Stanley Crouch has died at age 74, and I am sad.
If you don’t know who he was, his obituary is here, and I remember him most for his 'flip test"
The first time I heard Crouch explain the Flip Test, was during the O.J. Simpson murder trial.
Flip it around, said Stanley.
What if Woody Allen were accused of murdering Mia Farrow and a friend, and the cop who searched Allen's apartment turned out to be a rabid anti-Semitic who had said he'd plant evidence on a New York Jew if he had half a chance. At trial, the prosecution portrays the cop -- its star witness -- as Captain Whitebread, but Allen's lawyer learns of his attitude towards Jews and uses it. Would he be accused of waving the bloody shirt of Anti-Semitism? I'm sorry, but the case would go down! And when the nine Jews on the jury voted to acquit, it wouldn't be because they were crazy, it would be because the prosecution embraced a scumbag and got caught!
Okay... an interesting exercise. But Crouch is black, so maybe this was simply a convenient reach to get to a pre-ordained pro-O.J. conclusion?
But no, Crouch says the "Flip Test" works in both directions:
Black kids who dress like gangsters complain that they get bad service at restaurants and stores. They say, 'Hey, we aren't thugs, we just dress that way.' Well, let's flip it over. Let's say a white guy comes into a store wearing a K.K.K. outfit, and everybody is horrified. And he says, 'I'm not really a Klansman, I just like the look.' Now, with ninety-nine percent of those black kids it is only style, but we just don't have time to go around interviewing them. 'Excuse me, young man, are you actually carrying a 9-mm pistol or is your outfit just a cultural signifier.'
Flip it around says Crouch. Once you do that, you can see if you are running on principles -- or something else.
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