Dispatches From the Culture Wars – Ramadan edition

Hate Inc.; Ford Foundation restructures; Comedians lead; Surviving in Brooklyn; Ramadan Mubarak

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Photo by Jason Speakman/The Brooklyn Paper


Why the GOP Hates Talking About Hate: Conservatives Can’t Confront Racism in Charleston Shooting

By Ana Marie Cox
June 18, 2015
The Daily Beastl

In the 24 hours after the massacre inside Charleston’s Emanuel AME Church, GOP politicians and members of the conservative commentariat have tried to explain Dylann Storm Roof’s motivations on a spectrum that runs from merely murky to the explicitly anti-religious.
They have taken pains to avoid the abundant evidence that Roof was a sadly familiar figure: a young man motivated by racism to violence.

Ford Foundation Refocuses Grant Giving to Fight Inequality

By Jillian Steinhauer
June 12, 2015
Hyperallergic

The Ford Foundation, the second-largest philanthropic foundation in the US (by assets; it ranks 10th in terms of giving), will restructure its grant-making program to focus entirely on fighting global inequality, the Chronicle of Philanthropy reported. The foundation will also devote more of its resources to providing nonprofits with operational support rather than funding short-term projects.
Notably, this means that Ford — which was one of nine foundations that pledged money in the “grand bargain” to help settle Detroit’s bankruptcy (and save its art museum)  — will continue to fund arts organizations. “But to catch the grant maker’s attention, artists, filmmakers, and choreographers will need to focus on social justice and challenge ‘dominant narratives’ that perpetuate inequality,” says the Chronicle.

How Comedians Became Public Intellectuals

By Megan Garber
May 28, 2015
The Atlantic

The stuff of late-night LOLs used to be quippy monologues, vapid celebrity interviews, Stupid Human Tricks both official and less so. It still is, to some extent. More often, though, TV comedy that self-consciously defines itself as “comedy”—the stuff that originally airs on Comedy Central and FXX and HBO, the stuff that is firmly rooted in traditions of sketch and standup—is taking on subjects like racism and sexism and inequality and issues including police brutality and trigger warnings and intersectional feminism and helicopter parenting and the end of men. Its jokes double as arguments. “Comedy with a message” may be vaguely ironic; it is also, increasingly, redundant.
Which is to say that there are two broad things happening right now—comedy with moral messaging, and comedy with mass attention—and their combined effect is this: Comedians have taken on the role of public intellectuals. They’re exploring and wrestling with important ideas. They’re sharing their conclusions with the rest of us. They’re providing fodder for discussion, not just of the minutiae of everyday experience, but of the biggest questions of the day. Amy Schumer on misogyny, Key and Peele on terrorism, Louis C.K. on parenting, Sarah Silverman on Rand Paul, John Oliver on FIFA … these are bits intended not just to help us escape from the realities of the world, but also, and more so, to help us understand them. Comedians are fashioning themselves not just as joke-tellers, but as truth-tellers—as intellectual and moral guides through the cultural debates of the moment.


Boerum Hill Deli Re-brands as Artisanal Emporium to Protest Rent Hike

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By Noah Hurowitz
June 12, 2015
The Brooklyn Paper
http://www.brooklynpaper.com/stories/38/25/dtg-jesses-deli-artisanal-ta…
The owners of an imperiled Boerum Hill deli have staged an “artisanal takeover” of their 25-year-old corner store, re-branding products with yuppified names and jacking up prices to illustrate the kind of shop that could afford the 250-percent rent hike they say the store’s landlord is demanding.
Tongue-in-cheek posters advertising a “landlord price hike sale” at Jesse’s Deli, on the corner of Atlantic Avenue and Bond Street, show what neighbors can expect to pay if a new store hopes to cover the inflated rent, said one worker.
Owners re-branded packets of Goya Sazon sauce as “Oaxacan Sea Salt Taco Rub” — yours for just $18! — Slim Jims as “Hand-Cured Salami Tubes” — a steal at $5.99 a pop — and Raid as $15.99 “Artisanal Roach Bombs.”


Ramadan Etiquette Guide: How to be a Non-Muslim During the Holy Month

By Asma Uddin
July 18, 2012
Faith Street

In the next few weeks, you may come into work and find your co-worker taking a power nap at 9:30am. At break time, you’ll notice she is missing in the discussion about Harry Potter over at the water cooler. At the staff meeting, you will be shocked when she is offered coffee and cookies and refuses! By lunch time, your concern about her missing at the water cooler compels you to investigate the situation.
Then you remember what she had mentioned last week over a delicious Sushi lunch. Flooded with relief, you go up to her desk, and proclaim with much gusto, “Ramadan Mubarak (Moo-baa-rak)!” Ramadan’s Blessings to you!