{"id":1277,"date":"2013-07-04T20:06:25","date_gmt":"2013-07-05T03:06:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.talkinggrid.com\/?p=1277"},"modified":"2014-07-24T11:09:01","modified_gmt":"2014-07-24T18:09:01","slug":"dear-paula-deen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/talkinggrid.com\/dev\/dear-paula-deen\/","title":{"rendered":"Dear Paula Deen"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"img_7207_med\"<\/a>
\nDetail of, \u00a0“Eat Crow, Paula,” by Frau Kolb \u00a9 2013, Acrylic on canvas 12×9″, all rights reserved.<\/em><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know you.\u00a0 I did not even know of<\/em>\u00a0you before last week.\u00a0 \u00a0Forgive me, but I don\u2019t watch commercial television and I absolutely never would trust a cook that looked like you (overweight, flabby\u2026) to instruct me on any issue related even tangentially to nutrition.\u00a0 In other words, even the junkiest comestible that I might consider ingesting is informed by my concern for the planet and my individual well being.\u00a0 Moreover, it is likely to be the brand of gourmet and\/or even organic junk sold at\u00a0Whole Foods<\/a>, where I most frequently invest the bulk of my sufficient grocery budget. \u00a0 \u00a0Anyway, I cook. \u00a0I cook everyday for my family, because I CARE about FOOD and nutrition. \u00a0It is a spiritual concern for me. \u00a0Anyway, \u00a0Madame Deen, you have become pertinent, timely, of interest, since it became public that YOU casually use the N word with glib innocence of how very BAD a career strategy for a television\/celebrity chef purporting to cook Southern FOOD, but actually altering the history of the southern cooking to erase the influence of African cuisine upon the dishes traditionally prepared in the South.<\/p>\n

Now, I wouldn\u2019t be writing you a letter IF I had not had the pleasure of reading a letter written by\u00a0Michael W. Twitty<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I also, by the way took the time to see this nasty little clip where YOU humiliate a man, on camera, in order to “show,” how harmless your verbal whip is.<\/p>\n

Paula Deen Defended Souther Atttitude Towards Race In Fall 2012 by Joe Satran for Huffington Post.<\/a><\/p>\n

Here is an article<\/a> by\u00a0Janus Adams<\/a>, for the Huffington Post, examining both the letter and the incident.<\/p>\n

For those of you that need more information about the details of this case: \u00a0Here is a useful link by\u00a0Daryl \u00a0K. Washington for “Black Legal Issues,”<\/a>\u00a0on-line.<\/p>\n

The evidently brilliant culinary historian, Michael W. Twitty, and Southern Food, expert, eloquently addresses you and the public, with the aplomb and verve of a diplomat, inviting you to the table of reconciliation, forgiveness, and mutual respect.\u00a0 This move, or action, has profoundly impressed me.\u00a0 This letter is a splendid piece of writing, delightful to read. \u00a0I have rarely read such a moving letter, it is just short of the biblical\u2026\u00a0 anyway\u2026 it is amazingly well written and reading it I learned that BBQ is a direct import from the people that were kidnapped and brought in chains like fruit stacked in the bottom of dirty disease ridden ships to the New World, the people that were scattered like seeds across the Atlantic (WHO KNEW?)\u00a0the<\/em>\u00a0people that brought drum music and songs with\u00a0that<\/em>\u00a0beat, the root of ROCK n\u2019 ROLL, WE ALL LOVE.<\/p>\n

(Oh, how proud I am that around fifty percent of my blood is of the beautiful ripe plum toned people of mother AFRICA!)\u00a0 I am proud of my color, my heritage, my accent, my good looks, my physical strength, verbal accumen, my English, my Spanish,\u00a0my<\/em>\u00a0colonial past.\u00a0 I am also, like the vast majority of American African people, a mix of human stock. \u00a0I am Anglo-Celtic (ethnically) and Spanish (language and blood line).\u00a0 I am at ease with being the child of multiple cultures, \u00a0many peoples, at times enemies, at times best friends, lovers, HUMANS angry and bitter one second and sweet as cherries the next\u2026 OH, Paula\u2026. You fat ugly cow!\u00a0 YOU got me thinking!\u00a0 Consider that!\u00a0\u00a0 I am actually THINKING about YOU!\u00a0 Hah!\u00a0 As a classist elitist ivy-league Manhattanite ART brat, I look down on YOU! \u00a0Get THAT! \u00a0I think I am BETTER! \u00a0(But not really, Paula, I know we know YOU know you are a bigger ass because YOU make tons of money selling your shit and I’m a little independent artist writing this shit for virtually for FREE) Hah! \u00a0(WE humans LOVE being superior and I’m NO different, really.) \u00a0NOW: I\u2019m THE ASSHOLE, right?<\/p>\n

Anyway, I think… we ALL take turns being assholes no matter how hard some of us try not to be because the price of civilization, thus far is SLAVERY. \u00a0(Just go ask Plato how he got to The Symposium and he will tell you he was carried through the dirty muddy alleys of Athens via imported SLAVE labor.) Everywhere all over the world there are slaves working, RIGHT NOW to make the crap we buy and throw away without even thinking.\u00a0 YOU see ALL that garbage on the streets?\u00a0 All that shit was once shiny new shit waiting to be bought and discarded. \u00a0It was made by workers, here with little and elsewhere with virtually NO RIGHTS in far away or “exotic,” places we’d rather forget and therefore don’t even bother thinking about. \u00a0Tragic.\u00a0 Right?<\/p>\n

I am annoyed by so many things, lately\u2026 I could go on and on Paula, but I won\u2019t bore you with my superior rant.\u00a0 I will go out and pick up some garbage or play on electric keyboard some scattered lazy music. \u00a0Or I might go play on Facebook with my fabulous artist friends.\u00a0 I am FREE so I can do whatever I want.<\/p>\n

I know Paul that IF you could you\u2019d buy me and my kids and whip us IF we did not dance fast enough at your freakin\u2019 southern wedding.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m writing this letter to YOU.\u00a0 I know you will not ever read it.\u00a0 I know even IF did read IT (can you actually read, Dear? \u00a0IF you can, read some\u00a0Bell Hooks<\/a>, why don’t you?) you will NOT\u00a0get<\/em>\u00a0it.\u00a0 I know that you KNOW that I know that WE know that it is a NO KNOW to say the \u201cN,\u201d word, for YOU or ME, ever again.\u00a0\u00a0 You got that Paula?\u00a0\u00a0 IF so, get your fat flabby melanin deficient self (I wouldn\u2019t say all this to your diabetic face, butt I know you ain\u2019t gonna be reading this random little web-site read mostly by artists like Terry Amig and other progressive smARTy pants. Hah!) \u00a0go down, on September 7th<\/sup>\u00a02013, to Shitoric Stagville, in North Carolina, so you can break some bread with someone that actually would eat with you.\u00a0 I am not sure that I would or could because YOU and I do not have the same diet.<\/p>\n

Go cook and eat with a person that is willing to embrace you, forgive you.\u00a0 Please WILL some peace and love between us BLACK (bullshit! skin can be the color of coffee or night butt NEVER actually black) and WHITE (pretty piggy pink, like you or delicious cream like my loving German husband, butt never actually WHITE, call yourself WHITE and know I hear you thinking you are “pure,” like SNOW and that\u00a0you<\/em>\u00a0deserve more cherries in your freakin’ slice of the United States of American pie, which we, actually, ALL bake together every day of every week, in perpetuity). \u00a0“Cousins,” sisters, twins ONE and ALL in THE Fun-House mirror, of the media where clowns like YOU and\u2026 perhaps\u2026\u00a0me (<\/em>a little, LIKE you, ain’t I?)\u00a0are magnified and glorified and turned into people that pay other people\u2019s bills (thanks for paying your “workers,” Paula, unlike your granddaddy).<\/p>\n

*Also special thanks to, artist, Dave Stull, for not allowing me to get all high and mighty about myself, ass though I don\u2019t have my own prejudice and nasty side to contend with and, while I\u2019m at it, special thanks to Joseph Campbell, Karl Jung, and YOU for reading this fairly flip and not entirely thought out semi-secret letter to Madame Dean.<\/p>\n

**Also, thank you ARTIST BARRY. \u00a0You got me to pay attention to the Dean debacle.<\/p>\n

Yours truly,<\/p>\n

Frau Kolb<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Detail of, \u00a0“Eat Crow, Paula,” by Frau Kolb \u00a9 2013, Acrylic on canvas 12×9″, all rights reserved. I don\u2019t know you.\u00a0 I did not even know of\u00a0you before last week.\u00a0 \u00a0Forgive me, but I don\u2019t watch commercial television and I absolutely never would trust a cook that looked like you (overweight, flabby\u2026) to instruct me […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1278,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[22,26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1277","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cultural-commentary","category-health-spiritual-fitness"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/talkinggrid.com\/dev\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/img_7207_med.jpg?fit=440%2C330&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/talkinggrid.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1277","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/talkinggrid.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/talkinggrid.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/talkinggrid.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/talkinggrid.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1277"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/talkinggrid.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1277\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1281,"href":"https:\/\/talkinggrid.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1277\/revisions\/1281"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/talkinggrid.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/talkinggrid.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/talkinggrid.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/talkinggrid.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}