Too hot to touch?

I've debated whether to even comment on this. I'm sure there's a much deeper plane of thought and knowledge that went into the writing of this than I can appreciate. But yet something just keeps nagging at me.

It's from a Post columnist about Tyler Perry's new movie. He plays a fat, old grandma. And this is the columnist's reaction:

"And there I sat, silently ranting: There is nothing funny about this black man in pantyhose. And where is all of this cross-dressing-black-man stuff coming from, anyway? First, comedians Eddie Murphy and Martin Lawrence star in high-grossing movies as the fattest, ugliest black women that Hollywood makeup artists can conjure up, and now here's Perry with his gussied-up version of the same butt of the joke.

By the way, I don't want to hear diddly about Robin Williams as Mrs. Doubtfire or Milton Berle in high heels. Having a black man play super mammy is not the same thing. Perhaps it would be were it not for America's perverse, systemic and centuries-long efforts to humiliate African men and women and turn them into slaves."

I think possibly my fear is that my ignorance, or my simple comment on the situation, will sound racist or bigoted. Maybe it's that I'm too afraid to touch something so sensitive, and since I don't believe myself to be racist, that I'll end up being insensitive (unknowingly).

But here it is (anyway): For the last 2 years, all we could hear is "It doesn't matter your skin color." "We've broken the color barrier for the highest elected official in America." "We are a nation united." Etc etc etc. Which is great.

So why not now? Why isn't Tyler Perry similar to Robin Williams? Why do we have to keep going back to the "America's perverse, systemic and centuries-long efforts to humiliate African men and women and turn them into slaves." Can we no longer laugh at Chris Rock, for fear that our laughter will be confused as derision?

I realize there's this whole caveat in our view of racism that black people can say things to each other and about each other that we never can do as white folks. I don't really care (although if you ever listen to rap it's amazing the words they use). But I thought we're moving forward in race relations. Not backwards. We can never forget the atrocities of the past and we must vow to never let that happen again. But I also don't think it must cloud our every days lives, nor do I think it prevents us from laughing together, black and white.

Maybe Mr. Milloy just wants to keep bringing it up and continue to point out the sins of our forefathers. Maybe he can't laugh at it and wants to find a reason why. I don't know, and I shouldn't try to figure it out. I just can't seem to get it out my head that there's some kind of double-standard going on. In my opinion, articles of this sort only continue to feed the fire of racism and serve as a roadblock to American becoming colorblind.

[Full column is here. As of the time of this posting, this article was one of the top headlines on washingtonpost.com - which I think shows they think this deserves extra attention.]