It's like White Wakanda
January 8, 2020 11:11 PM   Subscribe

 
It's like White Wakanda
Except they don't fix broken black boys.
posted by krisjohn at 12:43 AM on January 9, 2020 [1 favorite]


"It's like White Wakanda"

I know I am very much not the GQ preferred audience, but this is SO offensive.
How did the editor let this stand from the writer?

I actually Like most of Larry David's comedy.
posted by Faintdreams at 3:59 AM on January 9, 2020 [9 favorites]


“I guess you might as well come to my house,” David says, with what can be described as enthusiasm well curbed. So I find myself winding my way up the hills of Pacific Palisades, streets lined with the hodgepodge architecture of Westside wealth—Tudors, Colonials, Mission Revivals—sidewalks empty except for gardeners and the occasional power walker with tiny dogs in tow. This, too, is indisputably Larry World: It is as easy to imagine David on Mars as it is in Silver Lake.

Looking clear through the entryway when David throws open the door, out the large picture windows at the back of the house, I get the illusion that we are suspended over a void. David walks us to the patio, which reveals itself to be perched on the wall of a canyon overlooking the dewy green paradise of Riviera Country Club. Soft-glowing viridescent fairways roll out toward distant hills, shrouded in mist and pocked with moon-white bunkers. A single golf cart crawls silently across the landscape as a flock of emerald parrots swoops by. It's like White Wakanda.

“How long before you started to take this view for granted?” David asks. “For me, it's two days. I'm a two-day take-for-granted guy.”
So, "White Wakanda" is multi-million dollar homes (Zillow) overlooking an exclusive golf course, where the initiation fee is as high as $250,000, and annual dues are said to be north of $25,000+ (How Much Is It).

But "White Wakanda" is a throw-away line, sandwiched between the description of casual luxury and how quickly Larry David can take his wealth for granted, further devaluing the notion of what Wakanda is for some.

Maybe ask the mods to re-title this? Because I think that's a notable self-derail.
posted by filthy light thief at 7:09 AM on January 9, 2020 [9 favorites]


There's also his casual valet identification of another "dark skinned" guest at the restaurant and his light pressuring of his housekeeper in limited spanish to say what a great boss he is. It's either unaware racism by the writer or carefully woven in fuck you, Larry David is racist and I can't say it openly because of his PR team because three examples in one article seems a bit much.
posted by dorothyisunderwood at 7:57 AM on January 9, 2020 [11 favorites]


I read white wakanda as a burn on the ludicrousness of the resort but who fuckin knows tbh
posted by ominous_paws at 10:31 AM on January 9, 2020 [2 favorites]


I mention a scene, from season seven, in which TV Larry stops a little girl, Jeff and Susie's daughter, from singing at a party. He smiles.

“To me that's too funny to be mean. When it's funny, it's not mean. It's just funny.”



So what exactly is the difference between self-actualized and "asshole"?
posted by Omnomnom at 10:57 AM on January 9, 2020


"White Wakanda" or not, I, for one, enjoyed this piece. I've always appreciated his observational humour, just as I look forward to the upcoming season of Curb.
We swing into the clubhouse dining room. David seats himself at the one spot of a four-top not made up with silverware, near a huge TV showing coverage of the Trump impeachment hearings, and orders a salad—debating and then allowing himself the luxury of adding turkey. “Oh, yeah, yeah,” he shouts sarcastically at the screen when the president appears to make a statement. “Stop lying, you asshole!” He is aware that in the wealthy precincts of the club there are sometimes other members nearby who feel differently about the administration. “I talk louder on purpose when they're around,” he says. “To me, if somebody bought Fox News, I would feel the same as I felt when the Berlin Wall came down. That feeling of euphoria, like the world was going to change.”
Indeed.
posted by Ahmad Khani at 11:12 AM on January 9, 2020 [5 favorites]


Thanks, I liked the idea of Larry David before this (despite knowing he has despicable wealth), and now I hate it.
posted by turbid dahlia at 2:54 PM on January 9, 2020 [1 favorite]


Love his comedy, but it doesn't surprise me that he's insufferable in real life.

Never meet your heroes!
posted by rhizome at 4:44 PM on January 9, 2020 [1 favorite]


If you read to the end: he hadn't considered the "Neighboring Factor?" Every man (other than Larry David) considers this. Studies have been made.
posted by kozad at 7:09 PM on January 9, 2020


Watching larry david's character du jour (and by extension, larry david) being an insufferable blithely sexist racist rich privileged asshole while everyone is just like "oh gee the smug unselfaware asshole is soooo cute lets let him slide again and reward him for his insufferability at the cost of all other characters"

and then have people say "this is the height of comedy"

is like having a colonoscopy while semi-sedated with the sound of a thousand fingernails being scratched down a blackboard.

he makes millions from this shtick? fuck him.
posted by lalochezia at 7:41 PM on January 9, 2020 [1 favorite]


So what exactly is the difference between self-actualized and "asshole"?

I think some have been wondering this for some time?
posted by timdiggerm at 5:14 AM on January 10, 2020 [1 favorite]


How did the editor let this stand from the writer?
It's not even original
posted by thelonius at 7:31 AM on January 10, 2020


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