Not the Worst Thing I Have Done, But Close

I must admit that I have not always been the beacon of special needs advocacy that you now know and love.  True I have always had a soft spot for those with special needs.  I have also always respected those that struggle alongside the special needs population so it should come as no surprise that I fell in love with my wife and shortly there after with fatherhood and parenting a child with special needs.

But as I previously mentioned, these skills needed to be honed.  In my defense, my heart was in the right place, even if my head was lodged squarely in my ass.

Enter Prince.

Not that one

I have roughly 15 years of food service experience.  In that time I can tell you that there are several types of individuals that seem to gravitate to different fields of the food service industry.  Those that are very personable and organized, (and occasionally gay) seem to become servers.  Individuals that have criminal records tend to work in the kitchen.  Psychopaths tend toward management.  Prince was a dishwasher.

Dishwashers are usually one or several of the following; alcoholic, special needs, teenagers, migrant workers.

Prince is an African American gentleman from Louisiana.  He has a thick accent, a fairly oddly shaped head, and worked as a dishwasher.  Prince and his brother Kenny both worked with me at a restaurant which will remain unnamed.  For months I worked with Prince but had minimal interaction with him as I was a server and we usually worked different shifts.  When I did talk to Prince he would talk about going to school.  I assumed this was a special needs school where he would work on life skills.

One day Prince came to work directly from school. Prince was wearing hospital scrubs.  It slowly began to dawn on me that if an individual with special needs works in a hospital it is not usually a position in which scrubs are necessary.  A terrible terrible feeling began to creep over me as I turned to Prince's brother (who did not have a criminal history to my knowledge) and asked, "Kenny, does your brother have a learning disability or something?" (Kenny's accent was also not nearly as thick as his brothers.)
"No? Why?"
"No reason."
I had assumed that due to Prince's oddly shaped noggin, slow manner of speech, and employment as a dishwasher, he was an individual with special needs. The following is a list of things that I ACTUALLY SAID to Prince.
"Great job busing that table buddy!"
"You mopped that floor all by yourself!"
"Wow! You carried 1,2,3,4 glasses and didn't spill a drop!"

 The horror of my situation must have been evident on my face as I uttered the words, "My god I gave him all those hugs."

Kenny (again, who does not have a criminal record) must have pieced together what I was going through and laughed the laugh that only a black guy can laugh at a white guys discomfort as I sputtered my poorly thought out reasoning for believing his brother had special needs.  Even more terrifying was the thought that Prince may have believed that I spoke to him in the manner that I did because I was racist and placating him.

Now if you can tell me how to explain to someone that you spoke to them as if they were a child, not because you are a racist, but because you thought that they were an individual with special needs, then I sir or madam will eat my hat.  Because that is a situation that is fucking impossible to navigate gracefully.

Thankfully shortly after this Prince moved on to another place of employment.  Probably one with less racist white people that treated him like a simpleton.  I don't know if Kenny (again, not a convicted felon), ever explained to his brother that I was not intentionally being an a-hole.  But that I was only accidentally being an a-hole.

The moral of the story dear reader is this; much in the way that you should never assume a woman that looks pregnant is pregnant, never assume a person has special needs until they tell you specifically that they have special needs.  Unless they are blind of course in which case you probably should err on the side of blind and not toss them anything.

In conclusion I would like to apologize to black people, those with special needs, my family, and anyone I may have inappropriately hugged.

L&P

Racism from Beyond the Grave

I am a fan of zombie movies.  I was a late comer to the genre having been "bitten" by the zombie bug while watching the remake of Dawn of the Dead.  Since then I have enjoyed both of Max Brook's books on the impending zombie apocalypse and several movies of the same flavor.
Fan of the genre is putting it mildly, I have developed a martial art style with the sole intention of fighting the undead.  I also developed a power point presentation and held a seminar.  No shit.

I started reading the graphic novel series the Walking Dead several months before I heard that it was to be adapted for television.  Though there are many differences between the two story arcs, I have enjoyed both.
If you have been meaning to start watching the series I'm going to warn you now that there are spoilers in this post.

One of the reasons that I am fascinated by the zombie genre is that I like seeing individuals work together that would otherwise have nothing to do with one another.  Call me sentimental but when I see strangers unified for the greater good I feel that it is a glimpse into the best parts of humanity.  Like when an entire theater of people collectively yell "Shush!" at the one dickhead that didn't mute his cell phone during the movie.

Being that I am a psychology enthusiast one of the things that I find most interesting about zombie movies is the backgrounds of the characters in the survivor group and how they interact with one another.  The relationships and their interplay can be an interesting insight into the mind of the writers.  For instance, if Hitler had written Starwars, it's a good chance that the main bad guy would have been name Emperor Cohen.

Wait... is that a yamaka?

   As a writer, you want the audience to connect with your characters.  One of the ways that a writer may accomplish this is to ensure that the reader, or viewer, sees elements of themselves in the heroes so that on a subconscious level, it is easier to identify with them.  Ideally you want broad enough appeal among your characters so that you can sell your product.  If all of your survivors were of middle eastern decent and worked as interns at a toothpaste factory, then you would really sow up that middle eastern toothpaste worker demographic.  But you may find difficulty in other markets.  

Now to my point.  There is a running stereotype in horror movies that there is always a black male character.  This character is typically amongst the first of the casualties.  To it's credit, the zombie genre has done a good job of steering clear of this featuring African Americans in many lead and positive supporting roles.  For instance the original Night of the Living Dead featured an African American in the lead role and he was a bad ass.

Undead huh? I got this shit.

That is why, when I began watching and reading the Walking Dead series I was not surprised to see an African American in the cast, but disappointed to see that he seemed to be filling the role as the, "token" black guy.  This is nothing against the actor IronE Singleton.  He did a damn fine job despite having been born with a silly name.
The following is a series of excerpts from the personal journal of Mr. Singleton that I was nice enough to write for him beginning with the day he was cast in the role.

 Day 1:  Dear Journal, I got the part! I'm a little bothered about the fact that they named the character T-Dog though.  I mean seriously, could they come up with a more racist name for my character? They might as well have named him Black Guy.  Oh well, still excited for the opportunity.

Day 30: Well we've been shooting for a while now, I'm feeling pretty confident that my character will stick around for a bit, no other black actors in sight!  As a matter of fact, there is only one other minority, an Asian guy.  Kind of surprised they didn't make him a ninja with all the racial sensitivity they've treated my character with.   Oh well, nice to have a steady pay check for a while.

Day 60: We just wrapped up season two and I haven't seen the last episode but I'm pretty sure I'm still the last black person on the planet.  Not sure how to feel about that.

Day 61: Shit, well that was a curve ball, apparently there is another black person but she's miles away from me and get this, SHE'S A NINJA!!!  If I was the Asian guy I'd be a little pissed.

Day 75: Well, still no other black actors, but the script says that we just found a prison.  I am worried about where this is headed.

Day 80: OK, for almost three whole episodes there was me and two other black guys.  One of them died.  Still stay'n strong!

Day 85: I'm a little concerned with the frequency and gusto with which the writers are eliminating the other minority characters.  There were five guys in the prison, three black guys, a hispanic(ish) guy, and a white dude.  Guess whose still alive?  Me, one of the black guys, and the cracker.  Me and the other black guy are a little nervous.

Day 90: Shit! I KNEW it wouldn't last!  Another black dude shows up and sure enough, I get bit and die!  Fuck this, I'm calling Tyler Perry.

In case I am not painting a clear picture.  I'm a little bothered that Walking Dead didn't keep T-Dog around.  Yes I like that the show is not afraid to kill off main characters because it keeps the viewers on their toes.  I like that it stays close to the source material.  I think I am just a little disappointed that, in our day and age, the writers still feel like we the audience might feel uncomfortable with more than one black male in the surviving group.  Especially T-Dog... he was one of the good ones!