The Urge to Purge Hits Kate Smith
04/19/2019
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From ESPN:

Yanks drop Smith’s ‘God Bless America’ recording

NEW YORK — The Yankees have suspended the use of Kate Smith’s recording of “God Bless America” during the seventh-inning stretch while they investigate an allegation of racism against the late singer.

The New York Daily News reported Thursday there are conflicting claims about Smith’s 1939 song “That’s Why Darkies Were Born.” The song originated in the 1931 Broadway revue “George White’s Scandals” and was considered satire, but includes racist language. It was recorded by Smith and also by Paul Robeson, who was black. …

Smith died in 1986. The Yankees have used her recording of “God Bless America” and sometimes live singers during the seventh inning since the 9/11 terrorist attacks. They used an organ version of the song on Wednesday and Thursday.

This song by Ray Henderson and Lew Brown is referenced by Groucho Marx in Duck Soup, so I guess the complete works of the Marx Brothers must be memoryholed too. The song “Bohemian Rhapsody” appears on the album “A Night at the Opera,” which references a different Marx Brothers film, so Queen has to go, too. (Now that I think about it, I suspect Freddie Mercury’s opinion of the race that massacred thousands of his family’s South Asian neighbors and relatives in the Zanzibar Black Power revolution of 1964 might not stand up to 2019 standards.)


[Comment at Unz.com]

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