So okay, first the picture....
(There was some debate as to whether I should make this Original size, X-large, or Large. Large won out but the more important question is who was I debating this issue with...)
Now a disclaimer. The disclaimer is very important in this blog. There is a video following this. It is not for the racist, the bigoted, and the generally stupid as hell. If you are any of those three then first off, what the hell are you doing here anyway, the way I talk about people you should have been gone like eons ago. Secondly, if you are offended easily, get over it, it will serve you no purpose in life and certainly not on this blog. Crap, I'm meant to be disclaiming... seriously if you don't know how to take a joke then just close this now, cause I'm about to embed a video that I find quite hilarious and it's the basis for this blog so yeah... I have disclaimed, you have been warned... now those of you that are left, go enjoy the video and I'll see you when you stop laughing... what am I forgetting... oh yeah DO NOT WATCH THIS AT WORK IF YOU DON'T HAVE HEADPHONES! I HAVE OFFICIALLY DISCLAIMED SO YOU CANNOT HOLD ME RESPONSIBLE IF YOU GET FIRED FOR PLAYING THIS!
Have you stopped laughing or should I sit back and wait a few more minutes?
So I ran across this YouTube video totally randomly in 2011 and I was floored. I was laughing so hard I didn't even catch the meaning until the fifth or sixth time of watching. In case you missed it My Favorite Martian is basically saying take all the stereotype you've ever heard of and blow them out your rear end because 90% of them are shit. And it's not just the cultural stereotypes that need to be tossed out it's all of them.
A definition of Stereotypes:
A lot of stereotypes annoy the piss out of me but I'm going to pick a few and see how long this gets. The first Stereotype that pisses me off is the ones about those on food stamps.
Want me to say it? I'm on food stamps. I need government help to feed my family. Am I proud of it? No. Am I going to put on a shirt that says that I get government aid, probably not. As soon as I can get off of it, am I going to march in my social services office and give them their card back? Yes. Does this mean that I am on Welfare? No! Am I ashamed of welfare? No.
People seem to think that all government aid is lumped together in one big ball of nedy lazy people that are taking advantage of your tax dollars. That is not true. That is not false but as a general stereotype it is. There are always, always ALWAYS going to be people everywhere that will be given a hand and take a whole arm. That is not all people. The general stereotypes that I run into if I happen to be unlucky enough to have to sit through a discussion about government aid is that the people who need it are fat lazy good for nothings that would rather draw the benefits than do something with their life. The people on Medicaid are taking the free healthcare and popping out baby after baby after baby so that the people not on it have to pay through the nose for their care to cover other's care. That they're all druggies who can't be trusted. Oh and my favorite, the people who don't need aid can't afford lobster for dinner, but people on food stamps can get it anytime they choose to.
Seriously, don't make me laugh. Starting from the bottom. If I could get lobster on food stamps, don't you think my ass would have learn to love that shit ages ago? I JUST got to try lobster when my mother took us out for Christmas dinner and I'm freaking 34! 90% of stores that accept EBT/SNAP benefits have certain items that you cannot get on food stamps. They don't fly. You have to pay cold hard cash for them and let me tell you most steaks (The good one, t-bone, prime rib, porterhouse, etc), lobster, fresh seafood (the stuff in the seafood case not the prepackaged stuff) and NOTHING from the butchers block counter (The fresh meat they cut for you) can be bought with stamps... at least not in North Carolina. You get tot he register and think we're getting away with that shit and the register tells us nope uh uh, cash please. Hell this afternoon I wasn't able to use my EBT card for some black grapes because that is what they classify a gourmet item. And the thought that the states should restrict what you can buy on stamps, they already have but what most people are calling for is no sugar type stuff. They already have that program. It's called WIC. As for sugary stuff on stamps, let me ask you this... a gallon of apple cider costs what? Four maybe five dollars? Guess what? Kool-aid costs two bucks. And with that small thing of kool-aid we can make drinks for depending on the household up to three weeks. (insert double stereotype that poor folks guzzle kool-aid... I will handle that later.) The government would have to up the food stamp roof to accommodate cutting out sugary stuff. because the healthy stuff costs so much more. That is not an opinion. That is a cold hard fact. Is it a fair fact? No. But it's still a fact.
Next that welfare people are just druggies. Seriously, do I have to debunk that one? I have never tried to get welfare in NC but I tried just after my divorce in New Jersey. They told me I couldn't get welfare because I had kids. I asked then who does get welfare? The woman told me that people with no kids who are trying to get a leg up on life. That is per a reform that took place and went into effect almost ten years ago. And the ones that were already on the old system were being phased into the reform which meant they were going to have to stop being the stereotype that unfortunately some of them created. No more free checks and no more people with a blatant substance abuse problem. And I love the people who post things on Facebook about all government aid recipients need to be tested for drugs before getting their benefits. They tried that in Florida. They spent 26 million dollars that the country technically doesn't have only to come up with one person. Everyone else passed because here's the thing. If you know that you are down on the food chain enough to have to ask for help feeding your kids, you know that it's defeating the purpose if you have a coke habit. It's the ones that don't know just how far down on the food chain that find a way to do drugs and still get aid and somewhere in the back of their heads a little piece of them knows it's not going to last because the government keeps track of everything you buy with that card. At any given time Social services can tell me how much I spent, where I spent it, and depending on the store what I bought. Would I mind doing a piss test if they asked me to? Honestly? No. Because I like the majority know that doing what they don't want you to do is the best way to muck it all up.
Having baby after baby after baby... Again, those of you crying about that have you ever trued to sign up for MedicAid? Ever? More than likely not. The state of New Jersey tells you flat out. We are covering the kids on this application. We are not covering anymore. If you need help for these, then you should be smart enough not to have anymore. No shit that is exactly what my caseworker in NJ told me. In NC they did one better. The application asks if I would be willing to be sterilized and that if I am not it may affect the decision to give me aid. For shits and giggles I told them no I would not be willing to be sterilized. (I had my tubes tied after my youngest daughter because we could barely scrape by with them and I wasn't bringing another into the picture especially when we had a loveless marriage on top of that.) The result was me being called to an itty bitty room and interrogated about my intention to have more children that I couldn't afford and that the government was going to have to support. They tried to go the shame route on me. There was one loophole to this interrogation however. I could have very easily said that religion prevented me from saying yes. There isn't a thing they could do about it then, but instead being the sarcastic ass I am, I started laughing and told the stern faced woman that I wouldn't agree to be sterilized because I had been sterilized years prior. That gave the woman a good pause. To which she actually apologized for the shaming she had tried to give me. So no, you can't get on Medicaid and pop out babies like a pez dispenser. It doesn't work like that.
Fat lazy good for nothings... I'm not even going to try and disabuse people of that one. For every one of us that are on government aid that are trying to do something with their lives there are five more that have simply given up and are content to sit and do nothing. And yes, I said given up. In most cases, they go out and they get the job, but it's minimum wage and it's part time but yet the state will cut benefits like it's a full time job. You can make $150 a week and feel good about yourself and the state will see that you are making money and cut your benefits. Normally this would be okay but if that $150 isn't guaranteed every week, then that cut in benefits stats to gain on you. Say you made 150 week one, 75 week two, 100, week three, and 80 the fourth week. But your benefits were cut $600 because you had a paycheck that said $150. Your pay adds up to $405. You are now $195 short on what you normally have to support your household. The government aid system was not set up to deal with flexible hours and pay. For most families, that missing $195 is an electric bill or maybe their share of the rent. After six months of that you are now down about $1,200. So yeah, I say given up because against odds like that, you really can't win. Months of choosing which bill you are going to pay that month are going to pile up like a tsunami and engulf you so the thought it is, give up go back on full benefits, catch up with bills and not try to get ahead again. Not fat lazy good for nothings. People who have been knocked down so many times they don't know how to get up anymore.
And I will never say another word on Government assistance again. It's not a topic that I discuss often.
Stereotype Number two and this was mentioned with the kool-aid vs healthy drinks line.
African americans drink nothing but kool-aid and eat fried chicken.
Have you ever seen a painting or drawing of a black family gathering? Nine times out of ten the prominent food/drink there is Fried chicken and kool-aid. Because that's what we drink/eat. Yeah, we do. But we drink and eat so much more. Fried chicken goes back to slavery times. And let me tell you. Back then more slave owners ate fried chicken that the average modern african american family. Someone, somewhere put flour on a piece of chicken and threw that bitch in some hot oil and chowed down and it was the greatest meal ever. Chicken farms. Hell unless you were lucky enough to have a dairy farm with a cow for beef and a pig for pork you could always find a chicken. The truth is, chicken is one of the cheapest meats out there. To make my family chicken wings for dinner, do you know how much it costs? About 11-20 bucks and we have left over for days. Bag of wings is 7-9 bucks and the oil is about 2. So depending if I'm making them to eat tonight or to eat for days, I'm still spending less than $25 bucks. Now you get a whole bunch of people together that have the stuff and know how to cook the stuff, you get a lot of fried chicken, you will get potato salad, cornbread, and there is no doubt that you will get about five different desserts. Is this a bad stereotype? No but it's not a totally correct one either. Have you ever heard of a kid drinking city punch? You think that's slang for Kool-aid don't you? Haha no. City Punch is another way of saying water. I actually saw on television one woman talking about all the kids telling her that they drink city punch and she went on and on about how the sugar in their diets was going to cause them to be obese and what not. I think the show that was airing this let her go on and on because either they didn't know what City punch was or they wanted to see just how deep this woman could stick her foot in her moth and down her throat. She was complaining about them getting fat on water. Hmmm...
Seriously the kool-aid and chicken thing is one of my favorite stereotypes. I can't say for why totally but it makes me laugh. And if you come from my family, Hells yeah you're going to get fried chicken , all that other mess I don't eat, and five different desserts and if no one thought to buy a few cases of soda, Hell yeah you're going to find both Kool-aid and Cool-aid. You figure that one out...
Women are bad drivers. Well, you try putting on your make up in those tiny mirrors. Let's see how well you drive! Go on, how bout you shave on your way to work. Go on! See how well you drive?
Blacks are better at sports and dancing. Have you ever noticed that a lot of the dance moves that blacks do look like we're having sex or getting the crap beat out of us or running away? I'm going to let that marinate in your brain. As for sports. It's mostly the ones that we're running in. Football. We catch the ball and twenty guys start running at you. Hell yeah I see a whole bunch of burly guys running at me at top speed, you bet your ass I'm going to run. Baseball. We ain't hitting the ball. We're hitting someone that pissed us off and then we're running because their brother/father/posse is coming after us. Track. WE ARE RUNNING AWAY. Swimming. WE ARE GETTING AWAY. Basketball. I don't know about them but I;m bouncing my ex husbands face into the floor over and over and over again and science tells us that if we drop it from high enough it's going to hit the ground harder usually so yeah I'm going to shove the butthead's face through an itty bitty hoop and slam it on the ground. Y'all really think we thinking about the mechanics of the sport? Ha!! Good one.
I'm spent bloggers. I'm hungry, my dinner is calling my name and since the kids are away, my big ol' tub that takes forty minutes to fill is calling me too so stay Frosty, guys!! Till next time!!
