"bitch" = racial overtones???

The principle of Occam's Razor is very simple: entities should not be multiplied beyond necessity. When analyzing an event, it's a good idea to keep Occam's Razor in mind. Sometimes an outburst is really very simple.

Last week, Dr. Ralph Lupin, a resident of the French Quarter and a member of the Vieux Carre Commission, didn't agree with one of Mayor Ray Nagin's department heads on the subject of trash in Da Quarters:

During a commission meeting last week, Lupin was among several members criticizing Sanitation Director Veronica White's insistence that French Quarter residents must begin putting out their trash in wheeled plastic bins that are designed to be lifted by mechanized arms on new garbage trucks.

"I don't understand Ms. White's obstinance other than that she's a bitch," Lupin said.

The VCC is the body that regulates a number of issues concerning the French Quarter, and the issue of the large plastic garbige bins the city wants Quarter residents to start using for garbage pickup is typical of the sort of thing brought before them. Lupin's perjorative remark in such a public forum has touched off a small tempest, with both Rainbow/PUSH and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference calling for him to step down from the VCC.

Lupin's characterization of Ms. White as a "bitch" was inappropriate for a person in such a public positon, but op/ed writer Jarvis DeBerry of Da Paper is carrying it a step further, saying that Lupin is racist:

Outraged that New Orleans Sanitation Director Veronica White insists on picking up the Quarter's trash her way and convinced that her stance has no logical support, Ralph Lupin, the chairman of the commission, decided that she needed to be put in her place.

DeBerry offers no support for his not-so-subtle use of language here. Let's face it, calling someone a woman a "bitch" is a fairly common insult. In fact, I heard the barista at a local coffee shop mutter it about a customer just after the customer left the shop counter. I'm sure if I go through the blogosphere, I'll encounter it numerous times. What I don't think I'll encounter much of is the use of "bitch" as a racial epithet. DeBerry's logic in arguing that Lupin's remark is racist is also a bit of a stretch:

I'd like to believe that I would have been just as angry if Lupin, a white man, had used that term to describe a white woman he disagreed with or an Asian woman or a Latina. But I can only speculate. The fact is Veronica White is black, and black women with any gumption about them are seriously at risk of having that assertiveness used against them.

This quote says more about DeBerry's bigotry than Lupin's. Let's go back to Occam's Razor for a moment. Two people are having an argument. One doesn't want to compromise or "agree to disagree." He's angry and resorts to a personal insult. Sounds like the comments at more than a few of the blogs I read daily. Was it inappropriate for a public forum? Certainly. But to apply racial overtones to this is way too much of a stretch. Unlike DeBerry, who would rather go on about loud-mouthed black females and some show on VH1, I'm going to offer some support for my position.

For starters, Lupin's record is not one of a racist. He's not only a gynecologist, but he's a Brigadier General in the Louisiana National Guard and worked tirelessly at Da Dome in the aftermath of the storm. A guy who doesn't like the Eebil Coloreds wouldn't have been down there. Additionally, as I've previously mentioned, "bitch" is a common perjorative.

Now, if I were to venture into the realm of speculation, as Mr. DeBerry has done, I might wonder if there was anything Ms. White might have done or said to provoke such an outburst from Dr. Lupin. Consider this thought from DeBerry:

Intentionally or not, Lupin evokes those hurtful and deplorable images when he calls White out of her name. Where does she, a black woman, get the crazy idea that she can maintain a position he abhors? Certainly not from her brain. Why, it's got to come from that store of bitchiness she and her kind are born with.

OK, since DeBerry has dealt a whole hand full of race cards here, I'm going to run with it. Ms. White is black, and Dr. Lupin is not only white, but wealthy and Jewish. If it is in the realm of possibility that Lupin's a racist, it's fair to ask the same question of Ms. White. Perhaps Ms. White has had her full of ne'er-do-wells from Da Quarters. The neighborhood was only marginally impacted by the storm, and the complaints of "his kind" really are minor in the grand scheme of things. Department heads at City Hall are working their butts off, and, let's face it, life with C. Ray is probably not a bed of roses. If Ms. White came to that VCC meeting with a chip on her shoulder, that attitude could have projected throughout the room.

Or, we could simply return to the notion of Occam's Razor and keep it simple: two passionate people disagree and one called the other a name.

Gee, ya think?

In the future, I propose that, if anyone want to insult someone else, they call them an asshole. "Asshole" transcends racial, ethnic, and sexual boundaries.

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