From the Dallas City Hall Blog:
County commissioners were discussing problems with the central
collections office that is used to process traffic ticket payments and
handle other paperwork normally done by the JP Courts.
Commissioner Kenneth Mayfield, who is white, said it seemed that
central collections "has become a black hole" because paperwork
reportedly has become lost in the office.
Commissioner John Wiley Price, who is black, interrupted him with a
loud "Excuse me!" He then corrected his colleague, saying the office
has become a "white hole."
That prompted Judge Thomas Jones, who is black, to demand an apology from Mayfield for his racially insensitive analogy.
Mayfield shot back that it was a figure of speech and a science
term. A black hole, according to Webster's, is perhaps "the invisible
remains of a collapsed star, with an intense gravitational field from
which neither light nor matter can escape."
I reaize the tensions and mistrust that surround racial relations in this country. I also realize that tensions were high, given that the meeting involved a critique of how a city office functions.
However, the term "black hole" is widely used and should not have caused accusations of racial insensitivity.
I may be biased, as I am a Phyics teacher.