Senator Frank Ruff Compares Obamacare to “Tar Baby” at Chamber Event?

fmruff

Now here’s a conundrum for you.  From the Virginia Pilot:

Appearing Tuesday at a breakfast meeting of the Danville Pittsylvania County Chamber of Commerce, Sen. Frank Ruff, R-Mecklenburg County, spoke against extending the state component of the Affordable Care Act with federal funds.

States have that option under the health care law that is a signature policy achievement of President Barack Obama.

Ruff reputedly compared reliance on promised funds to provide health insurance for thousands of low-income Virginians to a “tar baby.”

Now understandably, some folks in the audience took offense.  The article actually cites an article in The New Republic by one John McWhorter, who is probably the best American linguist alive today next to Noam Chomsky (yes I can hear your groans… but undeniably Chomsky did contribute something to his field, even if he defines the bleeding edge of the left wing in America):

Part of the human propensity for metaphor is that we make semantic associations, which drift and reassign over time. As such, it’s not the most graceful thing to refer to a black figure as a tar baby, and it was quite gracious for Lamborn to apologize. However, to assume Lamborn knew the word was a slur and was passing a grimy little signal to his base is unwarranted here. It is the kind of reflexive and recreational abuse we revile when it comes from the other direction (i.e. Obama as a “racist”).

Tar baby is one of those intermediate cases: The basic meaning is the folkloric one, while a derived meaning, known only to a segment of American English speakers (and to many among them, only vaguely) is a dismissive reference to black people.

There will be gaffes with expressions like these, upon which, in a sociologically enlightened society, apologies will be necessary. However, to insist upon the moral backwardness of the apologist is logically incoherent in reference to this particular term, and as such, less sociologically enlightened than it may seem.

I disagree slightly with McWhorter’s characterization that a socially enlightened society should not insist as a predicate upon the “moral backwardness of the apologist” — in fact, in many instances, this is a good starting point for any conversation, because a great number of people may not realize — for instance — that disrespecting the Eucharist is about as offensive to Catholics as disrespecting the prophet Mohammed.  Or using certain terms such as teague can get you into a fistfight in Ulster pretty quick.

The term “moral backwardness” is far more appropriate than ignorance, for two reasons.  First, morals are taught and are not inherent.  Second, our nature inclines towards appetites: those who agree with our own inclinations, those who share our own backgrounds and interests, etc.  We are all to one degree or another morally backward, and to come out of ourselves and into a better self is an iterative process.

…which is why I have no real problem with what Ruff said.

The reason?  My bar for offense is whether or not offense was intended.  It’s one thing for me to put my shoe on my knee — it’s something else to do it in front of Arab business partners where that is considered akin to scratching your forehead with your middle finger.  Terry Rea, a Richmond Democrat and all around good guy, reminisced on a cartoon he drew on the eve of the 1991 Persian Gulf War regarding the situation in Iraq as akin to a “tar baby” — which clearly outlined a small black child watching the whirlwind approach.  It’s worth reading in its entirety, because heck… Terry is one of the best writers I know:

Back in his studio, rather than waste money, the freelancer tore into the feast he had prepared for a beggar. The food scared, or perhaps offended the cat, who fled.

Between sloppy bites the artist wiped his hands off and sketched furiously to rough out a cartoon of Saddam Hussein as the provocative Tar Baby of the Uncle Remus story, taunting/inviting America into a war.

About an hour later the heartburn started. Eventually, it got brutal.

The writer described the way propaganda works to sell war — every war — as glorious and essential to the everyday people, who risk their lives. That, while the wealthy, who rarely take a genuine risk on anything, urge the patriots on and count their profits.

Thinking of the war in Vietnam that thinned out his generation, he wrote: “After the war the veterans were largely ignored, even scorned.”

The freelancer lamented the popular culture having gone wrong, so there was no longer a place for anti-war protest songs. He wrote, “Where are today’s non-conformists?”

The freelancer turned in his work at 4:50 p.m. An hour later his sour and noisy stomach began to calm down during his second happy hour beer, which a friend bought for him. When he recounted the tale of the stuffed frankfurter and the inspiration of the Buffalo Springfield song, he made his belly ache seem funny to those gathered at the elbow of the marble bar.

Once again, the freelancer had met his deadline.

Was offense desired?  None given, none taken.  That — perhaps — is the social enlightenment that McWhorter is asking us for.

Senator Ruff is a good man who just happened to stumble into a situation created during an unfortunate and ever-lengthening line of truly eyebrow-raising comments by prominent Republicans.  Of course, the Democrats know they are about to lose in a big way this year — so this is a narrative where they have ultimately no choice to play up (especially when some folks fall into the trap almost willingly).  Nevertheless, in the same call for social enlightenment, the discerning line between slur and metaphor?

That line has to be intended, deliberate, willful offense.  I honestly don’t see that here.

UPDATE:  Terry Rea responds:

While it’s a bit disconcerting to see my work used in this way, I can laugh it off. However, I do want to make something clear: When Shaun Kenney writes, “which clearly outlined a small black child watching the whirlwind approach,” that’s his view of the illustration. And, if what was intended by the artist (me) actually matters this time, Kenney missed the mark.

Art-wise, my intention with that 1991 political cartoon was to imitate the familiar 1904 illustration of the Tar-Baby by E.W. Kemble, as it appeared in the famous Uncle Remus folklore story, as written by Joel Chandler Harris. Moreover, it most certainly was not intended to be a depiction of “small black child” watching anything. Anyone who knows the Tar-Baby story should know better. Kemble drew a lump of tar wearing a hat and I followed suit.

The work in question?

032014_terryreatarbaby

As you can see… same metaphor, same implication.  I’ll leave it to the reader to determine whether this is a “lump of tar” or a depiction of a child (which, of course, is what a doll is).

Nevertheless, I found the story fascinating at the time, and certainly don’t import any ill-will on the writer’s intent.  As you can see though, the debate over the use of the term certainly is racially charged, as McWhorter demonstrates.


SHAMELESS PLUG!  If you haven’t read John McWhorter’s “Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue” you should CLICK HERE and buy it now.  Great book!

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