Black [Somethings] Matter

Regular readers of this blog will know that Curmie loves putting two or more stories together, finding a common theme.  This time, it’s the apparently sacred, not-to-be-trifled-with words, “Black Lives Matter.”  Curmie has already weighed in on that phrase and both its connotative and denotative meanings.  The short version is that whereas black lives unquestionably matter (and there are some areas of life in America in which this concept has not always been made manifest), the Black Lives Matter movement is not above criticism.

Curmie has often observed, both in this blog and in his classroom, that the ability to laugh at oneself is a signal of strength in a system.  We can trace this phenomenon back at least as far as Athenian Old Comedy two and a half millennia ago.  The best recent example came in the aftermath to 9/11.  That event shook us all.  (It may have affected me in a variation on survivor’s guilt: my brother-in-law was scheduled for a meeting high in one of the Twin Towers that morning; it was called off shortly before the attack.)  For a few days, the country reeled, and everything was solemn reportage.  We knew we as a nation were emerging from the metaphorical if not the literal wreckage when David Letterman went back on the air in New York; we knew we were really going to be OK when he started telling jokes about President Bush.

Curmie, of course, is very much fond of humor in general and wordplay in particular; that, along with “Black Lives Matter,” is the subject of this essay.

Item #1:

This is either a foul on Joakim Maehle (#5 in red)
or a flop by Raheem Sterling (#10 in white).

The Euro 2020 (still called that, despite the pandemic-necessitated delay) semi-final match this week between England and Denmark was de facto decided by a questionable foul call, resulting in a penalty kick for the home side, England. Raheem Sterling, one of England’s leading goal-scoring threats, went down “in the box” after some very slight contact with a Danish defender. Was it a foul? Maybe.

Watching the replay, I thought that it would be impossible to overturn the call, but it would also have been impossible to overturn a no-call.  BBC announcer Gary Lineker, who in his playing career earned 80 caps and scored 48 goals for England in international competition, saw it the same way I did.  There is perhaps a reason he has the extremely impressive record of never receiving even a yellow card in any type of game.  (Hey, if you can’t believe Wikipedia, who can you trust?)

What the video review did not do, contrary to the article linked below, was “confirm” the call. It didn’t overturn the call; there’s a difference. Plus, of course, there’s one of those unwritten laws that referees don’t call penalty kicks late in a game unless there’s absolutely no question.  So much for that idea…

Anyway, there’s a standing joke in Ireland that when it comes to international sporting events, an Irishman’s favorite team, of course, is Ireland. His second favorite team is whoever is playing England. So it’s not surprising that Bernard O’Byrne, the CEO of Ireland’s basketball program, viewed the episode, shall we say, through green-colored glasses. And Sterling is black, so when the BBC posted on Facebook about the English victory, O’Byrne responded “BLACK DIVES MATTER!!!”

Curmie thinks it’s a pretty clever line, especially since the call was so marginal.  Moreover, Sterling has something of a reputation for, well, diving.  Needless to say, there was predictable outrage from humor-deficient Woke Folk, and consequent groveling from O’Byrne and his employer.  Sigh.

This situation seems to Curmie to be a rather impressive tempest in a demi-tasse cup, but at least we are talking about an episode in which the race of an actual human being becomes at least indirectly the subject of a gag. 

Not so with Item #2.

It will probably not surprise you, Gentle Reader, that Curmie has an appreciation for, shall we say, offbeat humor.  He came across the cartoon you see to the right here in a Facebook post on a humor site… it seems to have been taken down now, for reasons less than entirely clear.  Anyway, someone suggested that it’s racist (!) because, you know: black ink, white out… obviously the cartoon is about race.  WTAF?

But, as they say on the late-night infomercials: Wait, there’s more!  Someone commented “Black Lines Matter,” and there was a Disturbance in the Force.  Again, good line, yes?  And to say there’s anything offensive about the quip is to deny even the possibility of literally anything humorous having the slightest connection to current events.  Count Curmie out of that mindset.

None of the foregoing should be taken to suggest that all proponents of Black Lives Matter are humorless sloganeers.  (“Not all [fillintheblanks]…”)  Nor is this a defense of the deliberately offensive, or even of tastelessness (Curmie would defend the latter, but that’s an issue for another day).  But just as it would benefit us all if the nation were to more fully uphold the notion of “liberty and justice for all” promised by its rhetoric, it would also be a boon if some of the more hair-triggered of the SJWs and BLMers paused for a breath, a thought, and perhaps even a smile before opening the spout of righteous indignation.