play that funky music white boy allowed or not??

[olly8080]

My local radio station plays this song every day.

whilst i am not racist it does offend me having to listen to this because if the word white was replaced with black it wouldnt get air time.Double standards dont work and never have so why do we as a country put up with it,i could list 100,s of other examples of this but i wouldnt want to upset our ethnic friends

[WaldoMcFroog]

"Play that funky music" is a song by the band Wild Cherry. The song has its origins in the fact that WC were finding that venues for rock and roll were becoming few and far between as venues converted to take account of the new disco craze. The band were still continuing to play rock and roll in these discos but the crowd would often ask them to play funk or disco. The band resisted this for a long time, not feeling that they could or should but eventually the drummer said, 'Perhaps we really should play that funky music, white boy,' meaning that despite the fact that they were a white band, they should have a go at playing funk, which they did and scored a major hit in the process.

So, er... where's the racism? Merely mentioning race does not make something racist. It is not racist to say Nelson Mandela is black. It is not racist to say the Queen is right. It is not racist to say funk music is mainly played by black musicians, or that heavy metal is mainly played by white musicians. It's racist to say that only black musicians can play funk, but it was precisely the opposite; it was black crowds asking a white band to play funk - i.e. it wasn't the band's race they had a problem with, it was their style of music.

[WaldoMcFroog]

Whoop! I meant to say 'it's not racist to say the Queen is white.'

[Ethel]

They play this on my radio:

whoa, black betty
whoa, black betty
Black betty had a child
The damn thing gone wild
She said "I'm worrin' outta my mind
The damn thing gone blind
I said oh black betty
whoa, black betty


And

Brown girl in the ring
Tra la la la la
Theres a brown girl in the ring
Tra la la la la la

And

I could escape this feeling, with my china girl
I feel a wreck without my, little china girl
I hear her heart beating, loud as thunder
Saw the stars crashing

And

I'm turning Japanese
I think I'm turning Japanese
I really think so
Turning Japanese
I think I'm turning Japanese
I really think so

All on Radio 2

[olly8080]

so if i wrote a song entitled "" black men cant swim "" would that get air time

because the film "" white men cant dance " seemed a hit

[Octavius]

My opinion is that the term or intention needs to be derogative to cause offence � otherwise we would be too scared to offend submarines by calling them all yellow in that song. Your examples are just so examples, as Waldo has put. I don�t find that song offensive at all, nor the other examples.

In the film White Men Can�t Jump, it actually turned out that they can and Woody Harrelson showed himself to be a fine basketball player in a predominantly black environment and made some friends along the way. Do you also object to the title �Men in Black�?

Colour alone is not derogative; it only seems to become so when an adjective is added to a noun or pronoun, such as the ghastly term white trailer trash etc and rightly so.

[smudge]

I heard this on Radio Two last week & because of all the pc hype, wondered if it would still be playing if the title was Young Gifted & White.

Just a thought.....

[smudge]

The link didn't show, but I was refering to the song
'Young Gifted & Black'...

[johnlambert]

For many years I thought they were singing "play that ******* music right boy"

[WaldoMcFroog]

Re: 'Young Gifted and Black' - again, the mere fact of mentioning race does not mean something is racist (there is no implication that white kids can't be young and gifted), but more importantly, why would someone write a song called 'Young Gifted and White'?

YG&B is a song that couldn't have been written unless there were racism, but the fact that it was written *as a result of racism* doesn't mean it *is* racist. YG&B is Nina Simone writing a song to reverse negative perceptions of young black people and saying, 'be proud of yourself'.

It doesn't say blacks are better than whites, which would be racist.

[smudge]

I didn't say it was any of those things Waldo & the lyrics don't bother me at all - I was merely talking of the title - that's all.

Now on to the next one!

[olly8080]

well said smudge i see they banned the use of calling chalk boards " black boards " but we still call them " white boards"

[WaldoMcFroog]

So therefore your point is 'should songs that mention someone's race in the title be allowed on the radio'?

Now that really would be PC gone mad.

[olly8080]

the opposite tbh but if we are led to believe any reference to ANY race apart from english or any colour apart from white is racist in any context of life then im offended by play that funky music white boy whats good for the goose etc

[WaldoMcFroog]

But no one is. That's the point.

Who is this mythical "they"?

I live in one of the so-called 'Loony Lefty' London boroughs -and we've got blackboards and whiteboards in our schools (I understand they use the colour of the board as a clue what they should be called).

They sing Baa-Baa Black Sheep to the kids, they celebrate Christmas and people are able to call a white man a white man, and a black man a black man without anyone going loopy about it etc.

If you're being banned from saying 'blackboard', you're clearly being stalked by raging nutters and you should get a court injunction. Or you're delusional.

[olly8080]

where do you live on the moon?????
or are you an ex champion debater who watched "love thy neighbour"??

[WaldoMcFroog]

No, I live in the real world where people understand the difference between being racist and merely mentioning race.

[Loosehead]

and what about Elvis Costello's Oliver's army:

"One more little one less white N*****"

[turkey154]

Me and my parents were talking about this the other day. My step dad is from Ghana and he said that when he was at school they had black boards and so on, so when i told him that all the time i was at school i had white boards, he couldnt believe it!

when i explained this is because some blacks found black boards a racist thing he actually laughed and said how stupid some people are.

i hate the double standard. at the end of the day whats good for the goose....