From the Dallas City Hall Blog on the Dallas Morning News website:
County commissioners were discussing problems with the central collections office that is used to process traffic ticket payments and handle other paperwork normally done by the JP Courts.
Commissioner Kenneth Mayfield, who is white, said it seemed that central collections “has become a black hole” because paperwork reportedly has become lost in the office.
Commissioner John Wiley Price, who is black, interrupted him with a loud “Excuse me!” He then corrected his colleague, saying the office has become a “white hole.”
That prompted Judge Thomas Jones, who is black, to demand an apology from Mayfield for his racially insensitive analogy.
Mayfield shot back that it was a figure of speech and a science term. A black hole, according to Webster’s, is perhaps “the invisible remains of a collapsed star, with an intense gravitational field from which neither light nor matter can escape.”
Other county officials quickly interceded to break it up and get the meeting back on track. TV news cameras were rolling, after all.
I’d love to see the video of this. What I find to be hysterically funny about this is that even though commissioner Mayfield wasn’t being the least bit racially degrading when he used the term black hole, commissioner Price (seen here letting his hair down) was being racially insulting when he responded to the imaginary slur with the term “white hole”.
At least he was trying to be which makes it extremely funny.
If I wasn’t such a cheapskate, I would send commissioner John Wiley Price and Judge Thomas Jones copies of Stephen Hawking’s landmark book, A Brief History in Time. I was looking around Borders yesterday and happened to find an updated, re-written version of the book entitled A Briefer History of Time. I was published in 2005 by Hawking and American physicist Leonard Mlodinow.
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9 Responses
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Mr. Price and Mr. Jones need to go back to school! I hope you post a link if you find the video of the event. I’d love to see that. Talk about looking for racism and making an issue out of something that was so NOT racist.
Poor Mayfield probably thought he was safe by referring to the central collections office as a “black hole” rather than a “tar baby.”
Imagine if he’d called it that.
I’ve come close to buying A Brief History of Time a few times at Borders, but haven’t pulled the trigger yet. I think I need to finish my current Carl Sagan book, then read a little Neil deGrasse Tyson before I’m ready to tackle Hawking.
THIS CLOWN IS A DUMB [edit] AND SHOULD BE ADDED TO THE LIST OF HEART ATTACK VICTIMS SOON. WHAT A PIECE OF SHIT, HIM AND THE OTHER [edit] . THINKS WHITES SHOULD WALK ON EGGSHELLS AROUND HIM? WOW, HOPEFULLY YOU NEVER SEE ME [edit].
To the previous commenter, Mr. “OBAMA”:
I’m only asking so I can update my personal calendar — when is the South scheduled to rise again? Because it’s been such a long time coming, I figure it’s gotta be any day now, and I’d sure hate to miss it.
You’re right; it is a shame that so many of us white folks feel like we have to be extra-sensitive and watch what we say around black folks. But that’s not the fault of Commissioner Price or Judge Jones. It’s the fault of ignorant fucking racist white guys like yourself, who embarrass not only those of us with similar skin-pigmentation, but the whole goddamn species.
My good man, you are the very definition of “clown.”
Sorry folks that this racist rant appeared unedited for so long. I normally don’t edit comments, but this was just too much. I was feeling sick yesterday and blogging was pretty low on my list of priorities.
Rick, I like your editing technique much better than that employed by the Herald-Mail forum when you had the gall to use the word “negro” in a post a few months ago.
Not that the word “Negro” is one I normally use. I was referring to it in a historical sense as in signs displayed in store windows during the days of Jim Crow that read, “No Negros Allowed”. At the time of the Herald-Mail fiasco, I believe this point went right over everyone’s head.
BTW, I looked up this racist puke’s IP address. He lives in Florida. Imagine that.
Yes, sorry if I gave the wrong impression of your “negro” usage; you were using it to make a point against racism, which so infuriated the forum admins at the Herald-Mail that you were immediately banned.
A racist? In the southern United States? Rick, I’ve heard some amazing-but-true stories in my time, but this one . . . I’m sorry. No. I refuse to believe it. You’re making it up.
Cayusa, it’s on the Fox 4 website, http://www.myfoxdfw.com, type in Judge Thomas Jones in the search field and it comes up.
They’re both idiots. And Mayfield totally looked like WTF??