Nope, Still Not Over a 9-Year-Old Girl Being Called a Cunt

Sunday night during the 85th annual Academy Awards show my 9-year-old son, Mr. T, was pretty jealous of one of his peers, 9-year-old Quvenzhané Wallis, the star of Beasts of the Southern Wild.

"So wait, she's the same age as me and she could win Best Actress?" he asked. I nodded my head yes. "She must be really good....are those statues made out of solid gold? She's sooooo lucky."

Lucky.

Only a few minutes after we scrunched our noses at "the Hunger Games girl" beating Quvenzhané for a performance that is not Katniss, a staffer at the Onion posted its now infamous tweet: 

After Twitter erupted, the tweet came down and this morning CEO Steve Hannah issued an apology:

"No person should be subjected to such a senseless, humorless comment masquerading as satire. The tweet was taken down within an hour of publication. We have instituted new and tighter Twitter procedures to ensure that this kind of mistake does not occur again. In addition, we are taking immediate steps to discipline those individuals responsible. Miss Wallis, you are young and talented and deserve better. All of us at The Onion are deeply sorry."

I appreciate the apology--although they needed to apologize to her parents, too--but 24 hours later, I'm still bothered by the whole situation.

I'm not over how some folks decided it was time to school those of us who were offended on the definition of satire. For your perusal, here's the Oxford dictionary's definition:

"the use of humour, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues." 

You want to read satire? Check out Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal." It's a masterpiece of satire and--shocker--no one gets called a cunt.

Calling a little girl a name like that isn't satire. It's vile misogyny that dives headfirst into the waters of racism. If you're questioning whether it's racism, ask yourself if young white actresses of Quvenzhané's caliber have ever been disrespected in such a manner.

I'm also not over how folks tried to silence those of us who were not having it. One guy had the nerve to reply to me that some women he knows like being called that word. That response is right up there with "some of my best friends are black."

And still others are saying that if the Onion censors itself with these so-called tighter Twitter procedures, free speech as we know it will end...because the fate of free speech and democracy depends on the Onion being able to call 9-year-old girls cunts, obviously.

I am all for free speech, but words are power. And anyone who's ever picked up a Spiderman comic (or read Voltaire) knows,"With great power comes great responsibility." So you can say whatever you want but ultimately, you are responsible for the consequences of your words.
 
Why is that so hard to understand? Which brings me back to what I said after I first saw the tweet:  

Dear @theonion Please fire the person/people who thought it was cool to call Quvenzhané Wallis such a despicable, disrespectful word. Now.
— Liz Dwyer (@losangelista) February 25, 2013

Is the discipline over at the Onion going to involve someone getting fired? When there is no real consequence, folks feel free to "go there" again. Of course, there will be no real consequence if this is a "Dude, you got us SO many page views with your controversial tweet...Don't worry about anything," situation. Hmm...I think we should all email Steve Hannah (shannah@theonion.com) and ask him to be more specific about what exactly he means by "discipline." Spell it out for me, please.

As for young Quvenzhané, go see her movie. Buy the DVD when it comes out. Support her with the only thing Hollywood cares about in the end--your money. It'll be worth it cos as even my son could tell, she is really good.