Over on Racialicious, AJ Plaid has an impressive exposition on the offensiveness of The New Yorker cover, and its racial implications.
Cross-posted on her blog, The Cruel Secretary, she talks about her [white] live-in partner, who is employed at the New Yorker, and she mentions his inability to understand why she did not find the cover satirically humorous and, in fact, saw no humor at all in its graphic depiction.
My current live-in partner, who works at the New Yorker, just couldn’t believe that so many people responded so angrily at the cover at the Daily Kos and other sites. He "wanted to see [my] reaction." When I emphatically told him that I didn’t find it funny, he said, "You’re so angry."
"Of course I’m angry. What do you expect? This is my reaction to your employer doing something so racist."
"I’m trying to have some fun here."
Humph, you gotta love hipster racism.
Plaid describes "hipster racism" firstly as "a borrowed phrase from [Racialicious contributor] Carmen Van Kerckhove." Her more definitive description:
[I]deas, speech, and action meant to denigrate another person’s race or ethnicity under the guise of being urbane, witty (meaning "ironic" nowadays), educated, liberal, and/or trendy.
Plaid goes on to say:
This racist and sexist balderdash that’s the New Yorker cover fits squarely into that definition. So, honestly, does the behavior of my partner, who prides himself on coming from a California family of educators who taught him to be colorblind and on working at a magazine renown[ed] for being, well, urbane, witty, educated, liberal, and trendy, yet likes to view me as the Angry Negress.
Well, some of the New Yorker editorial staffers, in trying to demonstrate these traits, showed themselves far more closely aligned to some of those "hardworking white folks" who may hold these beliefs that the Obamas aren’t true Americans, who will use the White House to carry out the collective and international people of color revenge against white people, as the high afro-wearing Black militants (think 60s era Black Panthers) and non-Western garbed folks seem to signify in the popular consciousness. The editorial staffers also must not have heard the ad nauseum arguments of their fellow media workers employing racist and sexist stereotypes of presenting the Obamas as "angry"—especially presenting Michelle as an "angry, vengeful Black woman," as the cover more subtly conveys with the framed picture.
Sing it, Sister.
[T]he New Yorker [is not] even on the right side of hiring practices: having the opportunity of working and Conde Nast and the New Yorker’s advertising and editorial floors (I temped as a receptionist about a year ago, so I got to observe the make-up of the staff), I noticed that there were no senior editors of color; the people of color in editorial capacity were already superstar writers before coming to the magazine (Malcolm Gladwell) or they were writing for the entertainment section (Hilton Als, who writes the theater column.) The former PR director, and African American woman, left the position.
Of course, hiring black folks usually doesn't heighten whites' racial sensitivity, but still.....
[T]here’s no one of color to at least talk Remnick off the ledge of this kind of glib bigotry. (Not saying that having a person of color guarantees a firm commitment to anti-racism efforts. But I hope for a fighting chance.) And whichever white folks pride themselves on being anti-racist or at least race-tolerant at the magazine either didn’t get to Remnick in time or simply chose to shut up and run for cover from the mounting fallout. Or choose to entertain themselves with the anger of people of color.
She ends her magnificent discourse with an excellent admonition:
And that’s the ultimate rub about hipster racism: as much as the people like to think they’re above it because they got degrees and live in the big city and befriend/sex up/marry people of color, these folks really aren’t above it.
That's it in a nutshell - the quintessential definition of hipster racism/hipster bigotry.
Have at it.