Slurs For Sale–NINA?* Irish Car Bombs

This is supposed to be funny. Many have died as a result of these measures of despair, measures of despair that should never have happened–and there is an ugly history behind these actions, ever since The Tudor Conquest.

* NINA, back in the days of newspaper want ads, tacked on at the end, meant, “No Irish Need Apply.” This is what my great-grandparents & grandparents had to cope with & why mostly the jobs they got were railroad & police-related. These jobs provided the best opportunities for some degree of economic stability. Eventually, this sort thing ended, but there remain residual elements, when there could be clever names that could sell items without the built-in expense of human dignity. A slur is a slur is a slur, just as Gertrude Stein observed about roses.

Slurs & Loathing In San Francisco-Michelle Shocked & Cako Chaos

Today, with a huge degree of sadness, I read about the anti-gay rant carried out Sunday evening by singer Michelle Shocked @ Yoshi’s. My initial information came from reading the San Francisco Examiner & later confirmed via Friends from Facebook, re-posting various Internet articles about the same topic.

I did not attend the concert, so my information may be technically 2nd hand, but I consider it reliable. I actually feel a sense of grief about this, how someone who seemed potentially with us (if, not, indeed, one of us) could allow self-hatred to devour her inner core.

Shocked to the core. Please note the heart as part of her autographing process. Somehow, she lost her heart. Will she ever get it back?

I met her briefly, many years ago, at the Castro Theatre–about the time Tower Records on Market Street was closing. The sense I had of her during that very brief ‘meet & greet’ encounter was nothing like whatever it is she has become.

From Cako Cupcakes: IRISH CAR BOMBS! This was their contribution to St Patrick’s Day? The sign was removed the next day.

And continuing with the topic of slurs, different focus…Saturday before St. Patrick’s Day, I noticed for sale @ the Cako Cupcake kiosk, Westfield Center, cupcakes given the name IRISH CAR BOMB!
I did not have a camera in hand @ that moment to record the sign, but took a photograph of two of these items. I returned the next day, and noticed that the sign with the rather inflammatory descriptive had been removed. So, unable to provide proof of what I saw, but here are the two of the cakes, and a photograph of one of Michelle Shocked’s compact discs, this one with the ironic & weirdly prophetic title, “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.”

Michelle Shocked is dead, totally self inflicted, but she managed to harm many on her way downhill. Is there hope for her? The cupcakes, may not be in the same league as the rant from Michelle Shocked, but the managers who made the choice to name cupcakes IRISH CAR BOMB just because a whisper of supposedly Irish-made liquors are part of the ingredients, made a terribly foolish & insulting choice.

Make that a sort of triple or quadruple whammy, being Irish, gay, used to enjoy Michelle Shocked, cupcakes…I am glad it’s not the end of the world, but both coming one on top of the other were just plain ugly, and entirely inexcusable.