Comments on: Snow Defends Use Of The Term ‘Tar Baby,’ Claims Critics Don’t Understand ‘American Culture’

By: Junkiness » Blog Archive » Tar Me Baby One More Time

Junkiness » Blog Archive » Tar Me Baby One More Time — Mon, 19 Mar 2007 00:19:41 +0000

[...] Tony Snow, then Mitt Romney, and now Senator Jonh McCain have all used the phrase “Tar Baby” in [...]

By: Muze

Muze — Fri, 02 Jun 2006 16:33:33 +0000

This proves that we need to emphasize multi-cultural education.
I am old enough to remember the pain of being victimized by that term.
Words have power and if the Press Secretary of the US has such a limited vocabulary, that he must resort to racial slurs to express himeself?
Wasn’t he briefed?,
Didn’t anyone tell him that one just doesn’t use the term ‘tar baby’, especially in and around the Chocolate City!
And then to justify it’s use with a now obscure reference from a film I saw 35 years ago, hardly remember and is no longer readily accessible? If he is so well versed in things such as Song of the South and American culture, he would know that this movie was killed off by Black America because it was THAT demeaning!

By: Muze

Muze — Fri, 02 Jun 2006 14:23:30 +0000

When Bush won the election, I was shocked! and since, I’ve never met anyone who (admitted) to voting for him!
Is this all we have to chose from?
If this is the best we can do, we’re screwed

By: Tar Heels get Buckeyes in eighth ACC-Big Ten Challenge - Tar

Tar Heels get Buckeyes in eighth ACC-Big Ten Challenge - Tar — Fri, 26 May 2006 09:04:54 +0000

[...] Snow Defends Use Of The Term Tar Baby, Claims Critics Don …Think Progress, DC - May 18, 2006Last night on the Hugh Hewitt radio show, White House Press Secretary Tony Snow defended his use of the phrase tar baby during his press conference on … [...]

By: Josh Lehto

Josh Lehto — Sun, 21 May 2006 06:33:42 +0000

“Tar Baby” is Brer Rabbit allusion for “quagmire” (ala Fly paper). One Google search for “Tar Baby” makes that perfectly clear. But its association with African American mythology, muddled by its “Uncle Remus” pedigree, left it dangling in American culture as an ambiguous ‘black’ reference. It’s name Tar (black and dirty) Baby (small person), made it low-hanging fruit for vulgarity, and it took the low road to a second meaning. Now, like “Gay”, it’s popular perception has been altered from its original context.

Linguistics happens.

Now, Tar Baby’s linguistic limbo makes it its own best example. In trying to avoid hugging the ‘NSA’ tar baby, Tony Snow hugged the ‘tar baby’ tar baby.

By: Scott

Scott — Sat, 20 May 2006 05:43:02 +0000

One more thing. Brer Fox and Brer Bear didn’t squeeze the baby made of tar (tar baby) in the old African folktale that Disney stole. They punched it and kicked it because it wouldn’t respond to their greetings. The more they punched and kicked the tighter they became entangled in the tar until they were totally helpless.

Maybe Tony could better use his tar baby as an excellent introduction to Bush’s policy in Iraq. The more we punch and kick the more helpless we become.

By: Scott

Scott — Sat, 20 May 2006 05:30:24 +0000

Just a quick historical note on comparing the majoritarian Congress to a plantation —a place where those in the majority have all the rights and power and the minority have none.

It may come as a shock to our young republican friends to learn that it was old Newt and republican his bully boys who popularized comparing Congress to a plantation during their attacks on the Democratic majority in the early 90’s.

Why is the same phrase spoken in the same context so offensive when Hillary says it and a “meaningful insight” when it is brayed by Newt?

By: reddogs

reddogs — Sat, 20 May 2006 03:40:15 +0000

So Tony Snow is going to take “hugging the tar baby” out of his tool chest of rhetorical devices . Well, who among us had any illusions that we’d be getting any straight talk from this clown but I’ll bet he has a great big tool chest so at least we’ll have a crapload of rhetorical devices to look forward to.

By: Politisink - Post details: Bush is both for and against English as Official American language

Fri, 19 May 2006 21:09:08 +0000

[...] Two titans go at it, but Snow has a Tarbaby up his sleeve for when the Ref is distracted! Look out, Gonzales! White House In Disarray: Contradicting Snow, Gonzales Says Bush Opposes Making English The National Language [...]

By: Theresa

Theresa — Fri, 19 May 2006 21:02:30 +0000

Clinton’s planation remark and Snow’s Tarbaby remarks were both offensive. Whether Democrat or Republican both remarks were insensitive. If it were a black person at a major press event that said, “I dont want to hug the honky” or “i don’t want to hug the cracker” people would be up in arms. A tar baby in american culture has been associated with black people, just like the term porch monkey.

By: Matt

Matt — Fri, 19 May 2006 16:48:02 +0000

Toni Morrison is indeed ignorant of American culture and, apparently, African culture. The tar baby is a form of a character widespread in African folklore. In various folktales, gum, wax, or other sticky material is used to trap a person.

The folktale achieved currency in the United States in written form in one of Joel Chandler Harris’s Uncle Remus stories, a collection of stories based on African-American folklore, narrated by the fictional Uncle Remus, a former slave. In the story “Tar-Baby,” the character Brer Fox makes a doll out of tar, which he places by the road to entrap his enemy Brer Rabbit. Brer Rabbit talks to the doll, and when it doesn’t answer, he hits it, and gets stuck in the tar. The more he struggles with it, the more he is entangled in it. That is a “tar baby”. The use of it to describe Blacks is a secondary, rarer useage.

This story has led to the figurative use of tar baby in the sense ‘an inextricable problem or situation’, sometimes with the nuance ’something used to entrap a person’. Both the examples cited in the question show the use of this sense, which appears to be first used in the early twentieth century.

By: pops

pops — Fri, 19 May 2006 16:33:01 +0000

I’m another progressive Southerner who has never heard “tar baby” used as a racial slur by Southerners. It’s got to be a regional thing. I’ve used the term recently at my office about a project that was likely to turn into a quagmire of a mess, and nobody batted an eye. I’ve heard more racial epithets than most Northerners have probably ever heard in their lives, and “tar baby” was never one of them.

By: mewstersworld.com » Blog Archive » While I was out. . .

mewstersworld.com » Blog Archive » While I was out. . . — Fri, 19 May 2006 16:16:37 +0000

[...] You know, I leave for a few days and everything happens.Â First, a senior official in President Bush’s re-election campaign was sentenced to prison in the New Hampshire phone-jamming scandal.Â What everyone wants to know is why the RNC spent millions defending this guy, after initially claiming he was a “free agenct.”Â And who wereÂ these operatives speaking to in the White House on Election Day?Â New Press Secretary Tony Snow proves himself to the Republican Party and Bush Administration by using the phrase “tar baby,” and apparently we are all too ignorant to understand him.Â He’ll fit right in. [...]

By: mewstersworld.com » Blog Archive » While I was out. . .

mewstersworld.com » Blog Archive » While I was out. . . — Fri, 19 May 2006 16:16:37 +0000

By: The Fool

The Fool — Fri, 19 May 2006 15:50:01 +0000

What I’m saying is I was born, raised, and currently reside in the south, I have been around a lot of racists and heard a lot of racial epithets, but “tar baby” isn’t one of them. Are you saying you know southern racists better than I do? I think not.

By: PeskyFly

PeskyFly — Fri, 19 May 2006 15:22:34 +0000

I think it’s sad that tar baby is a racist term because it’s so useful. Iraq, for example, is a tar baby. The more you attack it, the more stuck you become. I’m a professional progressive writer and I use the term from time to time.

By: Buford

Buford — Fri, 19 May 2006 14:45:12 +0000

ANTAGONIST – you’re not paying attention. Most don’t feel that Tony is racist, but they do agree that Tony is not very sharp for using this ‘rhetorical device’ and acting surprised when it pissed people off. Just shows that he’s really out of touch with American culture.

Isn’t it ironic that Tony’s use of the term ‘tar baby’ threw him into a sticky situation from which he finds it difficult to escape…?

By: Antagonist

Antagonist — Fri, 19 May 2006 13:50:47 +0000

#119

Why canâ€™t he just say, â€œYou know, I certainly didnâ€™t mean it that way, but I probably shouldnâ€™t have said it.â€ Usually itâ€™s liberals who get slammed for being intellectual elitists.

Comment by Yachts and Lattes â€” May 19, 2006 @ 9:41 am

Agreed—at least he promised to take that little gem out of his toolchest though.

By: Yachts and Lattes

Yachts and Lattes — Fri, 19 May 2006 13:41:56 +0000

I think that Tony Snow is not a racist, or at least, he didn’t intend to show racism in his comment. But he’s got a PR problem: his mistakes were not avoiding a term that many (maybe even most) people consider racist, and claiming the only reason he didn’t think it’s racist is that he’s smarter than everyone.

“Iâ€™ll probably take that out of my toolchest of rhetorical devices, rather than having to explain a hundred and fifty years of American culture.”

Why can’t he just say, “You know, I certainly didn’t mean it that way, but I probably shouldn’t have said it.” Usually it’s liberals who get slammed for being intellectual elitists.

By: Antagonist

Antagonist — Fri, 19 May 2006 13:08:38 +0000

Good point Drew. You’ve actually touched on an inherent problem with today’s media—they regularly fail to provide the news without being the news, or attempting to shape public opinion. The fact that Tony Snow is a well known personality is the only reason I disagree with him being Bush’s spokesperson—he’ll always draw too much attention to himself.