Heh [News - Employees find noose hanging at work]

cnn.com/2007/US/01/05/chernoff.noose/index.html

Saw this on the news not long ago. Really stupid thing to do.

I like how he desperately tries to argue he isn't racist, after doing something like that. How low can you get?

OK, I only skim read it but, perhaps because I don't live in the US, I don't associate a noose with anything other than hanging people - regardless of colour. In fact, if I were to picture a hanging, I'd probably think of highwaymen, criminals, Mussolini, Saddam and an old fashioned white-on-white Western lynching before a race-motivated hanging. Is a noose automatically a potent racist symbol in the US?

Not here in the Northern states. It may be in the South (which is where all the lynching was).

Pretty much what Enjay said.

I have to agree with Enjay. Nooses weren't always used for the lynchings in the south. Before that they were used for martial law, and hanging criminals in front of crowds and such. Of course, they guys that put it their basically admitted to being racist when they said "to hang two black employees".

Some western-themed restaurant got sued here in Alabama a few years back for one or two nooses on the walls.

A popular game to play when I were a kid were hangman... I'm such a racist bigot.

Enjay said:
OK, I only skim read it but, perhaps because I don't live in the US, I don't associate a noose with anything other than hanging people - regardless of colour.

The article seems to be quoting someone's take of a conversation where it was said that it was there to hang a couple of employees, who are black. And regardless of racist connotations... a hangman's noose at work, what the fuck.

Upon reading the headline here, I figured it was suicide-related, like a failed attempt, or the guy set it up so he could go get one last cup of coffee before stepping off the chair. Race or murder never came to mind.

Yeah, "vicious racist symbol" my ass. Fucking liberal pansy fuckup racial-persecution-complex-wearing assholes. Even if the person who put it up had racial intent, to go straight to that assumption is as stupid as putting it up with racial intent in the first place.

kristus said:

A popular game to play when I were a kid were hangman... I'm such a racist bigot.

We weren't allowed to play hangman because it was the death of a white stick figure on a black world.

But pertaining to the article even if the intension was there I don't believe a noose should be directed at a race rather then a form of criminal punishment.

Ultraviolet said:
to go straight to that assumption is as stupid as putting it up with racial intent in the first place.

Perhaps it would be, but you have to know what happened. Even if it was just a generic threat (regardless of race), it's still quite out of place in a workplace and liable to some sort of action, legal or union based. And if it's not clear it's racist, it seems it was easy to make it into a racist case (the company lawyer quickly acknowledged that the noose could connote racism), due to the circumstances.

Fifty years ago, he would have just had them hanging from a tree with forks up their asses.

Fifty years ago, he would have just had them hanging from a tree with forks up their asses.

He really knew what he was saying there. Now with every case of alleged racism everyone will think "wait, I remebered something... Kramer!"

EDIT: wtf... so there are drawbacks to being a mod; like hitting edit/delete instead of quote.

A noose doesn't have to be associated with racism but why would there be one hanging in a work environment in the first place as a joke? Racism or not, it seems a bit violent just in general :/

Are you guys kidding me????? Blacks were often hanged by the KKK and others in America's early years. Blacks were hung by the NOOSE while white supremacists gathered around chanting die NIGGER at one time in this country and it was ok. A noose to a black person, is like a SWASTIKA to a JEW. It reminds them of the past, a very ugly past.

Up until the advent of the electric chair the the gallows and the firing squad were the only two accepted methods of execution in most Anlgophone nations. Everyone was hung.

baronofhell said:

Are you guys kidding me????? Blacks were often hanged by the KKK and others in America's early years. Blacks were hung by the NOOSE while white supremacists gathered around chanting die NIGGER at one time in this country and it was ok. A noose to a black person, is like a SWASTIKA to a JEW. It reminds them of the past, a very ugly past.

You are a moron. Srsly. Liberal. Pansy. Faggot. EOF.

Ultraviolet said:
Liberal.

You fail it; if baronofhell is a liberal I'm a Catholic school teacher.

He doesn't look conservative to me.

Not being a liberal does not make you a conservative.

Liberal was a joke-insult. He is definitely a pansy-faggot though.

What the fuck? Shut up.

What the hell? Someone coulda come to the work in Klan robes, holding a whip, and yelling "Get back in the fields, niggers," and there'd probably still be people here going "It's not racist, you pansy liberals." Methinks thou doth protest too much.

/

Going out on a limb here, but I think it's entirely possible it could have been tongue-in-cheek. If so, it's in extremely poor taste, nor is it that funny.

alexz721 said:
Going out on a limb here, but I think it's entirely possible it could have been tongue-in-cheek. If so, it's in extremely poor taste, nor is it that funny.

True; they did say that in the article. It's hard to know without being there and knowing the people involved. It could also happen that both sides could genuinely come out feeling differently about the meaning of the event and any intents.