Buck Gets Bucked

Being a simple, humble woman, there are a few simple, humble rules that I choose to live by. For the last five years, it has been to eschew most forms of political correctness. Of course, there are times that you have to mince words to spare another person's feelings, but otherwise, this whole political correctness phase has gotten so far out of bounds that it has turned us into a society of stiff, stuffy robots. Besides, I believe that most people who are being politically correct are being just that and little more. Inside, they could be a seething cauldron of hatred and bigotry for all I know, which is when the real trouble begins.

Take the recent incident involving Buck Burnette, the former lineman of the University of Texas' football team, the Texas Longhorns. Judging by his post on his Facebook page, he was obviously unhappy that Obama won when he opined:

"All the hunters gather up, we have a &%$^#* in the whitehouse."

I have trouble with this post on several counts. First, he wrote a run-on sentence by using a comma instead of a period after the word "up," and second, White House is two words and a proper noun and should have been capitalized. As a life-long student, he should have been paying more attention in English and history.

But that was the least of Burnette's worries after that post because he was kicked off the team shortly thereafter, as in suspended, given the heave-ho, the old "adios, hasta la vista, baby" and the "don't call us, we'll call you."

The other count which I am sure is what infuriated the coaches, the fans, those holding bake sales, Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, etc., is that Burnette exposed himself as a racist. As a member of an ethnic group that is hardly on everyone's favored party list, on a certain level I say, "so what?" While bigotry and racism are hurtful, there were ways to counter it rather than booting him off of the team. They could have, for example, sent him to a local soul food restaurant for turnips and collar greens. Or they could have taken another route and made him sit through a Busta Rhymes or Nelly concert.

While I have never been called a "kike," people have uttered similar sentiments to me, and it has often hurt my feelings. I have been told that one of my coworkers who teaches history is not covering Judaism because it is not considered a major religion. One coworker recently told me that Orthodox Jews smell funny and another said that we are aggressive.

But I did not try to get anyone fired over it. If anything, I tried to counter it, to make them see it is hurtful or try and share something about the culture with them in an attempt to soften the sting of racism because I know where it can lead.

And that's what should have happened to Buck Burnette as well.