newsobserver.com projects - Was the catfish joke racist? - Comments

Re: Was the catfish joke racist?

mountainman — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 17:14:40 -0400

of course its racist, everything has a secret racist meaning if you twist it around enough. This is a joke!!!

Re: Was the catfish joke racist?

ryanteaguebeckwith — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 18:16:30 -0400

To be clear, I wasn't trying to be P.C., just pointing out the historical origins of the term.

And I do listen to rap, though I usually skip the misogynistic stuff. (There's a lot that isn't — you should check out A Tribe Called Quest or De La Soul some time.)

— RTB

Re: Was the catfish joke racist?

tangoz — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 17:52:18 -0400

Ryan

You obviously never listen to rap. The denigration of women and other groups is atrocious and despicable. Just check out Eminem's video and it's anti- woman message attacking Sarah Palin. Where is the outrage there?

Bill O'Reilly calls Helen thomas a Wicked Witch and is pillored by liberal and (liberal) women's groups. Eminem makes the crude type of video he does and there is silence from the left and the drive by media. Hypocrisy.

You should write about the Women's Media Center. That is a classless and hypocritical organization.

Re: Was the catfish joke racist?

cdtew — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 17:34:28 -0400

In re: 2:43's post:

Your post not only demonstrates a lack of your own intelligence, but also of your lack of personal knowledge about the persons who represent the rural districts in this state. On average the educational attainments of rural legislators are no less lofty than their urban counterparts.

Let's admit it -- maybe it is rural vs. urban -- but the fact is both sides try to stiff the others of funding at every turn. Whats worse is the fact that the urban areas of this state tend to believe that they predominate in terms of population and GDP. Only recently did NC's population become majority urban and suburban. Before the last census, the majority of NC's population was exurban and rural non-farm.

What I fear is developing is the mentality in New York City, that whatever is north of White Plains is the desolate, rural "upstate". How shameful. For that fact, I hope the rural politicians continue to gut the cities, because the catfish obviously doesn't have enough sense to avoid the hook.

A mirror

James_Protzman — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 14:47:34 -0400

That should be all that's necessary to get a roomful of legislators laughing.

Re: Was the catfish joke racist?

RonB — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 14:43:14 -0400

The urban areas of this state have been "unharmed, just gutted" by rual representatives like Robin Hayes for decades. Robbing the "Raleigh fat cats" blind to fund pork in their districts while complaining about every dollar spent anywhere else in the state.

North Carolina's government has been held back for decades by these unprofessional, less educated legislators from the more rual parts of the state long enough.

Hopefully the 2010 census will fix this, though there will probably be the usual good ol' boys network trying to gerrymander districts for self preservation at the expense of a representative democracy.

Re: Was the catfish joke racist?

ryanteaguebeckwith — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 14:15:25 -0400

Oh now, don't get me started. Click the links and you can see we pretty definitively proved the origin of the phrase.

I don't think the joke is funny either, for the record. But you would be surprised how little it takes to get a roomful of legislators laughing.

There's some social science research to be done on receptiveness to dumb jokes in the legislative process.

— RTB

Re: Was the catfish joke racist?

Atnor — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 14:02:52 -0400

That's so odd. I've never heard of this, and I've lived here all my life. And I don't see it as racist, or funny, or even marginally humorous, and only by the thinist of margins do I see it as relevant to the legislative procedure you attribute it.

Really? Well, I was born in the mid-70s, so I guess the 50s and 60s NC politics are a bit before my time. :)

Re: Was the catfish joke racist?

FurbishLousewart — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 13:07:41 -0400

I can honestly say I have never heard that joke in my life and it sounds about as racist as it is funny, which is not at all.

Re: Was the catfish joke racist?

Flowerpower — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 12:59:40 -0400

So much taxpaid time spent on something so inconsequential--no wonder we are in a economy-wide mess. Nobody can so sanitize life that you never hear anything you don't like, and it's foolish and immature to presume somebody can. It curbs your growth and creativity, and it stalemates your life. Ignore such nonsense, and move on toward your own goals.

Was the catfish joke racist?

ryanteaguebeckwith — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 12:03:30 -0400

Does the catfish amendment have racist roots?

Longtime readers will recall Dome's obsession with tracking down the origins of that peculiar North Carolina phrase.

Forgive us, but we were discussing the posts at a seminar on blogging in Richmond last week, and we had a long ride back.

One of the things we recalled was that the earliest references we could find to the catfish joke — "Don't worry, little catfish, I ain't gonna hurt you, I'm just gonna gut you!" — all centered on a young black child.

It struck us that there are two ways to interpret the joke: 1) The fisherman doesn't realize what he's saying, as in a "Cecil and Leonard" sketch, or 2) the fisherman is trying to trick the fish, as in a Tom Sawyer episode.

Not to get all third-rate W.J. Cash on you, but our theory is that the joke originally was racist, with the punchline depending on a stereotype that blacks are intellectually inferior.

By the time lawyers and politicians began using the joke as a rhetorical argument, the meaning had shifted, with the punchline now being that the fisherman was devious.

And since casting one's opponent in the courtroom or the legislature as the black child in the joke would not be, shall we say, genteel, the racial element dropped away and was eventually forgotten.