SF Weekly Letters

Not the Bell of the Ball
Not killing GIs: Wow, unbelievable. A cover-length article about a so-called "comedian" without a single example of what W. Kamau Bell says or thinks that suggests he deserves that designation ["Race to Fame," Reyhan Harmanci, Feature, 5/13]. Instead, we get a portrait of a paranoid, untalented, thin-skinned man who actually thought studying East Asian studies at Penn would be the path to becoming another Bruce Lee — his hero at what, age 20? I had no idea the intellectual bar for admission to Penn had sunk so low.

Then, just after preaching to the reporter about his contempt for people who prejudge others based on superficial physical and behavioral stereotypes, he works on material that mines the most tired, unimaginative, offensive clichés about women and gays. It's no wonder he didn't kill the audience of GIs in Okinawa.

Bell is not funny, nor clever. But I'll give him this much. He did show some self-awareness when referring to his "allegedly intelligent socioeconomic fare," the key word being "alleged."

Eric Peterson

San Francisco

In a bind over color-blind: Interesting how the negative comments [about this story] remark about how they have never seen W. Kamau Bell's act. How quick we judge.

I'm curious as to why white people are so quick to dismiss the existence of racism, as if the experiences of people of color are not to be believed. We live it. We see it. We experience it every day. My question is this: How do they know what does and does not happen in the life of a person of color? How do they know whether racism exists or not? The truth is they don't. So they should just stop talking and listen for once.

If you're not a part of the solution, then you are a part of the problem, and ignoring race is not the solution.

Riz

Web Comment

Nope-alito
Takes one to know one: I've tried Nopalito, and I thought the food was blandly perfect, overrated, and overpriced ["Best Pig in Town," Eat, 5/13]. The place has a precious attitude all too typical of the "organic" set. Upscale, Whole Foods. No fun. Unfortunately, critics almost invariably turn into lapdogs when they walk into such places. (I'm happy Meredith Brody had a couple of negative notes in her review.)

On my two visits there, half the clientele presented the air of superior, critical gays, and I should know, being one.

Michael Biehl

San Francisco

Blog Comment of the Week
In response to news that SEIU voted down an accord with the mayor's office that could have saved the city $38 million: Please keep in mind that half of our sorry excuse for a union voted yes. I am one of them and I can tell you our entire chapter, the Recreation and Parks Department, voted almost unanimously "yes" to give back. We are hostages of idiots in SEIU and we will be decertifying shortly, not that there will be any of us still working at that point. It is going to be a bloodbath of layoffs like no other we've ever seen.

Artdoggie

Correction
In last week's Matt Smith column ("Unsafe Words," 5/13), Smith incorrectly attributed a quote to writer Violet Blue. The words should have been attributed to a performer Blue quoted in her column. SF Weekly regrets the error.