You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!

[essentialsaltes]

Some real-life racebending(*) from Arizona. (more linkage at pharyngula) It's truly flabbergasting. Here's a summary:

City mural is painted on school, and "features portraits of four children, with a Hispanic boy as the dominant figure."

Quoth the mural director: "We consistently, for two months, had people shouting racial slander from their cars," Wall said. "We had children painting with us, and here come these yells of (epithet for Blacks) and (epithet for Hispanics)."

"school Principal Jeff Lane pressed him to make the children's faces appear happier and brighter."

Happier and brighter.
Happier and brighter.

As far as I can tell, this means lighter, because they weren't asked to alter the contours of the face.

"City Councilman Steve Blair ... mistakenly complained that the most prominent child in the painting is African-American, saying: "To depict the biggest picture on the building as a Black person, I would have to ask the question: Why?"

Added rage-inducing detail. The children's images on the mural were drawn from photographs of students at the school. Sorry, son, you're not happy and bright enough for our school.

Comments

[ian-tiberius.livejournal.com]

That school is barely a mile from where a bunch of my relatives live - my cousins went to the high school two blocks away. I spent large portions of my summers in Prescott throughout my childhood, and I can attest that a whiter community you have rarely seen. Prescott is something of a retirement community, and a "white flight" destination for Arizonans and Californians alike (the prejudice *I* used to constantly hear about there was towards "all these damn Californians moving here.") So while what happened is both appalling and disappointing, I can't say I'm stunned that this is where it happened.

Also, the local paper has more detail: http://www.prescottaz.com/main.asp?SectionID=1&SubsectionID=1086&ArticleID=81753

including an additional quote from City Councilman Steve Blair, who appears to be the person driving the change:

On Wednesday, Blair again emphasized that "I'm not a racist by any stretch of the imagination, but whenever people start talking about diversity, it's a word I can't stand."

[edgyspice.livejournal.com]

Ew.

[neverjaunty.livejournal.com]

Yes, Mr. Blair, you are a fucking racist. Please die in a fire.

[freudinshade.livejournal.com]

It'll take an act of the voters to remove him as a City Councilman, but apparently he got fired from his radio show over his comments. At least it's a start.

[rsheslin.livejournal.com]

Have you seen Roger Ebert's take on it?

How do they get that way?

[essentialsaltes.livejournal.com]

Impressive. thanks for sharing that.