How Soon Until Alice’s Restaurant is Deemed Hate Speech?

Loading

07SesameStreetThanksgiving

From this post’s title you’re probably guessing that I’m about to write about the latest tirade from leftist crybullies. While thankfully this has not happened yet, it almost feels inevitable. Ace gives a roundup of the latest round of outrages from just yesterday:

Man Caves are sexist.1

Practicing yoga is racist

Schlockumentaries on mythical campus rape statistics are having their Wikipedia pages edited by people who dislike the that that they’re getting called out on their lies

And even Math itself is under attack by by feminists.

The point is that nothing is too crazy to cause offense to the Radical Left. So how does this relate to the song Alice’s Restaurant? For those of you unfamiliar, this year marks the 50th anniversary of Arlo Guthrie’s legendary counterculture song that takes a jab at the Vietnam war toward the end of its 19 minutes. The song itself is just some acoustic guitar playing while Guthrie relates a tale based on a true story that took place in his life – in a nutshell, he is arrested for dumping garbage and this conviction ultimately disqualifies him from joining the army. The story itself takes place on Thanksgiving, and over the years has become a Thanksgiving tradition itself. Growing up in New Jersey, my older brothers and I would look forward to the annual Noon broadcast of this song on the former rock station WNEW-FM.

Despite the point of the song being a leftist message it doesn’t beat you over the head with it, such as with all of the ridiculous anti-American Iraq War movies from the Bush years or your average Colbert skit. It’s genuinely funny, and Guthrie is a master story teller. At this point you’re probably wondering why on Earth this song could be seen as problematic. Well, toward the end Guthrie offers this suggestion (lyrics via Metrolyrics, emphasis mine):

And friends, somewhere in Washington enshrined in some little folder, is a
Study in black and white of my fingerprints. And the only reason I’m
Singing you this song now is cause you may know somebody in a similar
Situation, or you may be in a similar situation, and if your in a
Situation like that there’s only one thing you can do and that’s walk into
The shrink wherever you are ,just walk in say “Shrink, You can get
Anything you want, at Alice’s restaurant.”. And walk out. You know, if
One person, just one person does it they may think he’s really sick and
They won’t take him. And if two people, two people do it, in harmony,
They may think they’re both faggots and they won’t take either of them.

Such slurs are very problematic. If banning this song sounds insane keep in mind that back in 2011 Dire Straits’ “Money for Nothing” was memory-holed from radio airplay north of the border by Canada’s “Human Rights” Commissars. Thankfully sanity prevailed and the ban was lifted after a few months. But given how our outrage culture has metastasized would anyone be shocked  if even a darling among the left like Arlo Guthrie came under fire?

This is one of those predictions that I don’t believe will ever come true, but if it did I wouldn’t be shocked.

And on this Thanksgiving as you enjoy time with your family, take a moment to remember the victims of the Pinedale Shopping Center Massacre.

And in the words of the late, great Rick Danko. “Happy Thanksgiving!”

Follow Brother Bob on Twitter and Facebook

Cross posted from Brother Bob’s Blog

 

1 I might be in the minority on this, but while the idea of having a man cave in Chateau d’ Bob sounds fun, my general thought on the subject is, “If you need a room to get away from your family you’re doing it wrong.”

0 0 votes
Article Rating
Subscribe
Notify of
25 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments

Salt Lake City had a visit from Arlo Guthrie just recently and hubby and I both were amazed that just the littering aspect of the song hadn’t made it verboten.
People loved him here!
All that un-PC in the most liberal city in Utah and they LOVED him!
Arlo remade that song to be a bit more liberal than liberal was by the song’s 40th anniversary.*
I wonder if he had to rewrite it even more by this year?
He is willing to.

*as per Page 240 of this book:
Living Blue in the Red States by
David Starkey 2007

BB The Band–Damn!
Alice’s Restaurant—could never stop laughing.

Happy Thanksgiving—A little different now I’m a vegan but the wish remains the same-of course I’m Irish so the Party goes on.

@Brother Bob: Actually, I heard from one concert-goer that he only sang the 1st 3 minutes or so then stopped.
He told the audience, ”you know how it goes….on and on and on for 17 minutes.”
So, he avoided many potential issues.

Blazing Saddles

Richard Pryor and Chevy Chase on SNL

What a life it must be looking at everything so you can pick out something to be offended, no sense of humor. You dont even have to think its funny just roll your eyes and live and let live. They cant do that organize tell others to be offended burn something down. Demand that history be wiped out. Conservatives have finally had enough, not another inch, restore what was lost, peacefully, within the confines of the law. We can be as relentless as them. We need to laugh point and laugh at their ridiculous arguments, make fun of them, hurt their feelings.

@Brother Bob:All should Turn up “The Night They Drove Ol Dixie Down” with the late great Levon* Helm on vocal and drums.

* Did you know that’s who Elton John was singing about?

Dr. J. Young Frankenstein Had me at “walk this way.” Happy Thanksgiving

It is truly amazing that the only two works in the vocabulary of the liberals, tree huggers, congress, the fool and the idiot’s toilet cabinet and demonstrators are sexist and racists? few went to college now went to high school and most do not even know their daddies.
Time to end this crap of poor me…
Stupidity is not curable.

@Rich Wheeler:

You too, Rich

I believe that it was his father who changed the lyrics of “City of New Orleans” to make them “less offensive”
The change?
“Freight yards full of old black men” became
“Freight yards full of tired old men”!
Wow, from racism to ageism.
Where’s my safe space?
Hint: It’s a control on my CD player…

@Rich Wheeler: Marilyn or Di?
hope that wasn’t the 64000 dollar question.

I’ve been seeing lot’s of local tv ads for “the Wiz”. Maybe we should target them for “cultural appropriation”. ;-D

@Jim S: No such thing anymore they changed the name its now “self identify”

@kitt
“Levon” Song by E.J.. about his friend Levon Helm.:

ohhh I should have stopped at 50000
😉

I saw the headline, thought it might refer to hate speech towards cops:
“I fell off a cliff, but I didn’t die. I fell on a cop. And he died.”

Brother Bob,
Here’s today’s bit of insanity from socialist Canada, America’s Canary in the coal mine:

When news started spreading about soldiers receiving letters notifying them that they would be asked to vacate their residences to make room for refugees, the Liberals denied it. They’ve now confirmed that single unmarried soldiers awaiting deployment, will indeed need to move.
Soldiers are used to being asked to make sacrifices and we’ll have to wait and see how long they can expect this dislocation to last.


http://www.brianlilley.com/#sthash.RyyM5Cq1.7VEHXIFL.dpuf

I caught Arlo at the Garden State Arts Center back in the 80’s, and he substituted the post office for the shrink’s office, because that’s where we had to go to register for the draft.

It was definitely a different type of leftism back when he wrote that song, as opposed to today’s bat guano insane people.

I strongly doubt these lyrics could be sung by an all-black group, but they were part of a BIG HIT in the day for En Vogue:

Why oh why must it be this way
Before you can read me you gotta learn how to see me, I said
Free your mind and the rest will follow
Be color blind, don’t be so shallow.
Free your mind and the rest will follow
Be color blind, don’t be so shallow