Fire Alan Richman
Allow me to begin by saying that my mother’s side of the family is French Creole. We got here wth Bienville and helped to found this City of New Orleans. As a child I remember steaming cups of Cafe Au Lait on the breakfast table every morning and wine with dinner every night. I started learning to cook when my age was tallied in single digit numbers. My maternal grandmother has been a proud and vocal keeper of our family’s creole heritage for as long as I can remember.
That makes it personal when a lackwit like Alan Richman makes statements about creoles such as, “I have never met one and suspect they are a faerie folk, like leprechauns, rather than an indigenous race.” Not being satisfied he continued to shove his foot further down his own throat by adding, “the idea that you might today eat an authentic Creole dish is a fantasy.” There are 8 pages of this tripe in his article in GQ Magazine (“Yes, We’re Open” November ’06 Issue).
I know I am late jumping on the bandwagon with this one having been out of the country for awhile, but I feel impelled to address it. The NY Times has had their say on the subject, now ’tis my turn.
The idea that someone who shows such a fatuous and willfully ignorant attitude is seen as an authority in his field is mind boggling (although not surprising these days). His lack of even a cursory attempt to do any historical or cultural research before making blanket statements of such an insulting nature calls into question his reliability as a food critic and a writer. I guess its okay, after all he didn’t use the racially explosive “N Word,” and he didn’t present a definable epithet. Denying the existence of an ethnic group isn’t the same as actually calling them names, is it? Merde.
I would like to ask everyone reading this to please take a minute and sign the online petition to have him fired from GQ. Ill informed people will always exist, as shall both the narrow minded and the woefully unpleasant. I do not believe that they they should be allowed to spew their ignorance forth as fact .
It only takes a moment and it’s the right thing to do. In addition I will view every signature added as a personal favor to me and to the many generations of creoles that are my forebears. Merci beaucoup!
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