Down and Dirty with Jayalitha

            I’m not prone to standing up for Barack Obama’s State Department, but U.S. Vice-Consul Maureen Chao is getting skewered by the “right to not be offended” crowd.  If you haven’t heard, Ms. Chao made a speech in Chennai, India last Friday that has sent  race baiters into the stratosphere. 

            During the speech in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, Chao recounted a 24 hour train trip she made some two decades previously as a student in India.  Chao said “after 72 hours, the train still did not reach the destination…..and my skin became dirty and dark like the Tamilians”. 

            Response was swift, predictable, and pathetic.  Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, Jayalitha (yes, she goes by one name, don’t get me started), wrote in a letter to the U.S. Consul General….”This remark which smacks of racism is highly condemnable” and “you will agree that this remark of the vice-consul is an affront to all Tamils”.  Sorry, Jayalitha, I don’t agree.  At most, Chao’s remarks seem like a condemnation of India’s mass transit system more than anything else.  Seriously, a 72 hr train ride?  My skin got dirty and dark riding the L from Chicago’s U.S. Cellular Field to the Navy Pier!  Anyone who has ridden a bus or train jammed with fellow travelers knows the sweaty, grimy, indeed “dirty” feeling that one can acquire. 

            What about the “dark” comment?  Here is a secret dear readers…..lean very close so no one around  can hear……you never heard this from me……most Tamilians are dark-skinned!  It is only the poisonous mindset of the “right not to be offended” crowd that interprets the adjective “dark” as being racist. 

            Early on in the 2008 presidential campaign, Joe Biden referred to then Senator Obama as “clean” and “articulate” in an interview published by The New York Observer.  Biden was subsequently lambasted by race baiters for his “offensive” comments.  I am trying to understand here.  The words “clean” and “dirty” are equally racially offensive, and should never be used in reference to a person who is, well, “dark”. 

Maybe the “right to not be offended” crowd will just publish an exhaustive list of all words, phrases, thoughts, and actions that they deem unacceptable.  I know this poor, confused white boy would appreciate it.