Charles Ramsay, Gong Gu jai, Storytellers

I saw a lot of stuff on my facebook from old teachers regarding the Charles Ramsay phenomenon, which was really a side story the Amanda Berry story. I saw various clips, read articles, listened to conversations and arguments about race, and also there was the story from the Hispanic man who says he got there first.
Here's my take. First of all, I do kind of care a little whether Ramsay or the other man got there first. But in the end nobody else seems to.
 Charles Ramsay was on the news because he helped, but he became a worldwide sensation because of the flamboyant way in which he is able to tell a story, and also for his mannerisms which make Anderson Cooper look awkward and out of place, and which we are just not used to seeing at a news station. The pauses, the looks, the details which normally wouldn't seem important, but are only important if you are trying to pay attention to the feeling of being in the story, rather than trying to simply find out facts.
Ramsay is a storyteller. The oral kind. Every culture has had them throughout history them, in pubs, tea houses, whorehouses, street corners,  Kung Fu schools, gambling halls, royal courts and villages. They are called storytellers, rappers, teachers, court jesters, stand up comedians, poets, skalds, bards, street performers, purim spielers, bullshitters, and politicians. Usually this oral kind is seen as low class (unless they somehow manage to make a lot of money)

One of my friends is a story teller like this. He happens to be black and has a lot of the same pauses and mannerisms as Ramsay. But usually in conversation, not in his storytelling. As far as being a story teller goes he is one of the best oral ones I know. To the point where I have seen kids begging him and begging him to tell them a story. And when he obliges, he makes the thing up on the spot, and it is fantastic, flamboyant, and full of physical movements. Not everyone can do this. That is why, whether Ramsay's story is 100% true or 90% true or 60% true, the main fact is true. The Amanda Berry was in the house and now she is out. The reason why he has become so famous is not because he was the hero, but because of how told the story. You can be jealous of him, admire him, laugh at him, but in the end, he is famous because of a skill. You can wag your finger at those laughing at him, and thinking racist thoughts, but the story teller, is not necessarily on a pedestal. Shakespeare is on a pedestal now, but was he when he was alive? No. Entertainers were in the same class as prostitutes. Shakespeare uses high language, but he was street, (or river rather) ghetto, low class, famous yes, celebrated yes, but his theater was next to the bear fights. Court Jesters play the fool/ They are laughed at. But they can get away with saying crazy stuff in front of the kind when nobody else can.
Ramsay can get away with saying all sorts of un PC stuff on all these morning shows too that anyone else would get jumped on for. My friend too. Though I tend to call him out on many things because usually are conversations are at my house.

Usually when you meet a story teller in person, whether or Irish, or Black, Latino, or Taishanese, there is some give and take, some shouting at him to get to the F-ing point, to summarize, to stop blowing water to such an extent. Unless the story teller is  himself, an alpha male good at Kung Fu or prone to punching interupters in the face.
Or...
 Unless the whole point of the conversation is not to find out some facts or information, but is about the STORY. Then the story teller is like a skald, or prophet and total attention is given to him (or her), no matter what their status. And if they are good at their story telling then they will be asked to tell it again and again and again.

That's what happened with Ramsay. The truth is everyone wanted to talk to Amanda Berry and the victims, or to find out more about the case. But since non of that was coming out, and because Ramsay told his story so well, with so many layers of it, what he felt at the time, how he felt about living next to such a person, how he can not sleep now just thinking about it, he became his own story.
Maybe the other man not only got there first but also was the one to break down the door. But his story was... boring.  And didn't have the levels of imagining being friends and neighbors with a guy who ends up being worse then some of the witches and demons in medieval fairy tales.
It doesn't mention  the feeling of being duped by such a person, wanting to kill such a person and at the same time knowing that women were trapped in the house next door in a dungeon for that long, everyday while you lived a regular life. The genuine surprise of learning this, the details of dress, food, and the comic relief at the end, a joke playing on race and the absurdity of the situation.
This type of story telling, is not as strong in suit and tie America. It is not absent completely. It usually can only tale place after a couple of beers because to suit and tie America it is a bit improper. It was left behind in Ireland, or lost when Taishanese fluency gave way to English, or your Puritan ancestors looked at all that askance in the first place as the work of the devil and proper people wrote their stories down.
But this type of story telling is a part of mainstream America, at least from my experience. Ramsay isn't a them. He's an us. The other suits of the morning shows are the them.