Guess who's coming to dinner?

I'll give some kind of prize to whoever can correctly name the reference I'm making in the title. Post your guesses in the comments.

There was this article in the Globe last week:

fbi_informant_in_bribe_cases_says_more_suspects_are_likely_to_surface

If you read the comments section, you'll see one from me on the first page, that asked, "Of all the words the author could have used to describe Wilburn's manner of dress, was "nattily attired" really the best choice?"

I guess it took a few more pages for people to get worked up about it, and elicited two more responses:

"nattily attired"  http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/nattily  "neatly or trimly smart in dress or appearance; spruce:"  Ignorance is sad. Nattily has absolutely no racist connotations. Read a book once in a while.  by Cai-1 November 25, 11:39 AM

And:

"addmmyerson", What's wrong with the word "nattily" by rrsafety November 25, 12:00 PM

It's always a short cut and cop out when someone tries to throw the dictionary definition of a word or phrase at you, as if the definition can capture all the context and connotations a word or phrase contains after years and years of use. When used to describe an African American, the history of "nattily dressed" is usually sarcastic, because it's such a highfalutin phrase to use. It's archaic, and you use it to reference something reminiscent of a time gone by. In that time, a well-dressed black person would have been considered haughty by white people. So usually if someone is using it, the image it conjures up is one of a pimp. You would almost always be using it sarcastically. That's not what I think the author meant, and they should have chosen a different phrase.

Secondly, describing Wilburn's manner of dress in the first place is racist, similar to how the reporting of what Hillary or Palin are wearing is sexist. We expect important white men to be well-dressed, so it doesn't get reported. A well-dressed black man is apparently worth reporting, just as we're all apparently interested in what hot little number Sarah Palin showed up in.

Lastly, "nattily" is also related to "natty," which has the same meaning but is always used to describe dreadlocks. So intended or not, it has connotations of race.

Since again, I don't think the author intended all of those second meanings, they should have chosen a different phrase to describe Wilburn's manner of dress, or even better, not reported it all. That he's African-American was important to the story. That he was well-dressed was not.

Sorry, I've been listening to the first two Public Enemy records a LOT in the past week.