Michael Richards – Back in the day, people were not allowed to bring recording devices into a live performance. The performer had rights to his / her material not being distributed without compensation. Evidently, those days are gone as evidenced by the YouTube video of Michael Richards going off on some hecklers at the comedy club where he was performing.

Had that been the case here, we would probably never have heard of the incident where Richards went off on a rant calling the hecklers nigger and acting stupid on stage. As it happened though, someone video taped the incident, decided they were offended by what was said, and tried to get some money out of the situation (if not money, at least some notoriety).

Was Michael showing good sense in going off on the hecklers? Certainly not. Was it his right to go off on them? It certainly was. Who was hurt by the incident? Michael Richards. He is the only one who was damaged in the least by his words. Were the hecklers hurt? No, they were trying to goad Michael into acting stupid, evidently they were not enjoying his comedy routine, understandable, but does that give them the right to ruin everyone else’s evening by shouting him down? I personally don’t think so, but hecklers have been a part of stand-up since its inception, so maybe my opinion doesn’t carry much weight on this topic.

What about the person who video taped the incident? If they were offended, it was their own fault as comedy clubs are a place to expect rude humor and offensive language. They were actually harming Richards by taping the incident. We also have to wonder how much of his act they were taping, were they trying to make money off of his routine by selling bootleg copies of the performance? We will never know the answer to that question, but before throwing Richards under the bus, it is something to consider.

Personally, I don’t think that Michael Richards’ type of comedy translates to stand-up well, but that is not for me to say. I do feel that he has been turned into a pariah unfairly by people who weren’t even there.

Somehow we managed to go from Michael Richards to Don Imus without batting an eye. Don never even uttered the notorious “N word” in his remarks about the Rutger’s girls basketball team. Don Imus did what he was paid for, and very handsomely at that. He pushed the edge of the envelope.

Evidently, the envelope he pushed that morning was on the desk of the self appointed spokesman for blacks everywhere, Al Sharpdon. Al got his posse on the case and managed to bring enough political correct pressure to bear to cause NBC to fire Imus, without cause.

Imus had a contract that required him, as a condition of employment to push the edge and be controversial, but pressure from some self-righteous bigot got him fired. Here again, I personally don’t care too much for Don Imus, I don’t care for the edgy humor, but the man has a Constitutional Right to do it so long as he has a platform and a desire to use it.

People like Al Sharpdon want to call what Richards and Imus said “hate speech,” and want it prohibited. When we start shredding the Constitution and censoring free speech, Al Sharpdon and his ilk need to beware. His speech is as hateful or more so than anything Richards uttered, and much more hateful than what Imus said.

I guess if you haven’t figured it out yet, I’ll tell you, I’m a conservative. Yep, that’s right, one of those gun totin‘, hate mongers that you hear about on the news. I’m not as far right as some, but far enough to annoy some liberals.

There are a lot of things that bother me about the direction our nation seems to be heading, and it seems that a lot of it stems from this idea of political correctness. As I said in a previous post, we used to have free speech in this country. That speech has been eroded over the years and the rate seems to be accelerating.

Growing up, we learned hymns in church. Hymns like Alas and did my Saviour Bleed, with the verbiage that the writer put in, “Would He devote that sacred head, for such a worm as I.” Words that empathized the vast difference between a Holy God, and sinful man. Check it out now, in a new edition of the hymnal, I assume most any denomination will have the same changes, but now, instead of ‘worm’, it reads ’sinner’. A huge difference? Maybe not, but neither is the difference noticeable when the Colorado river runs it’s normal course through the Grand Canyon, but the canyon itself is evidence of the changes wrought.

We have to apologize and qualify ourselves anytime we use a derogatory word, even if we are trying to chasten someone for using them. We just don’t seem to get it, the words are not bad, they are scratches on paper, dots on a screen, there is nothing inherently wrong with any word. Actions, on the other hand can be very wrong, and we have laws to protect us from the wrong actions of others. We cannot legislate morality, thoughts, or words. Certainly we can legislate actions, that is why you cannot yell ‘fire!’ in a crowded theatre, we also have laws to prevent someone from inciting a riot. In the case of inciting a riot, there has to be intent in order for there to be a crime.

I am amazed when I see a movie on television where the word ‘nigger’ is bleeped out. It wasn’t used out of context, it was used in the way people hear it used everyday on the street, but to be politically correct, it is cut out, even when it is a major plot point. One scene comes immediately to mind from one of the Die Hard movies where our hero, John McCain is taken to Harlem and dropped off wearing nothing but a sandwich board which says “I hate niggers.” The words on the sandwich board were digitally blurred to blot them out.

If it is that offensive, just don’t show the movie for Pete’s sake! The writer and director put that in the movie for a purpose and now they are being censored. I am surprised that they let that pass without a fight. Ooops, I forgot, don’t step on anyone’s toes, don’t be a hate monger. Are we about to start taking words out of the dictionary to keep them from offending someone? That is the next step.

It has become a sorry state of affairs when a candidate for the highest office in the land and arguably the world wears his feelings on his sleeves and people in the media tip-toe around him to ensure they don’t hurt his delicate sensibilities.

It is not acceptable to call him by the name his parents gave him because it might have a negative connotation and turn off some potential voters. The main stream media are tripping all over themselves to accommodate his wishes. Anyone who doesn’t follow his wishes in this area is considered to be a hate monger or a racist.

Yesterday, Barack had to come down on his preacher, Jeremiah Wright. I don’t know about anyone else but I wasn’t blown away with his speech. I really didn’t like the way he dissed the founders for not stopping slavery, but that is another issue. He also didn’t distance himself from what Wright was saying, only that he now knew that these things were being said and he didn’t agree with them. That begs the question of why did he stay in this church if the values being espoused were so wrong in his opinion. Why did he not stand up to challenge the pastor’s rhetoric? I just don’t buy it.

I remember a time before the Speech Police were formed. A time when a person could say anything they wanted, just about anywhere they wanted. Oh sure, you couldn’t yell Fire! in a movie theater, but this was also back in the day when common sense was a lot more common than it is now.

Back in the day, you could call someone a nigger, spic, wop, kike, cracker, faggot, or queer. Really anything you wanted to call them. You might get the bat crap beat out of you, but it was still your choice. You also had the choice to avoid situations where you were apt to be called a name that you didn’t like. It wasn’t always possible, but for the most part you could manage it.

People used to have enough sense to not go somewhere that would create a confrontation, or at least know that if they did, they might be offended. That’s not to say it is right to call people names, but our nation was founded on the principle that we have the RIGHT to do so if we choose.

Where does the media get off trying to tell me that something is ‘hate speech’ ? Hasn’t anyone read Orwell’s 1984? Americans are being stripped of their right to free speech incrementally and quietly. We blow up at a comedian for screaming nigger at some hecklers, we blacklist him and label him a racist.

We take a shock jock who doesn’t even say one of the previously listed terms above and get him fired from a national network because of his insensitive and racists remarks. This was exactly what his contract required of him, to create controversy. Obviously it hit someone the wrong way.

It is not even considered politically correct these days to call an illegal alien by that term, they must now be termed ‘undocumented workers.’ When will the BS stop and people wake up to the fact that they are losing their very freedom?

Every time there is someone upset about the words of another we all want to jump on the bandwagon with Al Sharpdon and Jesse Jackson to stop this vile racism. If Michael Richards said something to offend someone, let him apologize to them, not the American People at virtual gunpoint by the media and the Justice Brothers.

By the same token, Don Imus may have needed to apologize to the Rutger’s Girls Basketball team, but that is all who needed an apology. Sure it should have been public, after all, the comment was made on the air, but should he have lost his job? I don’t think so.

We have recently had a situation here in Memphis, TN where some people were fired from the community theater for using a hangman’s noose in the backstage area for whatever it is that they use ropes for. An employee, far too young to have ever even witnessed a lynching, was offended by the sight of the noose and complained. It would seem to me that if anything was called for, it would be to call the alleged offenders into the office and suggest they use a different type knot in the future. But instead, they are labeled racists and fired.

I guess by the same token, since I am a white male who lives in the south, I should be able to force Sunshine and Nabisco to change their saltines to read something other than cracker, because I find that term offensive.

Folks, we live in a squirrelly world!