Talk:Niggers in the White House

This article was nominated for deletion on 16 September 2013 (UTC). The result of the discussion was keep.

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A fact from Niggers in the White House appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 16 September 2013 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that "Niggers in the White House" (1902) was written after President Roosevelt invited Booker T. Washington to the White House?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2013/September. The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Nigg*rs in the White House.

Wikipedia

Poetry

	Poetry portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Poetry, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of poetry on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.PoetryWikipedia:WikiProject PoetryTemplate:WikiProject PoetryPoetry articles
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United States

	United States portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject United States, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of topics relating to the United States of America on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the ongoing discussions. Template Usage Articles Requested! Become a Member Project Talk Alerts United StatesWikipedia:WikiProject United StatesTemplate:WikiProject United StatesUnited States articles
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NOTCENSORED vs. COMMONSENSE

I wasn't trying to censor anything with my edit, but with an article this short, it doesn't seem to be necessary to repeat the fact that "niggers" refers to "African Americans". In the odd case that someone is unaware of this, it is explained clearly in the lede. Repeating it in the body seems entirely unnecessary, given the brevity of this article. Joefromrandb (talk) 19:38, 1 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think it belongs in the lead at all, per WP:SUMMARYSTYLE; it arguably is superfluous wherever it is included, and unnecessary.—John Cline (talk) 19:57, 1 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Fine with me. Joefromrandb (talk) 20:06, 1 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Horrible

Horrible! Horrible!! Awien (talk) 23:26, 14 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I know WP isn't censored, but aren't there things like this unutterable filth that are best left in richly-deserved oblivion, not stirred up?

But now the article has been created, could its creator Bonkers the Clown kill it if they thought better of what they're doing?

Or if not, if everybody involved decided publishing this is ill-judged, what would it take to get rid of it?

I wish I hadn't touched the horrible thing.

Awien (talk) 01:06, 15 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

History is rarely nice. That doesn't mean we shouldn't try to learn from it. User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 01:50, 15 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Precisely why I love American history. All the rich vocabulary. Unutterable? Gratuitously offensive commentary removed. Please do not do this here. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 01:58, 17 September 2013 (UTC) ☯ Bonkers The Clown \(^_^)/ Nonsensical Babble ☯ 06:56, 15 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Bonkers, you are doing the best you can at making me regret defending this article. I think the reasons you and I find it to be significant are very different.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 12:10, 15 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

See Wikipedia:Deletion policy for your options. The article has multiple substantial contributors now so the creator could no longer have it deleted with {{db-author}}. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:18, 15 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, you may be interested in Wikipedia:Lamest edit wars#Deletion wars but please don't start the 45th deletion debate. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:23, 15 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

PrimeHunter, thank you. Awien (talk) 13:46, 15 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Bonkers the Clown, you confirm exactly what I feared, that this is being published very little in a spirit of useful historical documentation, and a whole lot in a spirit of defiant provocation. Extremely unfortunate. Awien (talk) 13:15, 15 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

"Satire"

Every stanza is written in rhyme and employs satire throughout the poem.

Please explain where the satire is, because I can't see anything satirical in the entire poem. It's just repeating the word 'nigger' over and over like a naughty child who's learnt a new swearword. --86.181.17.180 (talk) 07:06, 16 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Of course there is satire... The white presidential family and the "niggers" are heavily ridiculed in the poem. ☯ Bonkers The Clown \(^_^)/ Nonsensical Babble ☯ 09:13, 16 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

You have no idea what satire is. I've seen Chinese bureaucrats with more understanding of irony and wit. --86.181.17.180 (talk) 23:13, 16 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Gfy. ☯ Bonkers The Clown \(^_^)/ Nonsensical Babble ☯ 09:08, 17 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

"The white presidential family and the..."? Sorry, I must have missed that; could you repeat, please? Basket _Feudalist 15:32, 16 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It's there for everyone to read, sarcastic one. ☯ Bonkers The Clown \(^_^)/ Nonsensical Babble ☯ 09:08, 17 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It is satire. Just not very good satire. 50.185.1.34 (talk) 16:27, 25 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Source

http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2211&dat=19290622&id=4mNGAAAAIBAJ&sjid=feUMAAAAIBAJ&pg=1235,7688059

Poetry Portal??

I can understand the historical context of this article, it may even be of some use after some additional editing, considering its unfortunate history and the wise permanent removal of its original creator by the community. BUT WHY, OH WHY is it in the Poetry portal? There must be more appropriate portals for this piece to go in. Race relations history in the United States, surely there is something more appropriate. It is racist doggerel, and was seen in that context by many at the time. The poetry portal choice is very dodgy. Irondome (talk) 21:25, 24 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see it anywhere at Portal:Poetry so I guess you refer to the Wikipedia:WikiProject Poetry banner on this talk page. Articles can have several WikiProject banners and often do. It's not a choice between different WikiProjects. Feel free to add another or more, but removing WikiProject poetry from a poem would be odd. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:27, 24 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I am aware of that, but my point is, is this a piece of literature that stands on its own merits as a work of art? I just do not think it belongs. Has it ever been discussed in a poetic context, ie literary magazines, etc? Somehow I doubt it. It is a piece of politically-motivated racist doggerel. This not Keats. Cheers Irondome (talk) 23:34, 24 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I have left a message on Wikipedia:WikiProject Poetry talk, linking here. I would like to get some opinions from our poetry specialists. Irondome (talk) 23:53, 24 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not a member but I have never heard of a WikiProject which refuses articles because the subject is offensive. Wikipedia:WikiProject Poetry#Tasks says: "Ongoing activity: Add the WP:Poetry template to the talk pages of articles related to poets, poems, and poetry collections to affiliate them with this project." It doesn't say to omit offensive poems. It also seems a waste of time to discuss which poems are too offensive, and I wouldn't want individual editors to willy nilly remove WikiProject banners from subjects they dislike. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:57, 24 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

You should be assuming NPOV here. My point is, Is this a poem in the full meaning of the term, including its literary acceptance as poetry? Simples. I said nothing about content, except briefly in opening remarks; rather its context and definition. Just because it has verses, does it make it a poem? That is my point, for the second time. Any old rhyming crap could be placed under the projects aegis by a simple undiscussed tagbombing. Does the group want to take ownership of this? Irondome (talk) 00:05, 25 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

We have millions of WikiProject tags and they are only on talk pages. I seriously doubt you would spend time discussing this if it was an innocent poem with an innocent title. Regardless of how racist and offensive it is, of course it's a poem. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:47, 25 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'll add my agreement with PrimeHunter that this certainly belongs in WikiProject poetry. It is a poem and was meant to be a poem, albeit a racist one. Ryan Vesey 02:04, 25 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

"Reprinted widely"

Anthonyhcole removed various references to republication of the poem with the edit-summary "Removed Tar Heel; Richmond Climax and "Honolulu Evening Bulletin". Can't find these anywhere. Do you have a link or a source? Removed 'reprinted widely'. No source says this." There is no rule that we need a source for every single word or phrase in an article. We are not automata. We are supposed to be writing coherent prose. As for the links to these, the Honolulu Evening Bulletin can be accessed online [1]. Tar Heel (now the The Daily Tar Heel) was linked as a source here, an article by the archivist of Elizabeth City State University. The Richmond Climax was cited in an online article I can't find now (so I've temporarily removed it). It's clear that the poem appeared in many many more newspapers, because several of the reprints attribute the poem to yet another paper (e.g. the Honolulu Evening Bulletin attributes it to the "Wartrace Tennessee Tribune". Several source it to the Missouri "Democrat Leader" [2]), but they don't give specific dates, and of course some of these papers are searchable online, but others are not. It was obviously doing the rounds from one newspaper to another. Why there is such an explosion of reprints in early 1903 I've no idea, but it seems to have reached a kind of "maximum saturation" at that point. Paul B (talk) 16:05, 25 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Party affiliations

I have added the party affiliations of several senators, since the structure of 1900-1930 US politics may be unfamiliar to modern readers. This addition is in line with other historical articles, such as Origins of the American Civil War. -- 101.119.14.102 (talk) 03:19, 29 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Something Wrong

In the reproduction of the poem shown in this article, it states that the poem, as shown, was published on March 13, 1903. Stanza 13 makes reference to a "Miss Dinah Washington." Dinah Washington, the famous jazz singer was born n 1924. I can not find any reference to any other Dinah Washington. Who is this poem referring to? Was it really published in 1903? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 219.115.148.122 (talk) 13:51, 10 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

File:Kentucky New Era 3 13 03.png says "Miss Dinah Washington" and is indeed from 1903 as shown by the source [3]. It's clear from the context that the poem refers to an alleged family member of Booker T. Washington, probably a daughter. He didn't actually have a daughter by that name. I don't know whether Dinah was a nickname for somebody or a racial epithet or just made up by the poet. There was a daughter named Portia but such information might have been hard to come by in another state at the time. If the intended audience didn't know the name either then the poet may not have cared. It isn't exactly an academic work. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:22, 10 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

"Dinah" was a generic name for a black woman at the time. It's analogous to giving him a made-up son by the name of "Sambo Washington". See here for a discussion of the "Dinah Washington" reference. See also Dinah#Symbol_of_black_womanhood. Paul B (talk) 15:05, 10 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

There should be something about this in the article, otherwise it's confusing... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.21.169.10 (talk) 22:04, 5 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

There is a piped link within the text itself that will take readers to the "Dinah" article. Joefromrandb (talk) 03:34, 6 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Contested deletion

This page should not be speedy deleted as an attack or a negative unsourced biography of a living person, because... (your reason here) --99.226.168.8 (talk) 03:39, 14 November 2016 (UTC) As nasty as this is, this poem is a piece of history and shouldn't be swept aside because it's offensive.[reply]

External links modified

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External links modified

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Its all about money.

So, 100 years ago in the US your skin colour was a small fortune by itself. And being a white European was at smaller scale like being a pretty young lady now. Since you could in some way capitalize it, avoiding certain dirty jobs. Hence, by writing such poems people simply defended their privileges. Bruno Traven for example wrote that for a white man it was better to commit a robbery than to do colored people's job. Miss the good old times, from the financial perspective of course. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.190.221.243 (talk) 19:38, 20 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

What. SoyokoAnis - talk 14:37, 24 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Talk:Niggers in the White House

NOTCENSORED vs. COMMONSENSE

Horrible

"Satire"

Source

Further reading

Booker T. Washington incident

Jessie De Priest incident

Poetry Portal??

"Reprinted widely"

Party affiliations

Something Wrong

Contested deletion

External links modified

External links modified

Its all about money.