If we get upset, we're angry black women. If we're happy, we're loud, obnoxious, and need to be put in our place, PARTICULARLY if we like to read.
The 11 members of the Sisters on the Reading Edge book club, all but one of whom is African American, say the Napa Valley Wine Train ordered them off Saturday, mid-journey. As debate built Monday on social media under the hashtag #laughingwhileblack, wine train spokesman Sam Singer said train employees had asked the women to either quiet down or get off the wine train and accept a free bus ride back to their starting point.
A manager on the train repeatedly told the women they were laughing and talking too loudly, book-club member Lisa Renee Johnson told San Francisco television station KTVU (http://bit.ly/... ).
Yes, that's right, black women laughing and having a good time were considered "loud" by management, even though it's a WINE train, and I have seen several posts from people who have taken the same ride noting that people are frequently drunk on this train and are not removed.
http://news.yahoo.com/...
Employees of the Napa Valley Wine Train, which offers food and wine to passengers as they roll to Napa County wineries in updated Pullman cars, had asked the book club members to either be quieter or get off the train, Singer said Monday. "The book club clearly was fun-loving, boisterous and loud enough that it affected the experience of some of the passengers who were in the same car, who complained to staff," he said.
The company refunded the women's ticket money, Singer said.
On average, Singer said, individuals or groups are asked to get off the wine train once a month for one reason or the other. "It's not a question of bias," he said.
Of course not.
However, a police spokeswoman in the Napa Valley town of St. Helena, which the wine train summoned Saturday, said it was the first time she recalled the wine train seeking police help removing a large group.
So even the police can't recall a similar incident.
The 11 women, one of them 83 years old, already were off the train when St. Helena police arrived, police spokeswoman Maria Gonzalez said.
Wine train employees had called the police to deal with what they reported were "11 disruptive females," Gonzalez said.
Because when you have women as old as 83 laughing, it's surely going to be a code orange terrorist event...
Police arrived at the railway siding and found "there was no crime being committed ... nobody was intoxicated, there were no issues." So officers left, Gonzalez said.
Maybe Trayvon Martin's grandmother was seeking revenge?
In the past, she said, the town's police had responded to wine-train calls to offload passengers because of domestic incidents on board or for fighting.
So now laughing from sober black women is the same as drunken brawls among rich white people.
did Johnson not immediately respond to messages from The Associated Press seeking comment Monday.
For generations, black women have been fighting against the meme of the "angry black woman". Then, when we accomplish something in our lives, look to expand our horizons, and do something special for ourselves, we are therefore happy and "uppity" if we dare laugh around white folks.
Over at the Yahoo comments board, it's open season. I don't understand how Michelle Obama has done it for almost eight years.