Thisisjimrockford writes
I thought Big Theory’s post was interesting and right in many ways. The highlights programme showed how negatively affected Charley and Nicky were by Emily’s language in a way the transcript didn’t; even so, Emily probably didn’t mean to offend; she thought she was being cool by appropriating hip hop language/culture, and her background helps explain both why she did it so apparently effortlessly and yet so appallingly badly. Yes, Charley and Nicky were initially confused as to how to take Emily’s use of the “n-word”, though they became clearer and increasingly unhappy about it as they thought and talked it over. And finally, yes, Emily was removed because there is a “symbolic order of the socially acceptable” and Big Brother (with its accompanying entertainment complex) felt it necessary to intervene on our behalf. Incidentally, it’s interesting that BB are not using the word “evicted” but are using instead the word “removed”, which distinguishes Emily’s exit from a normal nomination-public vote ejection, emphasises BB’s own agency in the leaving, and thus symbolically distances Emily from the show, Endemol, C4, and the sponsors. I think it’s appropriate, though, as one of the features of the Celebrity Big Brother race row was a failure on the part of some commentators to distinguish the voice of housemates form the voice of Big Brother, Channel 4 etc. Anyway, my main point her is this: isn’t the symbolic order (if I’m understanding things correctly) more fragmented and contested than Big Theory (BT) implies here? If so, there are some interesting implications for how we think about what happened, why it matters, and what it means for the debate over multiculturalism that Big Theory mentioned at the end of the post?
As BT says, Emily was engaging in “cultural appropriation”, presumably sourcing it from rap music (her explanation that this is how she banters with black people she’s “friendly with” is less than convincing). And Emily obviously thought she’d found some sort of post-racist space or context in which she could use any language she liked to try to connect with the people she was with. Here, as BT said in a previous post, is where Emily’s very specific social background comes in—an upper middle class one that imbued her with the kind of confidence and presumption that is inappropriate to people from more modest and polite backgrounds. Yes, BT, it will indeed be interesting to see how those commentators who ascribed the behaviour of Jade et al to their class background deal with this. Also, of course, Emily must have forgotten that this space was far from hermetic, connecting as it did and does to “our” space through the medium of the Big Brother cameras. (This may seem like a bizarre thing to forget, since being watched is the point of their being in the BB House, but past housemates have often said how easily you forget the cameras after a while). But still, however misguidedly, she thought she’d found a safe post-racist space or context in which she could use otherwise racist language.
Emily’s notion of a post-racist space is the first but the least significant sign of the extent of complexity and contestability in the moral and behavioural order. More significant by far is Charley’s and Nicky’s early confusion about how to react. As you say, initially they seemed willing not to be offended or at least too offended, implying their acceptance of the idea of such a space and even that a posh white girl could enter it. Their question, “where did that come from?” (which is where I’m getting all these space/place metaphors), clearly hints at suspicion that Emily’s comment came from a racist place, and was spoken during Charley’s and Nicky’s conversational journey towards being more offended that they were at first, but it sill implied the possibility that Emily and her word came from a non-racist place. And it’s possible they still think her word might have come from a non-racist place, even though they finally concluded that she had, in fact, used it unacceptably.
Finally, the symbolic order on the outside is of course made by people, by us, and reactions to the comment and the consequent removal have naturally varied. There are debates over whether Emily was just trying (though obviously failing) to be cool, or was actually being racist. And there are debates over, whatever she might have meant, whether or not she deserved to be evicted (and whether or not should have been evicted—which is a different thing). Once again, then, we see a complex and negotiable symbolic order, in particular among the people who decide what that order is.
None of this is deep or profound, as you may have noticed. I think most would agree that context is important, though given how many contexts Emily’s word mattered in—not only what Emily meant, but how it affected Charley and Nicky, and how it affected viewers—it’s hard to sustain the view in this instance that context is everything. Indeed, the many people who take time to say that Emily wasn’t meaning to be racist or offensive even while saying that she should have been evicted clearly think that context matters but isn’t everything. Also, I’m sure most would agree that symbolic orders are complex, contested, and negotiable. But I think that remembering these things helps account for the interesting delayed reaction exhibited by Charley and Nicky in the minutes and then hours after Emily’s outburst. Also, more significantly, remembering these things can help us with the multiculturalism issue that BT brought up.
I think BT is right to say that “the facts of difference persist beyond our desire for them”. And I think this fact is worth two cheers—it’s a good thing and gives hope that we can build a better multicultural society. A third cheer may be warranted when people like Emily have better appreciation of others’ sensibilities. The question is: how exactly do we do achieve a better multicultural society? BT says, in reference again to the facts of difference despite our desire to transcend them, that “we have to start from there, acknowledging and exploring the reality, if we are going to get anywhere”. I think that’s dead right, but the question again is how exactly do we do that acknowledging and exploring? And one possible answer may be that Big Brother (and Endemol, Channel 4, the sponsors, advertisers, and us, the supporters of the symbolic order, whoever is ultimately responsible for the decision) should have let Emily stay, albeit, for sure, with a serious bollocking and a final warning. That may sound weird, but bear with me.
In an earlier post, BT said Emily’s removal was “excellent news. And this despite hoping that in Week 5 Emily would get strangled by Alice bands in act of class war”. I too had hoped fervently for some such thing. But maybe Emily’s removal at this stage was not such excellent news. Had Emily stayed, the housemates and the rest of us might have been able to do more to acknowledge where we are as a multicultural society and to explore how we might yet be a better multicultural society.
Whatever its detractors think, multiculturalism is not going to go away. The only serious debate is whether we want to live in one society that is both integrated but also diverse and multicultural in which we all have multiple and overlapping identities and allegiances. That sounds difficult and indeed it is, but it’s not impossible: people in the British Isles have been it doing for thousands of years. Or else whether we want to live in one of many isolated and segregated societies that rarely or never speak to each other and which is only multicultural in the mutually unenlightening and potentially dangerous sense that we live together in a state of no communication on the same island. I rather favour the former, but if we are to succeed and thrive as that kind of multicultural society we need to do exactly what BT says, even perhaps (admittedly more arguably) to the point of acknowledging and exploring Emily’s moment as far as we can take it.
There are many reasons why exploring relations between Emily and Charley and Nicky might be enlightening. First, had Emily stayed, she could have learned—and learned a lot—from the very people she hurt. She surely would have learned more from them than from the sometimes concocted outrage of others on the outside. An added benefit of this is that Charley and Nicky would have retained more control over the debate about race and language (which they are surely entitled to in this instance) had Emily stayed than they have now she is gone. Also, not just Emily, but other white people could have learned more about this issue of race and language with Emily in than with Emily out. It’s true that we’ve learned something about these issues from Emily’s removal and perhaps for some people that’s all you need to know: use racist language and you are excommunicated. But maybe we could have learned more from it, acknowledged and explored it further, had she stayed. She and we could have learned more about why it’s so unacceptable. It might be obvious to many why it was unacceptable, but it was clearly not obvious to Emily and I’m sure it’s not obvious to many others. I have read many, many times since Emily’s removal comments to the effect that if rappers can use the word, why not Emily? A good, long debate in the House and out may help explain why. Besides, if the use/non-use of the n-word matters (as of course it does), then surely we can’t learn enough about it in all its ingloriousness.
My (little) brother was telling me this weekend how his children (aged 9 to 19) listen to and love hip hop, and how he tells them where some of its language comes from originally, why rappers might nevertheless use it themselves, but how that doesn’t mean anyone and everyone can go round using it. Not all of the many young white people who listen to that music get that advice—and it’s not entirely their fault is they then make the big mistake a huge, Emily-sized mistake. Either Emily was never taught these things, or she never listened. But other potential Emilys might learn from her error; other potential Charleys and Nickys might have less of this kind of thing to put with. And we all might live in a better multicultural society because we know more about each other’s sensibilities. And let’s not forget, while we’re talking about the nature of multiculturalism, that Emily was, however misguidedly, adopting what she thought of as black idioms, trying, in other words, to acculturate to aspects of African-Caribbean-British culture (albeit influenced in this instance by African-American culture). If white people want to do this, and it’s to be celebrated when they do, then sometimes they will make mistakes, and sometimes those mistakes will cause offence. This is not to say that offence should be overlooked. Just that it should be learned from so there can be more, and more successful, white-to-black acculturation and integration.
There would, for sure, be dangers in letting Emily stay in the House. The biggest are that further hurt and offence could be caused to Charley and Nicky, and not necessarily by Emily repeating that kind of language but even perhaps simply by her continuing presence. But BB can monitor the situation in meetings with the two women (strictly private and never broadcast meetings so they can be honest about how they feel without worrying about their status in the house or with the public). If they find they can’t tolerate Emily’s presence after what she did, if for example they feel forced to walk, then Emily’s out and they get to stay—no question, experiment over. There is also a danger of putting Emily under too much scrutiny, beyond what a housemate should normally expect and have to endure, even if they’ve done a bad thing. Again, this is a situation that could be monitored with the understanding that housemates’ welfare is paramount. There is also of course a danger of offence to the watching public and, as was evident during the CBB row, to some of the non-watching public as well. Well, offended viewers could switch off or turn over. True, some people, white and black, made eloquent and compelling cases for how good it was that Emily was booted. I don’t dispute the goodness or sincerity of their sentiments. I merely propose that it would be even better (for our mutual, anti-racist cause) to let her stay and see what we all can learn. As for non-viewers, I’m not saying they have no right to be offended by what they don’t see or hear (it’s still out there), but if we want an informative debate about how best to negotiate the sometimes hazardous terrain of multicultural Britain then we would all be better off if they listened and watched and then made their contribution.
Ultimately, and with the above caveats not forgotten, I think leaving Emily in would have been worth a try. BB, however, felt it could not defend a decision to let her stay, especially after the last CBB. I can understand that, but I still think it’s wrong. BB could have defended such a decision on the above grounds. Of course I would say that, but there are other grounds as well. BB could have added that historically it has been one of the most open and multicultural programmes on television. I can’t think of another programme that represents people of diverse racial and sexual identities more numerically or more positively than does BB (a defence, unless I missed something, that BB inexplicably failed to make for itself either last time or this). And BB could have pointed out that housemates don’t speak for BB (I was amazed how many TV experts conflated the voices of housemates and that of BB, and can only assume they were fooled by their own prejudices against the show—but that’s not the kind of wilful ignorance we need in a debate like this). BB has pointed out that the show often works as a sort of morality play: bad people get evicted. That’s seems to me a great argument for keeping her in and letting the public decide and demonstrate what it thinks of what Emily said.
Also, kicking Emily out as quickly as BB did is not without its dangers, not the least of which is rendering the programme unwatchably boring and pointless. When BB first appeared on our screens (all those years ago, in what now seem like the simpler times and innocent days of Craig and Brian etc), it defended its existence on the grounds of social experimentation. If BB now forgets that mission—and forgets it when that defence is most important and most valid—then is it anything more than slightly exploitative light entertainment? There is also a danger perhaps that in attempting to underscore the seriousness of racism, Emily’s removal has in fact had the opposite effect. There is the danger of a complacency setting in: Emily’s out—problem solved. Of course few of the people who wanted Emily out would view her removal from the Big Brother House as a proxy for the removal of racism from our society. But some of the very people who have the most to learn about these issues might easily think exactly that. Ultimately, then, in booting Emily out we may have missed an opportunity—an opportunity to acknowledge the nature of some of our multicultural interactions as they are, and to explore how much better they might be.
“Thisisjimrockford”
As BT says, Emily was engaging in “cultural appropriation”, presumably sourcing it from rap music (her explanation that this is how she banters with black people she’s “friendly with” is less than convincing). And Emily obviously thought she’d found some sort of post-racist space or context in which she could use any language she liked to try to connect with the people she was with. Here, as BT said in a previous post, is where Emily’s very specific social background comes in—an upper middle class one that imbued her with the kind of confidence and presumption that is inappropriate to people from more modest and polite backgrounds. Yes, BT, it will indeed be interesting to see how those commentators who ascribed the behaviour of Jade et al to their class background deal with this. Also, of course, Emily must have forgotten that this space was far from hermetic, connecting as it did and does to “our” space through the medium of the Big Brother cameras. (This may seem like a bizarre thing to forget, since being watched is the point of their being in the BB House, but past housemates have often said how easily you forget the cameras after a while). But still, however misguidedly, she thought she’d found a safe post-racist space or context in which she could use otherwise racist language.
Emily’s notion of a post-racist space is the first but the least significant sign of the extent of complexity and contestability in the moral and behavioural order. More significant by far is Charley’s and Nicky’s early confusion about how to react. As you say, initially they seemed willing not to be offended or at least too offended, implying their acceptance of the idea of such a space and even that a posh white girl could enter it. Their question, “where did that come from?” (which is where I’m getting all these space/place metaphors), clearly hints at suspicion that Emily’s comment came from a racist place, and was spoken during Charley’s and Nicky’s conversational journey towards being more offended that they were at first, but it sill implied the possibility that Emily and her word came from a non-racist place. And it’s possible they still think her word might have come from a non-racist place, even though they finally concluded that she had, in fact, used it unacceptably.
Finally, the symbolic order on the outside is of course made by people, by us, and reactions to the comment and the consequent removal have naturally varied. There are debates over whether Emily was just trying (though obviously failing) to be cool, or was actually being racist. And there are debates over, whatever she might have meant, whether or not she deserved to be evicted (and whether or not should have been evicted—which is a different thing). Once again, then, we see a complex and negotiable symbolic order, in particular among the people who decide what that order is.
None of this is deep or profound, as you may have noticed. I think most would agree that context is important, though given how many contexts Emily’s word mattered in—not only what Emily meant, but how it affected Charley and Nicky, and how it affected viewers—it’s hard to sustain the view in this instance that context is everything. Indeed, the many people who take time to say that Emily wasn’t meaning to be racist or offensive even while saying that she should have been evicted clearly think that context matters but isn’t everything. Also, I’m sure most would agree that symbolic orders are complex, contested, and negotiable. But I think that remembering these things helps account for the interesting delayed reaction exhibited by Charley and Nicky in the minutes and then hours after Emily’s outburst. Also, more significantly, remembering these things can help us with the multiculturalism issue that BT brought up.
I think BT is right to say that “the facts of difference persist beyond our desire for them”. And I think this fact is worth two cheers—it’s a good thing and gives hope that we can build a better multicultural society. A third cheer may be warranted when people like Emily have better appreciation of others’ sensibilities. The question is: how exactly do we do achieve a better multicultural society? BT says, in reference again to the facts of difference despite our desire to transcend them, that “we have to start from there, acknowledging and exploring the reality, if we are going to get anywhere”. I think that’s dead right, but the question again is how exactly do we do that acknowledging and exploring? And one possible answer may be that Big Brother (and Endemol, Channel 4, the sponsors, advertisers, and us, the supporters of the symbolic order, whoever is ultimately responsible for the decision) should have let Emily stay, albeit, for sure, with a serious bollocking and a final warning. That may sound weird, but bear with me.
In an earlier post, BT said Emily’s removal was “excellent news. And this despite hoping that in Week 5 Emily would get strangled by Alice bands in act of class war”. I too had hoped fervently for some such thing. But maybe Emily’s removal at this stage was not such excellent news. Had Emily stayed, the housemates and the rest of us might have been able to do more to acknowledge where we are as a multicultural society and to explore how we might yet be a better multicultural society.
Whatever its detractors think, multiculturalism is not going to go away. The only serious debate is whether we want to live in one society that is both integrated but also diverse and multicultural in which we all have multiple and overlapping identities and allegiances. That sounds difficult and indeed it is, but it’s not impossible: people in the British Isles have been it doing for thousands of years. Or else whether we want to live in one of many isolated and segregated societies that rarely or never speak to each other and which is only multicultural in the mutually unenlightening and potentially dangerous sense that we live together in a state of no communication on the same island. I rather favour the former, but if we are to succeed and thrive as that kind of multicultural society we need to do exactly what BT says, even perhaps (admittedly more arguably) to the point of acknowledging and exploring Emily’s moment as far as we can take it.
There are many reasons why exploring relations between Emily and Charley and Nicky might be enlightening. First, had Emily stayed, she could have learned—and learned a lot—from the very people she hurt. She surely would have learned more from them than from the sometimes concocted outrage of others on the outside. An added benefit of this is that Charley and Nicky would have retained more control over the debate about race and language (which they are surely entitled to in this instance) had Emily stayed than they have now she is gone. Also, not just Emily, but other white people could have learned more about this issue of race and language with Emily in than with Emily out. It’s true that we’ve learned something about these issues from Emily’s removal and perhaps for some people that’s all you need to know: use racist language and you are excommunicated. But maybe we could have learned more from it, acknowledged and explored it further, had she stayed. She and we could have learned more about why it’s so unacceptable. It might be obvious to many why it was unacceptable, but it was clearly not obvious to Emily and I’m sure it’s not obvious to many others. I have read many, many times since Emily’s removal comments to the effect that if rappers can use the word, why not Emily? A good, long debate in the House and out may help explain why. Besides, if the use/non-use of the n-word matters (as of course it does), then surely we can’t learn enough about it in all its ingloriousness.
My (little) brother was telling me this weekend how his children (aged 9 to 19) listen to and love hip hop, and how he tells them where some of its language comes from originally, why rappers might nevertheless use it themselves, but how that doesn’t mean anyone and everyone can go round using it. Not all of the many young white people who listen to that music get that advice—and it’s not entirely their fault is they then make the big mistake a huge, Emily-sized mistake. Either Emily was never taught these things, or she never listened. But other potential Emilys might learn from her error; other potential Charleys and Nickys might have less of this kind of thing to put with. And we all might live in a better multicultural society because we know more about each other’s sensibilities. And let’s not forget, while we’re talking about the nature of multiculturalism, that Emily was, however misguidedly, adopting what she thought of as black idioms, trying, in other words, to acculturate to aspects of African-Caribbean-British culture (albeit influenced in this instance by African-American culture). If white people want to do this, and it’s to be celebrated when they do, then sometimes they will make mistakes, and sometimes those mistakes will cause offence. This is not to say that offence should be overlooked. Just that it should be learned from so there can be more, and more successful, white-to-black acculturation and integration.
There would, for sure, be dangers in letting Emily stay in the House. The biggest are that further hurt and offence could be caused to Charley and Nicky, and not necessarily by Emily repeating that kind of language but even perhaps simply by her continuing presence. But BB can monitor the situation in meetings with the two women (strictly private and never broadcast meetings so they can be honest about how they feel without worrying about their status in the house or with the public). If they find they can’t tolerate Emily’s presence after what she did, if for example they feel forced to walk, then Emily’s out and they get to stay—no question, experiment over. There is also a danger of putting Emily under too much scrutiny, beyond what a housemate should normally expect and have to endure, even if they’ve done a bad thing. Again, this is a situation that could be monitored with the understanding that housemates’ welfare is paramount. There is also of course a danger of offence to the watching public and, as was evident during the CBB row, to some of the non-watching public as well. Well, offended viewers could switch off or turn over. True, some people, white and black, made eloquent and compelling cases for how good it was that Emily was booted. I don’t dispute the goodness or sincerity of their sentiments. I merely propose that it would be even better (for our mutual, anti-racist cause) to let her stay and see what we all can learn. As for non-viewers, I’m not saying they have no right to be offended by what they don’t see or hear (it’s still out there), but if we want an informative debate about how best to negotiate the sometimes hazardous terrain of multicultural Britain then we would all be better off if they listened and watched and then made their contribution.
Ultimately, and with the above caveats not forgotten, I think leaving Emily in would have been worth a try. BB, however, felt it could not defend a decision to let her stay, especially after the last CBB. I can understand that, but I still think it’s wrong. BB could have defended such a decision on the above grounds. Of course I would say that, but there are other grounds as well. BB could have added that historically it has been one of the most open and multicultural programmes on television. I can’t think of another programme that represents people of diverse racial and sexual identities more numerically or more positively than does BB (a defence, unless I missed something, that BB inexplicably failed to make for itself either last time or this). And BB could have pointed out that housemates don’t speak for BB (I was amazed how many TV experts conflated the voices of housemates and that of BB, and can only assume they were fooled by their own prejudices against the show—but that’s not the kind of wilful ignorance we need in a debate like this). BB has pointed out that the show often works as a sort of morality play: bad people get evicted. That’s seems to me a great argument for keeping her in and letting the public decide and demonstrate what it thinks of what Emily said.
Also, kicking Emily out as quickly as BB did is not without its dangers, not the least of which is rendering the programme unwatchably boring and pointless. When BB first appeared on our screens (all those years ago, in what now seem like the simpler times and innocent days of Craig and Brian etc), it defended its existence on the grounds of social experimentation. If BB now forgets that mission—and forgets it when that defence is most important and most valid—then is it anything more than slightly exploitative light entertainment? There is also a danger perhaps that in attempting to underscore the seriousness of racism, Emily’s removal has in fact had the opposite effect. There is the danger of a complacency setting in: Emily’s out—problem solved. Of course few of the people who wanted Emily out would view her removal from the Big Brother House as a proxy for the removal of racism from our society. But some of the very people who have the most to learn about these issues might easily think exactly that. Ultimately, then, in booting Emily out we may have missed an opportunity—an opportunity to acknowledge the nature of some of our multicultural interactions as they are, and to explore how much better they might be.
“Thisisjimrockford”
posted by bigbrothersbigtheory @ 9:33 pm
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