with no bad intentions at all. The problem is there is so much connotation that comes along with that particular flag that what ever it may actually factually mean doesn’t matter any more. To a lot of people it is a symbol of racism no matter what you say or believe.

There is a lot — a lot — of pejorative connotation that comes along with the word “nigger.” So when black people use it out of the pejorative context, with positive/neutral connotations, it confuses white people like me. What compounds the problem is in Richmond (America?) we don’t like to talk about race issues. We don’t even like to acknowledge they exist, how could they it is 2k6!?

I don’t pretend to even have the slightest glimmer of understanding what is like to be black so I don’t know what the answer is. What we need, in general, is a dialogue. Especially in our city.

Technorati Tags: race, Richmond, Virginia