The Wright Brothers - just "Dead White Males"?

[Caligastia]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Cali,

There's this thing called the "quote" tag and it is there for a purpose. As you may have noticed, italics is for emphasis. Putting the entire quoted passage in italics does not make it more important, it just makes it hard to read, and thus getting ignored.

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Ok.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Sikander


This is simply an opinion column. Check out one of his books if you want to see documentated facts, he has millions of them.

It's a lame excuse for an opinion column, because his core premise--that the Wright Brothers are denigrated in their acheivement for being white men--is utter crap. He doesn't even bother to try and substantiate it.

What's the point of it? If he wants to rant about how white men are being shat upon, then just say that without making up specious stories. Or using outright falsehoods in his examples.

Just because the guy wrote a bunch of books doesn't impress me. When he says something as ludicrous in his opinion piece that sans Wright Brothers, we wouldn't have flight, then I don't need to read his books to see he's a fool.

[Drake Tungsten]

because his core premise--that the Wright Brothers are denigrated in their acheivement for being white men

You might want to read the "lame excuse for an opinion column" again, as the author's core premise is very much not that the Wright Brothers are somehow being "denigrated". His premise seems to be that their achievement, along with the achievements of many other white men, are being ignored in a push to play up the achievements of minorities and women in the interest of diversity.

When he says something as ludicrous in his opinion piece that sans Wright Brothers, we wouldn't have flight

He never said that, either. Strawmen sure are fun, though, aren't they?

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
You might want to read the "lame excuse for an opinion column" again, as the author's core premise is very much not that the Wright Brothers are somehow being "denigrated". His premise seems to be that their achievement, along with the achievements of many other white men, are being ignored in a push to play up the achievements of minorities and women in the interest of diversity.

Urh, and he is "proving" this premise how? By saying the Wright Brothers are being discredited--his discussion of the Wrights takes up half the piece, and is in the title. But does he offer even ONE example of this happening? No. Point stands.

He never said that, either. Strawmen sure are fun, though, aren't they?

I even quoted this before.

"That part of the United States is often referred to disdainfully as "flyover country" because it is part of America that the east coast and west coast elites fly over on their way to what they consider more important places. But they are able to fly over it only because of those mechanics in Dayton."

That is a pretty clear statement--without them, he asserts, we couldn't fly over the country. Now, do you believe that's true? I certainly hope not.

[mindseye]

Add me to the list of those confused over the alleged failure to give the Wrights their due. Jeez, even students in China credit the Wrights with the invention of the airplane.

In fact, if nothing else, I think their contribution to the development of aviation is rather over-emphasized.
Makes a nice story for the American history books, though.

[DAVOUT]

Four times a day, for seven years, I walked by a monument dedicated to the Wright brothers (on my way to the *lycée*), in my native town of Le Mans (France).

Even the Frogs celebrated the Wright brothers.

[Q Classic]

update:

the wright brothers are still dead, still white, and still male.

[chequita guevara]

I'm not sure they are either white or male anymore, just dead.

[Q Classic]

surely you're not suggesting that the wright brothers are black transsexuals!

though that might get them into some history books.

[Boris Godunov]

Neither of the Wrights married, devoting their lives to their work. Or perhaps they were incestual gay lovers. There you go, Cali. Now we can preserve their place in history from this dreadful onslaught of invisible people trashing them.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Q Cubed
surely you're not suggesting that the wright brothers are black transsexuals!

No, I'm suggesting they're putrified corpses which no longer resemble anything white or male.

[Q Classic]

it's a pity they aren't black or transsexual. after all, it would get the white power structure into a tizzy, wouldn't it ?

at least we both agree that the wright brothers are dead.

[MrFun]

You lie!!!!

They are not dead! They work for Santa now.

[Q Classic]

Shh! dammit, mrfun, why'd you have to go and blow their cover?

they're still pasty white, though, being up in the north pole all the time.

[MrFun]

Nah -- not pasty white -- more like creamy white.