https://abc7ny.com/viral-video-man-grabs-wig-manhattan-caught-on/133346…
But losing his job and facing assault charges seems extreme?
https://abc7ny.com/viral-video-man-grabs-wig-manhattan-caught-on/133346…
But losing his job and facing assault charges seems extreme?
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Agreed
If it was the other way round, it would not have been a problem
Must happen all the time in clubs and stuff - seen it in fancy dress parties enough times
God I hate fancy dress
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"What he gave to me was definitely violence, definitely disrespect. So, he devalued me, he took my confidence away in that moment."
Or he was just a bit of a dick...
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And this comment from the young lady:-
""What he gave to me was definitely violence, definitely disrespect. So, he devalued me, he took my confidence away in that moment.""
You what? I totally get that it was annoying and embarrassing, because she would have been left with just her wig cap, and that isn't a good look on anyone, but "violence"? And "devalued"? Love, if your self esteem is so fragile that it can be shaken by someone doing something so infantile, then you have bigger problems than you know.
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going to a fancy dress party is one thing - walking down the street minding your own business and a random person snatching something off your head is quite another
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Poor old Davos has his wig pulled off his head most weeks on the Tube.
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Can’t believe I’m going to disagree with Cru for once…
I think a lot depends on the job in question. If it had been a cop I’d expect the same outcome and I think that a solicitor who works with the law can’t be seen to casually break it and expect to go back to work on Monday.
Not sure about the US but it would count as an assault over here although I would hope for a community resolution myself which would mean an apology (which she wants) and nothing permanent on your record.
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a stranger pulling the wig off a Black woman as she’s walking down the street feels racially motivated to me (or at least i can understand why she might feel that way)
completely different context to someone pulling the wig off someone in fancy dress in a club
and if the chap’s a lawyer i can understand why he might face repercussions at work (though i think the assault charge is a bit much tbh)
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Clearly what she wants first and foremost is her 15 minutes of fame. Which she has now got in spades.
I don't actually really have a problem with the guy losing his job and it's clearly a (very minor) assault. If that was all it was he'd find another job, grovel to the judge and pay a fine and move on having learned a sharp lesson. The problem is it's all over the fvcking internet and was on television news (god it must have been a slow news day!). Which will fvck his life up for a long time (particularly given the determination of some to find a race angle). No firm is going to hire him in the immediate future...
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That was crossed posts Chill, but sure enough, there you are with the race angle...
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well i dunno if he was drunk or something donny but if you choose to pull the wig off a Black woman in the middle of the street i don’t see how you avoid the “race angle” (and the “misogyny angle” ofc but people seem to care less about that for some reason)
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I think there's a difference between pulling a wig off someone where it looks like their actual hair and pulling off a huge green wig that is obviously a wig. My response would be very much to call them a dick and move on.
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I have only seen a few seconds of the video but he is pretty clearly completely out of it. If I had to guess I would say he had taken significant advantage of the relatively recent legalisation of pot in NYC...
There is no suggestion I have seen that he said anything racist or misogynist or indeed said anything at all to the young woman in question.
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My understanding is that it isn’t simply snatching off something like a toupee - a wig is typically attached quite tightly to the head, so there is quite a lot of force needed to pull off a wig and that’s reflected perhaps in her comments that her head was pulled right back?
It is a clear assault and not as minor as some people would have you believe - eg I would compare it to forcefully pulling a person’s dreadlocks backwards in the street.
Donny’s comments re 15 mins of fame is disgraceful frankly. The reason why people do this is mainly because there is zero trust in the police to do anything.
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Is she wearing a green wig in the video like the still? Got to be easy enough to avoid being automatically dragged into a racism story if the lady in question is wearing a green scouser wig?
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also I note the various attempts to play down/dismiss what happened by introducing new stuff
”he must have been under the influence” - does that excuse it?
”must happen all the time in clubs” - yes but this wasn’t in a club - it was in the street
”My response would be very much to call them a dick and move on.” - yes but that’s not what matters here, is it?
Jim 100% correct here
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Unfortunate choice of word from Donny tbh
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oh FFS.
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Leave your garden tools out of this
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I once went to an event where they gave out limited edition caps and for the rest of the night people kept taking mine off my head and actually trying to steal it (long story but there was actually a quite lucrative resale market for them) but I never considered involving the police.
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And:
1. No, being under the influence doesn't excuse it.
2. I entirely agreed with Jim that it was an assault, that it was right he was charged and that I didn't think even losing his job was unduly harsh.
What I didn't see was a race or gender angle because there is absolutely no evidence of either.
I also don't think it's particular fair that his life be ruined over what appears to be a drunk/stoned bit of stupidity.
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A toupee is attached to basically velcro strips stuck to your skin so rather more painful to have pulled off than an elasticated wig that simply sits over your own hair.
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Heh! Another incredibly specific anecdote
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I've been subject to other forms of theft too although they generally involved threats with knives and not having clothing pulled off so not really relevant.
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I once went to an event where they gave out limited edition caps and for the rest of the night people kept taking mine off my head and actually trying to steal it (long story but there was actually a quite lucrative resale market for them) but I never considered involving the police.
at a summer camp I was at when I was 17, several of the boys thought it would be hilarious to go around grabbing the girls’ bra straps and flicking up their skirts
never went to the police
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yeah i agree with jim (as usual)
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sorry just thought I might tell my own irrelevant story after Sails’ did
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what do you mean?
she’s a Black woman - that’s the “angle”
you can’t honestly think he had to be shouting racial or sexiest abuse for there to be a race or gender “angle” can you?
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We only got oranges at Newcastle.
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Chill, mate, is there any minority on whose behalf you don't feel you can speak? Her wig was green and curly, it looked like a clown's wig, and she is paler than he is (I actually thought he might be Hispanic from the video). If it was a "real" hair wig, then maybe there might be some chance that there was more to it, but chances are that he saw some silly looking hair, and decided to behave like the douchebag he seems to be and pull it off.
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why are some people so determined to ignore context when making a judgment on something?
pulling the wig off a Black woman on the street is different to pulling the wig off a white man on the street (or in a nightclub)
just like punching a nazi (like richard spencer) is different from punching a gay man (like owen jones)
not everything is the same!
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I can at least 100% agree with Cru’s latest! Don’t see any suggestion of race being an issue even from the victim.
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chill it’s because among certain people, certain groups of people get the benefit of the doubt and others don’t
HTH
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I think there has to be some indication that her race or gender played a motivating part in his actions before people jump to the conclusion he was motivated by her race or gender. Don’t you?
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Re the force needed to pull a wig off : that was actually what I was expecting her to go on to complain about, he could very easily have hurt her, and certainly, I can understand the shock and pain would have made her lose her sh1t with him. I remember a clip where some jokester in a nightclub decided to pull the wig off the head of a celeb, you could see that it hurt like fvck, and her instinctive reaction was to turn around and slap him hard. And everybody cheered.
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Punching a nazi is the same as punching a gay man if I have no idea that one is a nazi and the other is gay and I'm punching them for some other reason.
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"pulling the wig off a Black woman on the street is different to pulling the wig off a white man on the street (or in a nightclub)"
Honestly, "listening" to you to claiming knowledge and understanding of this sort of stuff is so irritating, it makes my teeth itch.
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i wasn’t really responding to you cru, it was more davos up top saying “If it was the other way round, it would not have been a problem”
yes probably! different things are different!
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you think they’re not different?
bollocks, you’re just reflexively taking a position against me cause i annoy you
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heh, beautiful
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Thats not what cru is saying chill and i think you know it. Sorry fam but you come across as touristing through other peoples lived experience and claiming empathy and ownership of those experiences.
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Difficult to argue this when the wig is fooking green.
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He’s concern trolling. He doesn’t actually believe that.
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i don’t even know what that means tbh gwan
i’ll definitely “claim” empathy (whatever that means) but not ownership
what i’m saying is pretty obvious - assaulting a Black woman is different to assaulting a white man
assaulting a nazi is different to assaulting a gay man
there are elements of racism, misogyny and homophobia pervasive throughout society that allows a person to feel justified or able to do one but not the other
i honestly don’t even see how that’s controversial
(i also don’t understand what you mean by “touristing” by pointing this out, but ok)
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Heh the way you try to speak authoritatively on behalf of black people is so damn racist chill.
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heh i’m not speaking on anyone’s behalf!
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Black people with green hair
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If I punch a gay Nazi do they cancel each other out?
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Chill m7 you seem to be defending a hill that even Owen Jones wouldn't choose to die on.
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That's cos he "feels" things more than the rest of us mere mortals do, so he just knows, man.
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Larping about. I think its a cis white male with no fvcking clue about what it is like to actually experience racism.
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It feels a bit needy
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lol sorry does anyone think pulling the wig off a Black woman and pulling the wig off a white man are the same thing and should be treated the same way?
would be more fun to hear someone explain why they disagree rather than a pile-on over nothing
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No. Get a grip !
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SO IT’S SUDDENLY OK TO PUNCH NAZIS NOW IS IT?
YOU MAKE ME SICK!
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Heh for Mr Large.
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I'm really not sure what the black / white has to do with it when it comes to wigs specifically - I think that any woman wearing a wig, whatever colour the woman is, is going to be embarrassed, maybe even humiliated, depending on what's underneath, and where she is at the time, if someone pulls her wig off (but feel free to educate me some more about the experiences of black womanhood, so I know what I'm getting wrong). I also think that someone knocking the toupee of a white bloke's head might be even more humiliating, as it goes.
As far as this particular incident is concerned, I do think that there is a good chance that a drunk / high bloke dude bro pulling a bright green, cork screw curled, acrylic clown style wig off a woman in the street might just have thought that it would be "funny", and that his fellow dude bros would join the laughter with him. I mean, I know that they are completely "other" to you, but even you know that black people don't routinely have green hair, right?
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What Jim said it's assault in this jurisdiction. He's a weapon and deserves to get fired. However, doesn't deserve to get life ruined.
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cheers for responding cru
yes agreed - that’s the misogyny of it
completely disagree but ok
sure - and my point is that a large part of the reason he likely thought it would be “funny” is cause she was a Black woman and all the weight that goes with that
or look - maybe i’m wrong and he would have done the same to an asian man wearing a similar wig (though in that case thinking about it there may be homophobic undertones)
my main point is pulling the wig off a Black woman is different than pulling the wig off a white man and you can’t compare the two directly - do you disagree with that?
god really? thanks for the info!
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Can't see the racial angle btw- Chill would have had more of an argument if the wig hadn't been green!
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“maybe i’m wrong and he would have done the same to an asian man wearing a similar wig (though in that case thinking about it there may be homophobic undertones)”
You can’t stop yourself, can you? You invent another hypothetical situation where no evidence would be there for hate crime and decide to make it a possible hate crime.
It’s attitudes like this that make a mockery of the McPherson definition of hate crime and make it so useless.
You know there are other motivations for committing crime other than an “ism/ic” one don’t you Chill? What is your evidence that his motivation was anything to do with race rather than “Cor look, there’s a big green wig, wouldn’t it be a laugh if I pulled it off?”
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Of course, won't we think off all the unfortunate green haired Asian men.
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Someone seems to have found himself in a hole and decided the best thing would be to keep digging. S***s?
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i’m not a judge jim and so don’t give a tug what his motivation was (i’m also not accusing him of a “hate crime” and don’t think the assault charge is particularly fair)
what i’m saying (again!) is that pulling a big green wig off a Black woman and pulling a big green wig off a white man are two different things
pulling a big green wig off a gay man is different from pulling a big green wig off a gay woman
pulling a big green wig off an indian man is different from pulling a big green wig off a northern gammon
early in the thread (before the obvious pile-on) there was a bit of a tendency to say “well it would have been different if she’d pulled a green wig off him” or “where’s the racial angle” and i’m saying - the racial (and misogynist) angle is obvious
everything we do - everything you do, jim - is permeated with racial, patriarchal, capitalist, heteronormative etc undertones even if you don’t realise it (sails)
again, i didn’t realise this was particularly controversial
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“i’m not a judge jim and so don’t give a tug what his motivation was (i’m also not accusing him of a “hate crime” and don’t think the assault charge is particularly fair)”
“a stranger pulling the wig off a Black woman as she’s walking down the street feels racially motivated to me”
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I was about to jump on that but Jim has, thankfully. He’s clearly concern trolling - and doing it rather well tbf
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yes it does - and i’ve explained why multiple times
i also wasn’t accusing anyone of a hate crime and said this in the same post:
i’m talking about motivations not criminal liability, i thought that was obvious
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“i’m talking about motivations not criminal liability, i thought that was obvious”
The thing you don’t give a tug about? Looks like you give quite a tug about it after all - it was the reason you first posted. Maybe you give a mass debate?
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oh i see
when i said “i don’t give a tug what his motivation was” i was responding to this of yours jim:
from a moral / judgment perspective i don’t think you can get away from the motivations, but i don’t think there’s any real criminal issue
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also tbh i think you’re overreacting there to what i think is a fairly banal point (our capitalist society is inherently racist, misogynistic and homophobic, you can’t get away from it)
🤷
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If it was motivated even in part due to race it is a hate crime. That’s just a fact based on the definition of hate crime from MacPherson. Therefore, speculating on his motivation is part of deciding whether it is a hate crime or not. It’s very lazy and, I would hope you would agree, utterly unprofessional for anyone working in law, to draw conclusions around motivation for crime without even the slightest bit of evidence to support it.
So, I’ll ask again, “What is your evidence that his motivation was anything to do with race rather than “Cor look, there’s a big green wig, wouldn’t it be a laugh if I pulled it off?”
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I’m the one overreacting?
’Scuse me, off to buy another irony meter.
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like - every interaction you have with a Black person jim will have some racial undertones
every interaction you have with a woman will have - not “misogynistic” - but some patriarchal undertones
every interaction you have with a gay person will have some heteronormative undertones
this is the case even if (especially if) you’re deliberately trying not to be biased
but this is moreso if you’re pulling a big green wig off one of them
i don’t really see how that’s controversial
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we’re talking about two different things
i don’t give a toss about the macpherson definition of a hate crime and don’t really think the chap should have been charged for assault
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really? good job i wasn’t doing that then
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Can't believe Chill left out transphobic from his 19.10 post!
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transphobia is misogyny and homophobia clive, they’re lucky enough to get the double on that
(and if they’re a racial minority and not able-bodied - oof they’ve won the crown!)
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We need a chill bingo card for when he goes mental like this
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Heh.
You agree this was a crime (even if you don’t think it warranted a charge)
You repeatedly assert that the reason for this incident (which we agree was a crime) was probably due to race.
You spectacularly fail to provide any evidence to back up your assertion.
You cannot see how this in fact means that you are saying this was a hate crime yet have no evidence to do this.
And you wonder why I am confused.
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I’m enjoying this - can we get Cru a tun?
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Yeah rof bingo cards, a totally normal not stalky sign of being a total fvcking nutjob
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erm no i didn’t
i said pulling a wig off a Black woman feels racially motivated to me
to be clear - i didn’t say that was the “reason” he did it and i don’t think it matters
winking at a Black barista in Starbucks can be racially motivated
promoting a Black guy to senior associate can be racially motivated
and yes of course pulling a wig off a Black person on the street (whatever the colour of their natural hair) can be racially motivated
(and to be clear:
winking a gay barista in starbucks can be motivated by heteronormativity
promoting a gay person to senior associate can be motivated by heteronormativity
and pulling a big green wig off a gay person can be motivated by heteronormativity
feel free to reproduce the above for able-bodied, patriarchy, cisnormativity, class-based prejudice etc)
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these are all power structures we naturally interact with constantly throughout our lives
you can’t ignore them and you definitely can’t flip them and say “but where’s the evidence it had anything to do with the fact she was a woman or Black”
the evidence is baked in, as it were
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What a load of old shite.
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“i said pulling a wig off a Black woman feels racially motivated to me
to be clear - i didn’t say that was the “reason” he did it and i don’t think it matters”
Definition of motivation: “a reason or reasons for acting or behaving in a particular way.”
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I know you tend to shy away from definitions in general but thought you might want a reminder of that one.
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sin is original, as it were
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heh
jim stop being a prat we were getting on so well
why a dictionary definition - i’m talking about societal context
again - i think we’re talking about two completely different things!
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Stop gaslighting him just to avoid being wrong.
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Sorry Chill, I think the rake’s yours today. Unless you know of another definition of motivation that I’m unaware of.
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Still, at least you know what exponential growth is, I’ll give you that.
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ffs ok i’m gonna do this one more time and then i’m giving up because this seems so obvious to me and everyone’s either trolling me or just doesn’t get it
jim - i can’t think of an equivalent type of assault off the top of my head but for the sake of argument:
you are in a crowded bar at 11pm, everyone is hammered
person a slaps person b on the arse while waiting to be served (let’s assume they’re strangers)
do you think there is any difference if:
or do you think there is no difference at all?
again, i’m not talking about criminal liability or “hate crimes”, i’m talking about power differentials and motivations
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Ummmm - this is not what we’re arguing about chill.
Do you think motivation for an act = reason why you did it?
That’s my point.
If not, what do you mean by motivation?
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i explained this at 19.36 i thought
every interaction you have with a Black person will to some extent be racially motivated (and with a woman be patriarchally motivated, which everyone has apparently ignored)
this goes double if you’re pulling a wig off them
of course you might be drunk and think “cor a green wig, it’d be funny to rip that off”
but if your actions are then different if you see a Black woman (or an asian woman, or an hispanic woman) vs a white woman, that’s racially motivated
that doesn’t mean i think the chap saw a Black woman in a wig and that’s the “reason” he ripped it off
(and similarly if the chap saw a man in a green wig and thought “cor it’d be funny to rip that off”, but only actually did it to a woman - of any race - in a green wig, that’s societal misogyny in action)
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hence my thought experiment above
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Can you answer my 20:24? A simple yes or no will do.
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(P.S. for your above bits to be correct, as Sails pointed out ages ago, you have to presume some belief in the perpetrator. S/he must believe that the person they are interacting with is black/female etc otherwise your argument is null and void).
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sure
yes in the bald dictionary definition you’re framing it
i’m talking about underlying racial or sexist (or homophobic or transphobic etc) factors for why people do anything
in which case no of course not
someone can have racial motivations for doing something - giving x candidate a job over y candidate, or slapping someone on the arse - without that being the “reason” they did it
but then we’re just parsing words aren’t we?
do you understand my basic point?
or are we just trying to tun cru up now?
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sure i get that, but here the Black woman was walking down the street while Black, so i sort of assume he’d have understood that
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(i agree for example that a trans woman can suffer misogynistic attacks if they pass as a woman, I don’t think that’s in issue)
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Tun for Cru - thanks Chill. Enjoyed this.
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