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Friday, October 22, 2010

Is Life Always BLACK or WHITE?

The world is rich with differences to acknowledge and celebrate. I get it. But sometimes the conversation crosses the line and hits a nerve. Remember Imus and the uproar he caused when he referred to a mostly black women’s basketball team as “nappy-headed hos”? This week I was equally disturbed when Phaedra on the Real Housewives of Atlanta said this about her husband:

"Apollo does not like very elaborate dishes, and I am a connoisseur of finer foods. You know, growing up in a white household, he's not used to all this fancy stuff. He likes canned foods. He likes packed meats. He just doesn't care. But it's very important for me to feed people the way I like to be fed, which is the best of the best."
Excuse me? I can't tell you how low my jaw dropped or how many times I backed up the DVR to get the exact quote. Granted, my childhood experience included hot dogs, fish sticks, and canned vegetables, but I know plenty of 'white households' who care about what they eat, including my own. We garden, shop at farmer's markets and whole food stores, and cook some (not everything) from scratch. We're not all popping open cans of Vienna sausages and Spam.

Phaedra is quick to point out her husband's "white collar crime" and that he wasn't incarcerated for some gang-associated drive-by. So why not show Apollo's "white household" some respect. She might be a proper, Southern, larger-than-life lawyer, but Apollo can't be that bad if he was marriage and father material.

To be fair, Phaedra clarified her statements on her blog.

But she must have believed them in order to say them in the first place.
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