Not sure if you heard, but Harry Connick Jr. had to check some Australians about a blackface routine. The video’s right here.

First, who knew Harry was the fifth Hot Boy?
(Well, I knew, but still…)
Second, points for having the heart to take the needle off the record. Most people won’t. I know I’ve let lots of things slide in situations like that, just to keep the party going. Nothing like that, mind you, but let’s not pretend as if it didn’t take serious nerve to assert himself there.
Here’s where he got me to thinking.
“I just want to say, on behalf of my country, I know it was done humorously, but we’ve spent so much time trying to not make black people look like buffoons, that when we see something like that we take it really to heart.”
Now, there’s some hyperbole in this. There’s still lots of money in making black people look like buffoons. The trick now is to find real-live buffoons to do the job. They can do it better than actors, anyway.
He’s right about one thing, though — that nonsense would NOT fly here. Maybe the response would be disingenuous, but the American public, generally, wouldn’t let that slide. Some folks would be OK with it, lots would think it’s funny…but someone would get fired and/or beat down behind that.
I’m one of those people that doesn’t have much patience for people that defend America’s current state of racial affairs by saying things are better than other times and places — as if that’s got a gotdamn thing with here and now. I can, however, say there was truth in what Connick said.
And that does say some good things for America. Doesn’t matter if people want to act right. Just matters if they do. And, at least when it comes to putting shoe polish on your face to look like Tito, we have some things right.
For better or worse, there’s something to that.