Another Dispatch From Post-Racism America

The election of Barack Obama has meant a lot of things to African-Americans like myself, an upwelling of pride, hope, and joy. It has also meant an increasingly grim realization that we still have a long way to go in race relations in this country as incidents like this one from California prove.

In the past several months Atwater City Councilman Gary Frago has sent at least a half-dozen e-mails to city staff and other prominent community members containing racist jokes aimed at President Barack Obama, his wife and black people in general.

In all, the Sun-Star obtained seven e-mails that Frago sent from October 2008 to February 2009 from an anonymous source.

Some compared Obama to O.J. Simpson while others suggested that "nigger rigs" should now be called "presidential solutions."

Perhaps the most overboard e-mail was sent on Jan. 15. It read: "Breaking News Playboy just offered Sarah Palin $1 million to pose nude in the January issue. Michelle Obama got the same offer from National Geographic."

Frago admitted sending the e-mails, but showed no regret. "If they're from me, then I sent them," he said. "I have no disrespect for the president or anybody, they weren't meant in any bad way or harm."

You sent a joke implying the First Lady of the United States was in fact an animal or a primitive tribeswoman rather than a highly-educated black woman, and you meant no disrespect?

Screw you, asshole. No, seriously. I see that idiotic excuse all the time, "Well I didn't mean any disrespect or anything bad by getting a cheap thrill out of a degrading, tasteless set of racist jokes referring to the President as a 'nigger' among other things and then sent the jokes to all my other friends."

Yeah folks, I know. We've all got that friend who means well, who'll occasionally tell you that racist joke (yes, people will in fact tell a black guy racist jokes on occasion, usually it's one about Asians or Latinos, causing me to say "So, do you tell your Latino friends jokes about me there? Not cool.") or a misogynist joke or a homophobic joke or an anti-religious joke of some sort. We all know a guy like that. He (or she) is not a bad person, they don't think they are a bad person. They just think it's a funny joke. What's the harm in a funny joke?

The harm comes of course when you fail to tell your buddy there that it's not okay.

The list of people who either sent or received the e-mails reads like a who's who of Atwater community and political leadership, including a county supervisor, a former police chief, a city manager, a former city council member, a former president of a veterans group, a former grand knight of the Knights of Columbus, among others.

All the jokes that Frago sent originated from others, the e-mails show. Those who could be identified were Bob Rieger, a retired Atwater city works employee; Michael McIntyre, a Merced resident; and Lee Aldridge, a retired Air Force colonel in Alabama.

Most of the recipients said they do not recall receiving the e-mails and several of the senders either do not remember sending them or claim they were not meant to be harmful.

Still, a few of the senders and a recipient said they saw no harm in any of the jokes sent.

Black community leaders called the e-mails outrageous, revealing that American society has not left behind some of its racist past.

While recent racial barriers have been broken -- such as the election of a black president -- and most outright racial and prejudice is not acceptable in public, local civil rights activists and others believe the e-mails illustrate the racism that lingers behind some doors assumed to be closed in Atwater and America.

And you know, the crazy thing is that people have to be taught racism. If you've ever seen a kindergarten class, you know little kids don't give a damn about race or religion, they just want to finger paint and pet kitties and make a mess in the kitchen and play kickball and hug each other when somebody skins a knee. You have to go out of your way to teach a kid how to dehumanize a particular group of people so that they grow up and treat people different from them like garbage. You have to ingrain that into them. You have to make it okay to laugh at racist jokes and then send those jokes to other people because you want to reinforce the social more that racist jokes are okay.

You have to stay silent and not speak out against things like that for it to spread.

Well, I'm here to tell you that it's not okay. And the reason it's not okay is that nobody deserves to be dehumanized and degraded like that. Nobody. We're all human beings here. It's a wonder we haven't killed ourselves yet, frankly.

But it won't change unless we change. And it starts with you and me.