Hey hey thanks for getting back to me. I hear ya on sleep deprivation, apparently there have been some wacktastic astrological things going on so that might explain the unabashed rage too (aside from recent obvious events in America and world).

Here's the thing, it wasn't your comment alone; it was the barrage of comments, the likes of which I've rarely seen in response to anything other than articles written by Black people on Medium, many which were far meaner than yours (which, yes, could be construed easily as a joke by anyone in a neutral or positive mindset, albeit still falling under a very conventional but perhaps worthy of reconsidering category of humor that is somewhat mean while being ironic or pithy). Based on how many conversations I've had with POC about "Schitt's Creek" and how angry and defensive people get when they say they don't like it, I guess I got a little protective (and some of that was selfish because I too have been called a number of names for writing that article).

I guess the clarification about what you asked is not necessarily that we POC should be treated differently in comments because of race, but that in general we shouldn't have a culture online that is fundamentally mean or mocking -- even if in jest, since sarcasm can't be conveyed as it can in real-life interactions. But like I just watched both Sex and the City movies (I truly have no idea why I did that) and I see reflected such a precedent even for IRL mean relationships that I felt so used to when I was growing up and in college and depressed af. And now when I talk to a lot of people from my "old life" before I came out and started seeking friendship in softer communities (not to say queer community is ANY kind of utopia), I see those old mean "joking" relationship dynamics play out again. So my perspective is that this way of interacting isn't really beneficial to anyone, but even more so when it adds to a sea of commentary that may be perceived as racist or otherwise causing harm to someone already experiencing a lot of pain right now (but in many ways we're all experiencing different kinds of pain, which is why I don't think this "tough love" kind of interaction even if it's sometimes fun or goofy is productive or compassionate as the norm).

Also, I say the previous acknowledging that I flipped out this weekend and behaved on the interwebs in a way that I disavowed years ago when I was still extremely depressed and angry (I'm still some of both, but despite my slip-up I've really tried to not stoop to that and I guess I just reached a breaking point after the response to the riots compared to what it was like getting teargassed during the Uprising this summer). But I always believe we can all do better and no one is as bad as their worst mistake.

Anyways I don't think it's ridiculous. I think it's ridiculous as we want to believe to think that we can or should be more compassionate, and by proxy be more sensitive in how we communicate. We all know that words have meaning and consequences, and it's this awareness that has disqualified the extremely violent "n" word from the non-stigmatized use of white people, made it so blackface is taboo, and even made it unacceptable to caress the leg of your female co-worker just because she's there. What I'm getting at is that by most standards, "reforming" how we behave in the moment always reads as oversensitivity. I mean, I can laugh heartily at the line in "Legally Blonde" where the radical lesbian from Berkeley is ranting about how "semester" is a representation of sexism in the English lexicon and she wants to campaign to change it to "ovester." At a certain point, shit really is ridiculous. And there's a fine line that we always have to be aware of.

But like, yes, the reality is that sometimes if you're not going to generally alter your language to be a little "nicer" (whatever that means), then sometimes there are things contextually said to a POC that sound worse than they might to a white person, even if it would sound snippy or mean or stupid regardless. Like condemning a Black person for having a "black soul" or condescendingly telling them you hope their children grow out of their "Hallmark whitebread sanitized world" because you don't like their taste in media. The former plays into trends of stigmatizing blackness at the exact same time as insulting the character of a Black person (which seems grey area enough to at least make a small cringe of maybe don't say that...) and the latter implies that the author enjoys and/or upholds all the aspects of "whitebread" society (a term which often has very much to do with whiteness, even if in a pejorative way), which also doesn't look very good when a white person is accusing a Black person of such... especially on the grounds of something so trivial as disagreeing on a show.

Here's the thing-- I don't mean to be presumptuous but I'm wondering if based on your spelling whether you are (or were born in, even if you now live in America?) Canadian, British, or Australian? I ask because I hear a lot of leftists in political spaces that I occupy discuss how overemphasis on racial sensitivity (or "identity politics") is what drives people into the arms of Trump. It's a gross exaggeration for anyone to claim that any one thing drove people into the arms of Trump, but it's also a gross neglection of American history and culture to suggest that the role of explicitly and uncomfortably calling out racist behavior doesn't have productive outcomes. That was the whole point of the Civil Rights movement. And when you come from a place as absolutely mired in racism as America is--given that we were founded on genocide against Indigenous people and then built on enslavement of Black people, the legacies of which have never really been meaningfully addressed or rectified-- then the only way to move forward is to really understand and learn from actions.

Part of the ambivalence and desensitization to conversations about privilege and "identity politics" has everything to do with just wanting the conversation to end, even though by every measure the problem is still here, and by many accounts as bad as it's ever been (Indigenous elders dying at disproportionately higher rates than any other population while the US cuts funding to their hospitals; Black people getting killed for nothing while a QAnon Shaman terrorist gets served organic food in prison). It warrants mindful and uncomfortable reckoning, and of course people won't like that. That's the nature of white supremacy and why it's so insidious--people will defer to classism and other issues (which yes, are salient and pivotal to address and absolutely inextricably connected to racism, at least in America), but it doesn't negate the need to become more aware of how even small actions and interactions and behaviors and privileges play into the upholding of white supremacy. White people who refuse to give that up will be angry regardless of the degree to which they're being asked to hold themselves accountable because they don't want to give up the privilege or the hierarchy--especially if it's all they have because they're poor.

Anyway, like I said, I mean it that I appreciate what the show means for some people. It brought me laughter and joy too in hard times. That's why I was so disappointed with it in the end. And I don't think it needs to be "canceled," I think it needs to be reckoned with just like Sex and the City or any other show that is "fun" and dumb and maybe even radical in certain ways but problematic in others.