Triggered by Banana Peel

[Thumpalumpacus]

Bananas in a noose is fairly overt racism, a banana on a tree isn't.
Unless you know something else about the situation you're setting the bar where banana skins in and of themselves can be racist.

That's the thing. There have been several previous incidents where bananas have been used as racial taunts at American universities. These ladies being black students, it's much more likely that they knew of those incidents (and indeed they did, hence their response). One of those incidents saw a banana being placed at the doorstep of a black student's dormitory, another saw a banana thrown at a black student. The noose or writing are at this point not necessary to the race-baiting.

It is the racists who are making banana skins the taunt. Place the blame where it properly belongs, Paul.

[Amarok]

Yup It's been used as a taunt so that's how they treated it. And the circumstances surrounding the perps story does not add up.

[paulpablo]

Bananas in a noose is fairly overt racism, a banana on a tree isn't.
Unless you know something else about the situation you're setting the bar where banana skins in and of themselves can be racist.

That's the thing. There have been several previous incidents where bananas have been used as racial taunts at American universities. These ladies being black students, it's much more likely that they knew of those incidents (and indeed they did, hence their response). One of those incidents saw a banana being placed at the doorstep of a black student's dormitory, another saw a banana thrown at a black student. The noose or writing are at this point not necessary to the race-baiting.

It is the racists who are making banana skins the taunt. Place the blame where it properly belongs, Paul.

Yeh people are using bananas as part of taunting black people. Black people shouldn't have bananas thrown at them, and bananas shouldn't be hung from a tree by a noose with racist writing on, also a banana shouldn't be left outside someone's door as a mock gift for them, but that's as far as it goes.

People shouldn't be afraid of putting a banana skin somewhere where a black person might see it.

In all the other instances you mentioned I see racism. I can see how racism could be brought into question if a peel is left on a tree but just if itself that's not proof of racism.

[Neo-Scholastic]

Every morning on my way to my car I pick up Doritos bags, tea bottles, and those little aluminum cigar bags. And plastic grocery bags. But I refuse t pickup tissues or napkins.

Anyways, the larger point is that obsessions about symbols, ulterior motives and miligning other people's character, to the point that an entire retreat is scuttled because of something that could be a random stupidity or a subtle insidious slur.

There are very real and serious issues that cannot be discussed when people resort to accusations of bigotry such whether or not economic policies reduce opportunities for job seekers or whether some social policies create a permanent underclass or if development projects disproportionately affect minority communities.

I am ignorant of fluid dynamics and multidimensional maths. Apparently I don't know a whole lot about the feeding habits of raccoons. And I really don't know much about how to trap a gorilla. But I do know a lot about the fluidity of symbols, how the shift, how they change with time, context, and accumulated use (Duchamp comes to mind), and how easily they are misinterpreted (like Hindu statuary) or deliberately misinterpreted (like Carrara marble representing "white privelege" or Bronze statues as "blackface"). All these hysterics, and that's exactly what they are, are predicated on the idea that symbols and symbolic acts, when they aren't even clearly symbolic, mean one thing and one thing only and that one interpretion must overrule all others to invalidate the political opinions of those with which they disagree.

[Crossless2.0]

Every morning on my way to my car I pick up Doritos bags, tea bottles, and those little aluminum cigar bags.

You have those, too, huh?

[Thumpalumpacus]

Of course, Chad -- it is only your interpretation of those symbols that is valid, I get it. Snowflake sensitivities being what they are, you're entitled to ignore any other view of the events that happened. Of course. Their responses, their interpretations, are "hysteria".

It's amazing how self-centered a person can be. Dismissive even after you've already been shown the evolution of this particular symbology -- even as someone educated as you seem to be surely would know the history of these particular racist tropes -- and yet you would argue that sometimes a banana is just a banana in this instance? When it is this obviously deliberate, what with the explanation this tissue-thin, what with other recent incidents?

How comfortable you must be, sitting inside the cocoon of your own perceptions, where you need not concern yourself with those pesky other views.

It isn't these students defining the banana as a symbol. It is the racists. As I told Paul, you need to blame the right folks. Right now, you're engaged in victim-blaming.

In all the other instances you mentioned I see racism. I can see how racism could be brought into question if a peel is left on a tree but just if itself that's not proof of racism.

I'm left to assume that you don't understand how humans build associations.

I'm also left to assume that you don't see a weak excuse such as the one the young man proffered as indicative of intent.

Feel free to correct me, but bring something better than "I don't see how this could be offensive," because I already see that about you: you are unable to see past the surface of this story. I want to know why you think it is as shallow as you seem to think. I've already laid out why there's a lot more depth to it than the OP attempted to portray.

[FFaith]

It was shitty for the person to leave the banana in the tree like that if they meant to send a racist message, but cancelling the retreat seems really dumb. What's that going to accomplish? Some people are racist. Duh, but if a banana peel is causing people to feel so mindfucked that they have to cancel events, that's pretty pathetic. Make note of it and move on with your day and enjoy the rest of the retreat. Look at the video footage later and question the person. That's fine, but you can't get him in trouble for anything other than littering I would think because how do you know he was being racist? I think he very well may have been meaning to send a racist message, but I don't think they can be sure enough to really punish him for that.

[Thumpalumpacus]

They could not bring their own vehicles on this retreat. They were out in the middle of nowhere. They were females who had no idea at first who it was that left what was likely a racist message, and as we're all aware, a person was killed in Charlottesville only last month standing up against bigotry.

I personally wouldn't have canceled the event, but under the circumstances outlined above, I might feel differently.

[Neo-Scholastic]

It was shitty for the person to leave the banana in the tree like that if they meant to send a racist message, but cancelling the retreat seems really dumb. What's that going to accomplish? Some people are racist. Duh, but if a banana peel is causing people to feel so mindfucked that they have to cancel events, that's pretty pathetic.

Exactly, this. I'm not arguing whether it was a symbolic contextualization or just random stupidity. Thump and the rest of you are saying that this was a crystal clear racist message and that simply is not true. Anyone who has ever written an email knows that even one written with the best intentions and carefully crafted can still be misconstrued. If this was indeed a message it was even more vague than when Marcel Duchamp put a urinal in an art gallery because Duchamp at least titled the work! I doubt 1 in 10 of you could tell me the meaning of "The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors Even" or the significance of "Ceci n'est pas une pipe" without doing an internet search.

What you didn't know? Jane you ignorant slut, how could you be so oblivious to the subtle nuances of important art symbols from the last century! (and how many of you young readers caught that reference.)

You're all assuming the kid had all this background knowledge about other people's experiences. Maybe he did, maybe he didn't. Before yesterday (when I started this thread) I had never heard about bananas being hung in nooses or heard of a gorilla trap. And you're going so far as to say that now that I have been 'educated' I should acknowledge it as a racist statement. Well, what the fuck. If this banana peel was a symbolic act then it was about as vague and ambiguous as it can possibly be.

You leftists spend half your time calling more conservative people hapless ignorant rubes and the other half of the time saying they are carefully attuned to cleverly disguised 'dogwhistles' and making insidious secret references that only we understand. In reality, you're the ones constantly on the lookout for any hint of racism. And then you accuse us of bigotry because we haven't got a clue what you are talking about. You are no different than people who say certain biological features are obvious signs of intelligent design. Well gee whiz, they looked for subtle signs of design and glory be they found them! Maybe it was never there, dipshits, it just looks to you like design...I mean racism.

[brewer]

It's called sophomoric for a reason.

This was not an action or reaction of adults, or wanna be adults, but children. This whole thing is childish, from banana, to come rescue me, to cancel the event. 

We don't know what happened in the discussions during the rest of the day, but I'm confident that rational calmer heads did not prevail. My guess is an unfounded escalation of fear, tension and hate. There are/were bigger things at stake than an inappropriate placement of a banana peel 

This whole event needs to be thrown into the rubbish heap of racial healing. On both sides.

Including thread also.