"The Sopranos" has
crystallized something. Since "The Sopranos" began airing, it
seems to me that some people feel it's
given them a license to slur Italian Americans".
"I've
covered stories with journalists from all across the nation -- people who
presumably have achieved a certain level of sophistication -- and I've heard some make ignorant comments about ''wops,'' or say
that Italians are prone to criminality or joke that they must be involved in
coating people with concrete. When I've
challenged them, they looked puzzled. Shocked. Surely
there was nothing wrong with what they were saying -- was there? I've known reporters who have been asked if they're "connected" because their names end in
a vowel. "
[RAA Note: Paragraph 10. "Of course
there is an Italian mob " Just a slight clarification
. It was the IRISH that were the FIRST Mobsters in the US (even before the
"Robber Barons"). The JEWS took over from them, and the ITALIANS succeeded them. But that is Ancient History.
Although the Media "plays up" every Italian petty criminals move, the
Mafia is Extinct, and they seem to ignore the Juggernauts in the field
nowadays, The Russian Jewish Mafia, the Israeli Kosher Nostra, the Columbian
and Mexican Cartels, and the Latin and Black Street gangs who since they have
victims mostly in their neighborhoods, we ignore it. The focus has always been
on the physical crime, we only scratch the surface of the Monumenmtal
Fraud and Looting prevalent on Wall Street, and in Pensions, Health Care, etc.]
Thanks to Manny Alfano of IAOV
The Sour Note in 'The
Sopranos'
Maureen O'Donnell, Columnist
June 5, 2007
I'm
watching the final season of "The Sopranos" with mixed feelings. It's a great show, of course. Even if you don't follow it, you know it's
critically acclaimed.
I love the way David Chase (DeCesare was his original family name) intertwines fine
actors, writing and set design to capture a certain criminal milieu in a gritty
part of New Jersey.
But "The Sopranos" has crystallized something I
learned when this Irish girl married an Italian boy. Because I kept my name,
I've traveled undercover, so to
speak, hearing what some people say about Italians when they think no Italians
are around.
I think I've
had a little taste --maybe 2 percent -- of what a white person in America must
experience when they marry a black person. The white spouse, assumed to be
"one of us,'' must hear so many complicit comments about
"them": inappropriate slurs and jokes, or less malicious -- but still
benighted -- remarks.
I've
watched and listened and learned that some people will say anything, either out
of ignorance or a nervous inability to tolerate silence. Their negative
comments about Italians betray something hidden. In the privacy of their own
homes, I'll bet these same people
are saying some interesting things about Jews, Mexicans and African Americans.
Since "The Sopranos" began
airing, it seems to me that some people feel it's
given them a license to slur Italian Americans. I recently sat at a banquet table and listened to a
highly educated person joke about a way to solve a problem. "Do you know
anyone named Vinnie or Mario?'' he said, brushing under his chin for emphasis.
I've
covered stories with journalists from all across the nation -- people
who presumably have achieved a certain level of sophistication -- and I've heard some make ignorant comments about ''wops,'' or say
that Italians are prone to criminality or joke that they must be involved in
coating people with concrete. When I've
challenged them, they looked puzzled. Shocked. Surely
there was nothing wrong with what they were saying -- was there?
I've
known reporters who have been asked if they're
"connected" because their names end in a vowel. The people making such comments wouldn't dream of saying anything negative about African
Americans. That would be wrong, wouldn't
it?
At least in public.
You don't
have to e-mail me and say there are more important things to worry about, and
that we've become too politically
correct. I agree. Growing up in Chicago,
a child of Irish immigrants in a neighborhood where everyone's grandmother spoke a different language, I learned
that "What are you?'' could be a well-meaning conversational opener, not
a politically incorrect hand grenade.
Of course there's
an Italian mob. There are also mobsters who are Chinese, Irish, Russian,
Serbian and Vietnamese. Sometimes the stereotyping is breathtaking. I heard a
Red Bull radio commercial in which an Italian-accented character named
"Luigi" at "Pier No. 13" is trying to fit somebody with a
pair of concrete shoes. It didn't
work because the victim drank Red Bull, which "gives you wings." I
heard another radio spot in which a girl introduces her aghast
dad to her new boyfriend -- "Rocco."
My dear father-in-law Rocco, a combat veteran
of the Korean War, spends his days looking at tissue samples to figure out if
people have cancer. My husband's
great-uncle Silvio caught malaria fighting for his
country in World War II and never shook it.
My husband's
relatives have names like Annunziata, Arcangelo,
Pasqualina, Rosaria. Say
them out loud. Those aren't mob
names. They're music.
Maureen O'Donnell
is a metro reporter for the Sun-Times. and can be
reached at :
modonnell@suntimes.com
She deserves a Big
Thank You !!!!!!