Judging Bill O'Reilly: Why His Comments About Lunch in Harlem Matter

The worst thing about trying to talk honestly and incisively about race in America is dealing with the demagogues.

And there are few folks in modern media -- besides, perhaps fellow red state pundit Rush Limbaugh -- who push buttons on race more effectively from the conservative side than Fox News' Bill O'Reilly.

I've written before about the ways in which O'Reilly couches racially insulting ideas -- treating gangsta rap culture like the primary voice of black America and then blaming a host of ills affecting black people on that cartoonish caricature.

Now, after an attempt at rapprochement with civil rights advocate Al Sharpton, O'Reilly has stepped in it again, this time by marveling at how he had dinner with Sharpton at a Harlem restaurant and people were civil to him; no cursing, crotch grabbing or ugly behavior in sight.

Here's the quote, fresh from the admittedly liberal media watch Web site, Media Matters: "(O'Reilly) reported that he "had a great time, and all the people up there are tremendously respectful," adding: "I couldn't get over the fact that there was no difference between Sylvia's restaurant and any other restaurant in New York City. I mean, it was exactly the same, even though it's run by blacks, primarily black patronship." Later, during a discussion with National Public Radio senior correspondent and Fox News contributor Juan Williams about the effect of rap on culture, O'Reilly asserted: "There wasn't one person in Sylvia's who was screaming, 'M-Fer, I want more iced tea.' You know, I mean, everybody was -- it was like going into an Italian restaurant in an all-white suburb in the sense of people were sitting there, and they were ordering and having fun. And there wasn't any kind of craziness at all."

For background, here's my first column, written in 2002, about how O'Reilly uses racially charged language about gangsta rappers to scare his presumably white viewership and press his points. Here's my second column about O'Reilly's racist rhetorical tricks, employed this time to criticize those stuck in New Orleans during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Here's his response to the Katrina column -- a typically personal attack in which he cites his radio comments, not the TV appearance I criticized.

I think these comments are typical of O'Reilly's technique. Too smart to personally use an epithet in the way Don Imus finally did, he instead turns rap culture into a straw man used to represent all or most of black America. Then, he's free to tee off on the stereotypical excesses of THAT culture, rather than talk about real, live black people with all their contradictions intact.

In O'Reilly's world, black people were either vocal protesters like Sharpton and Jesse Jackson, or straight-up thugs like N.W.A. After his trip to Sylvia's, O'Reilly seems amazed to meet black folks who don't fit his disconnected stereotype of what we are.

The most disappointing turn for me in this media meltdown was watching a discussion on the issue this morning on The Today Show. Anchor Matt Lauer, clearly unsympathetic to critics, kept pressing the point that O'Reilly was trying to be complimentary, if by using "ham-fisted" language.

But when it comes to dialogues on race, I judge people's intent and meaning by their history. And O'Reilly has never been one to seek understanding with an open mind. To this black American, his words felt like the most backhanded compliment I'd heard from a celebrity in many years -- a congratulation to black people for having, finally, the ability to act like we have some sense.

News flash, Bill: black people have been conducting themselves this way for many, many years. I'm just sorry that it took a lunch with Al Sharpton for you to finally realize it.

Follow Eric Deggans on Twitter: www.twitter.com/Deggans

Comments

[Chadama]

What O'Reilly is really saying is; The black people he saw acted like white people! -- and for him, that's a good thing. Why do we waste time with these kinds of comments? We should not care what O'Reilly or any other person like him thinks of us. We pay taxes, die fighting our nations Wars and vote -- people like O'Reilly will never believe we are their equal and getting into a snit over their stupidities seems to me a waste of time -- we need to stop legitimizing him with our attention. He's smart enough not to say what Imus said -- and I say count that as a blessing. We have made it clear that we will not tolerate the Imus style of comment anymore, what I believe we should do is ignore the O'Reilly's -- don't watch their TV shows, don't listen to their radio shows -- let's try to reduce their income by not buying products they promote, but I think we should not waste anymore time giving him another platform -- one that he will obviously use to argue -- how terrible it is that anyone would think his remarks were racist!

[Blackacre]

Here we go again. I see people are trying to make this story about negative parts of Black culture to excuse racist statements, just they did with Imus. The only question in Bill's case is why did he think Sylvia's was anything but a civilized restaurant?

[Yukon Jack]

As an innocent Canadian, I had no idea about racism, until I crossed th border at Buffalo, NY.

I entered the first restaurant I came across. Granted, I was served, but I NEVER felt so threatened in my life.

My guilt? I was white.

So, if anyone tells you that you are not treated differently in a restaurant because of the color of your skin, you can safely that person that he/she is full of boloney.

Blaming O'Reilley for stating the obvious is nothing less than the expression of artificial indignation of racism and phoney condemnation of something that you are more guilty of than O'Reilley.

[fuzzwald]

Maybe you could tell us WHY you felt so threatened?

[Yukon Jack]

Would you feel threatened if twenty eyes of ten people in the establishment were on you, non-stop, while you were trying to hurriedly gobble up the expensive food you ordered?

[glesslib]

If that happened to you in Buffalo, I am sorry.
It could probably happen to you in a lot of cities in this country. But, for God's sake, O'Reilly is in New York City, the melting pot of the world. I've been there tons of times, and I can tell you that a guy who works there every day of his life and is still surprised that black people are civilized in Harlem really needs to get out more.

Either that, or he really is making some sort of (nod, nod, wink, wink) statement for the good ole boys who still watch O'Reilly Factor and consider this fellow to be someone whose opinion actually counts. Good Luck to them and to poor picked upon Bill.

[doodlefarbe]

Yukon Jack writes, "As an innocent Canadian, I had no idea about racism, until I crossed th border at Buffalo, NY.... NEVER felt so threatened ...My guilt? I was white."


No Dude, you got it all wrong.

They were just watching you and waiting with bated breath for you to do something... "so polite", like all them other innocent Canucks we've heard about.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

Yukon Jack wrote: "As an innocent Canadian, I had no idea about racism, until I crossed the border at Buffalo, NY."

As someone from the States, I can tell you, please be careful. We have a diverse country, and you can easily find White Racism, Black Racism, Yellow Racism, and even Red Racism. Some of these people are very dangerous and are more than just mean looking.

I can also tell you we have some people who are totally indifferent to color. Some would be willing to rob you or otherwise make you a victim regardless of whether you are white, black, etc.

On the other hand, we also have some good people. More than a few of them envy Canadians, such as yourself, who can live under the rule of law in a peaceful country.

[myearth]

I am sure that black culture is not perfect, nor is white culture. And yes, it is easy to condemn the music and the violence it encourages. But the real point is that Bill O'Reilly seems to believe that all blacks in the U.S. are alike. That is a clear indicator of racial prejudice as they are obviously NOT all alike. How he could possibly miss this fact? Looking just at the last week, I saw plenty of evidence that this is not true. For example, there were black people in my shop, and they behaved just like the whites, Hispanics, etc. And I had a colonoscopy on Friday and it was done by a black doctor. How can you live in this country and not see black people living their lives in a positive way. Should I have been surprised that the doctor wasn't speaking in rap to me? I am a woman and I am an engineer. O'Reilly is just like so many people I have met over the years. Because of their stereotypes about women, they act as surprised as if a dog has talked. The difference is that these dolts are not on TV promoting their prejudice against blacks, women, etc.

[RobinLandseadel]

I guess I've got some kind of bizarre POV. I'm white [more or less, just like practically everybody else is], my parents were deep into the civil rights movement, both subsequently married black, and I know what a soul food restaurant is like, Grandma Johnson had one right in the heart of South Central with a giant Louisana hot-link painted on the wall. So I'm not in some sort of state of shock when I encounter a person of the coloured persuasion who erudition exceeds mine. An uncle-in-law taught physics at USC, an aunt performed Balinese dance. Ishmael Reed used to teach part of his UC Berkeley writing course in the window seats of the CD/Coffee shop I used to work at. Billo is such a cracker. . . .

[sparafucilli]

O'Rielly's first concern is his bank account and to fill that he has to placate and cater to his base. Period. It's mostly marketing. Meanwhile he's handy to have around since it stimulates controversy. It would be a dull world if all you heard are opinions that reflect your own.

[cowsandsheep]

You Guys give Bill far too much credit,

Hell he didn’t come up with that style of speaking. What did Ken Melman Apologize for? I'll tell you "Language". Thats what the southern strategy was about? "Language". What is Rush a master of "Language" and I can go on with other masters of hate language on our airways but why?

[Ben Dixon]

Yes Bill O'Rielly did toss around some ugly sterotypes of black people. Unfortunitaly though all sterotypes do have a grain of truth in them.

[Robert59]

I previously worked what some call second shift (1600-2359). We ate dinner together 3 to 4 nights a week. Over half of my coworkers are black. Not once have I ever heard them preface a sentence with Mother-----, pass this or hand me that.

As a matter of fact we have a problem with an employee who is foul mouthed and angry. He is white.

O'Reilly is a racist, plain and simple. Listen to him rant and rave about illegals. What he really dislikes are the fact so many of them are brown and so many of them are from Mexico.

[realpolitic]

O'Reilly often rails against declining cultural norms. Did anyone read his one attempt at a novel? I don't recall the title and just as well. It was something about a journalist who kills those around him who have been holding him back professionally. It was nothing more than soft porn and poorly written soft porn at that.

[LiarLiarIraqsOnFire]

I'm sure it was on literary par with Lynn Cheney's sapphic novel, and I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libbey's loving homage to child prostitution and beastiality.

Got Loofah?

[oogabooga]

Instead of taking shots at buffoons like O'Reilly and Imus, how about black leaders start urging the youth to turn their backs on the mindless violence celebrated in the rap music? Young men are being cut down on the streets every day because of the stupid macho posturing and the "dissing" nonsense. Bill Cosby tried to point this out. But the black "leaders" derided him personally as hating black people and turning his back on black culture. Since when is violence the "black culture?" Stop defending the indefensible, encourage the youth, change the message to positive and guide the youth properly to success, and you'll see THEM turn their backs on the violent macho culture quickly.

[politrix]

It's easy to blame rap, but it's like blaming videogames or movies. Only the highly suspectible people would act on something they learned from music, videos, games, etc... There are legitimate problems in most ghetto's, like majority of the households being single parent only. Majority of adult men being incarcerated. Lack of employment and rampant poverty. Then kids living with the effects, like violence and crime, which feeds into their worldview as they grow up. It's easy to see how this ends up into an out of control cycle, how children growing up in this environment could see no way out and no future for themselves.

Then to blame rap music for such community's problems seems rather naive, right?

I want to clarify that I'm not talking about black culture, but ghetto's here. I have to make that point clear since the two are so often confused with each other, like you just did. Middle class kids listening to rap music in their dad's BMWs never seemed to be a big issue anyways.

[Wilson33]

Amen!

[Eric Deggans - Huffpost Blogger]

Wilson, I grew up in Gary, Indiana, the murder capital per capita of the U.S. three years running in the 1990s. By the time I was 13, I had seen two people shot -- one, my best friend's brother, was killed by the police in a righteous shooting at the end of my block.

And in my life, there have always been knuckleheads who embody the worst in black culture, and people striving for the best.

If you see all or even most of black culture, when you look at people who embody the worst, then let me respectfully suggest that is your problem. And you need to expand where you're looking...

[Wilson33]

I am not stupid enough to think that this is how all black people are or even most, but a big enough number is like this and it is, not slowly, but quickly seeping into how they talk, walk, dress, think, act, etc.

Look, I am big brother to two black teenagers (16)and I ask them straight up what they deal with on a daily basis. They tell me that they have no where to turn to in a lot of instances because most kids around them are drop out drug dealers with no future and no hope. And one of them will not even listen to rap because HE KNOWS how uninspiring and hopeless the music is. His brother has not realized it unfortunately.

Where is the black leadership? Where is the outrage?

[mrcontinental]

There is no such animal as black leadership.

[akoop]

The spin is in the given not the comment. As Mr. Deggans aptly points out, the focus is directed to the false premise not the reality.

In BO's remarks, the (false)premise is that Sylvia's is either an aberration from or a reflection of the 'norm'. I have never been to Sylvia's, in fact I've never heard of Sylvia's prior to BO's inadvertent advertising.

BO remarked about 'soul food' and related how he enjoyed the coconut prawns in close reference. I'm not an expert on 'soul food' but I was suprised to learn that coconut prawns could be expected on the menu of a 'soul food' restaurant.

It sounds as if Sylvia's is a quality dining establishment and would be so regardless of the predominent clientele.

BO's suprise that he liked 'soul food' and that a number of black people could actually congregate in close proximaty without breaking into a rap music session or a constant flow of vulgarity reveals more about BO's limited exposure to reality than his knowledge of culinary art or social behavior.

Prehaps Sylvia's will experience an expanded clientele base now that BO has deemed it an acceptable enviroment.

[realpolitic]

O'Reilly has been living well off of dividing people for years. He blames the poor for Hurricane Katrina and blames many blacks for growing up in poverty. When confronted with his own words, he goes on the offensive blaming the "loony left" or he plays the I've-been-­taken-out-­of-context card, as he did here. If O'Reilly's crazy rantings are out-of-context, I would hate to see them in context. He is almost funny, if not so very, very scary. He has squirmed out of other controversies, and with his combination of hate and vitriol, will squirm out of this one.

[jungpatawan]

Billo: the hard bigotry of low introspection.

JP

[oldpotsmuggler]

I suppose if BO met, say, a college professor who was black he would be crazy ecstatic and gushing about how much like a real college professor he seemed. And make it a woman and he might just stand there and pee his pants in awe.

The dude is so impressed with how intelligent and humorous he is (though, to his credit, less so than Limbaugh) that he has lost the ability to consider that his own is simply one of numerous view points. He doesn't comment or discuss, in his own mind he is entitled to command reality. "Life shall be as it is, and it is because I say it is."

What ever that particular personality defect is I sure wish that we didn't have a President that shares it!