Thursday, February 23, 2012

Hollywood Meets DC On Racism

One of the big arguments for Barack Obama in 2008 was that he would be the first post-racial president. His election, we were told, would put an end to racial discord and bring the races together. Unfortunately, the hope and change lasted about five minutes after the inauguration in January of 2009. Racial division began almost immediately to become a hallmark of the Obama administration.

There was the arrest for disorderly conduct of black Harvard professor Henry Louis “Skip” Gates, an Obama chum. Without any investigation into the matter, Obama called the police action stupid and inferred that the arrest was racist. He later had to apologize and have a “beer summit” with Gates and the arresting officer. Around the same time, he referred to the grandmother who raised and pampered him as “a typical white woman.” Then his Attorney General dismissed voter intimidation cases against the New Black Panthers in Philadelphia, even though the cases had already been won. Eric Holder called the American people "cowards" for not talking enough about race.

But the atmosphere in DC isn’t enough to satisfy the race-baiters. Those who most loudly proclaimed that Obama was the man who would usher in the post-racial era and make America into a wonderful interracial movie have changed their tune. That’s the Hollywood crowd. And loudest of all are the voices of black movie stars who claimed that race was irrelevant in politics and only whites suffer from racial identification.

Two movie stars have made the news and the blogs after making statements that completely negate all their previous statements about the need to vote for Obama, the post-racial president. It’s not his economics which draw them. It’s not his foreign policy. It’s not his religious devotion which draws them. In fact, it’s not any of those things which ordinarily make people choose a particular candidate. It’s race. Pure and simple. And in no uncertain terms. If you don’t believe me, read on.

Samuel L. Jackson made his reasons abundantly clear in an interview published in Ebony magazine. “I voted for Barack because he was black. ‘Cuz that’s why other folks vote for other people—because they look like them. That’s American politics. Obama’s message didn’t mean s**t to me.” I guess he forgot just how many white people voted for “Barack.” I guess he also forgot that Obama himself injected a little racism into the campaign by pointing out that he didn’t look like the other presidents.

Echoing DC denizen Rep. Shirley Jackson Lee, another fine actor decided it was time to drop the mask. Morgan Freeman, much beloved by almost everyone, let loose with a screed against the Tea Party. Said Freeman: “Their stated policy, publicly stated, is to do whatever it takes to see to it that Barack Obama only serves one term. What underlies that? Screw the country. ‘We’re going to do whatever we can to get this black man outta here.’” Freeman is so wrought up in racial identity that he has no idea that the Tea Party wants Obama out because of his color, all right. He’s a red.

Obama has broken almost every promise he has made. Unemployment stubbornly remains officially above 8%. The economy is showing a very feeble recovery despite all the government tinkering and bailouts. We have become a laughingstock overseas as a result of Obama’s foreign policy (or lack thereof). The government has grown by leaps and bounds, and executive orders and bureaucratic agency mandates have replaced Congressional action. American freedoms are being snatched from our hands at an alarming rate. Our energy-dependence on the whim of foreign dictators has grown by quantum leaps as the administration adds new prohibitive regulations and nixes “shovel-ready” projects to wean us off Middle East oil.

Yet Freeman and Jackson can only find one reason that the Tea Party and the vast majority of conservatives oppose Obama. He’s black and conservatives are racists. Having damned white people for having only one reason for opposing Obama, they promptly produce only one reason why black’s should support him. The same reason. He’s black (sort of). Jackson carried Freeman’s thoughts a bit farther: “It’s pretty obvious what they [the Tea Party] are. The division of the country is not about the government having too much power. It’s not politics. It’s not economics. It all boils down pretty much to race.”

The left used to accuse Ronald Reagan of thinking that his movies were real. Jackson seems to embody that thinking, channeling his tough, angry black man roles into his view of what Obama ought to be doing in the upcoming election cycle. Obama only picked up white votes because he wasn’t angry enough or black enough But Jackson suggests the remedy:

“When it comes down to it, they wouldn’t have elected a n****r. Because what’ a n****r? A n****r is scary. Obama ain’t scary at all. N****r don’t have beers at the White House [with white cops]. N****r don’t let some white dude, while you in the middle of a speech, call him a liar. A n****r would have stopped the meeting right there and said, ‘who the f**k said that?’ I hope Obama gets scary in the next four years, ‘cuz he ain’t gotta worry about getting re-elected.” I’m not sure if Jackson is suggesting that Obama should turn black and angry before or after the election. But at least he has told Obama what he must do, sooner or later.

Jackson and Freeman join Castro-loving Sidney Poitier and America-hating Harry Belafonte in making race the only criterion for the White House that matters. Less in-your-face black entertainment figures have spoken on the subject without quite the zeal of Jackson, Freeman, Poitier and Belafonte. But Tracy Morgan, ultra-rich rapper Jay-Z, Will Smith and his wife Jada Pinkett Smith, Kerrie Washington, and choreographer Debbie Allen have all made public statements indicating how important retaining a black president is, despite all the other possible negatives.

Too many whites in Hollywood have bought into the racism argument, but at least have many of the same leftist views as Obama to hide behind. Think Matt Damon, Sean Penn and Mark Ruffalo. The same likely applies to the leftist-indoctrinated “youth vote,” and surely to the Occupy movement which Obama praises. So far, actor Wesley Snipes has not weighed in on the subject, but I’m sure as soon as he has completed his probation for tax-evasion he’ll be on board with the rest of the Hollywood crowd.

Meanwhile, if you need clarification, you might want to visit Facebook at the Obama-approved site African-Americans for Obama. Somehow, I don’t think we’ll be seeing a candidate-approved website called White Americans for (Fill in the Blank). There’s a reason for that. Only whites can be racist. Only blacks are entitled to identify with others solely based on their race. Just ask Samuel L. Jackson.

27 comments:

Tennessee Jed said...

I saw this one about Samuel L. the other day and it saddened me yet it did not surprise. As a native son of Chatanooga, Jackson embarrassed the city, state, and himself. While driving through Chatanooga on our way home, I thought Sam Kackson-- a racist and moron.

T-Rav said...

I listen on my laptop a lot of the time to talk radio in STL, which has a large black population. Earlier this week one of the shows was discussing something about racism; I don't remember the exact issue. Anyway, one of the callers, who was black, started going on a long rant about white people hating Obama because he was black. It sounded like an exact caricature of a race-baiting liberal. Allow me to reproduce it:

Host: So are you saying that white people can't oppose Obama because of his policies? It has to be his race?

Caller: Well--look, this is America, man. And, you know, Obama is our President, and I think you have to support him.

Host: But there's no way to legitimately oppose them?

Caller: Well, man, white people don't understand what black people have gone through in this country and--yeah, I think they have a big race problem.

It went exactly like that for ten minutes. I was amazed.

Joel Farnham said...

It is sad to see the shallow convictions of Morgan Freeman and Samuel L. Jackson. Racism is unbecoming in these fine actors. Unfortunately, they said it unbidden. To them, it was and probably still is far more important that Obama is black than anything else. They must think that they have earned enough money.

Tam said...

If I cared much at all, I'd be more disappointed in Morgan Freeman than any of the others. Morgan Freeman is the one who had this exchange in an interview with Mike Wallace:

"Black History Month you find....

"Ridiculous. You want to relegate my history to a month? What do you do with yours? Which month is white history month? Come on. Tell me."

"Well...uh...heh heh...I'm Jewish."

"Okay, which month is Jewish history month?"

"There isn't one."

"Oh, Oh. Why not? Would you want one?"

"No."

"Why not? I don't either. I don't want a black history month. Black history is American history."

"How are we going to get rid of racism?"

"Stop talking about it. I'm going to stop calling you a white man, and I'm going to ask you to stop calling me a black man. I know you as Mike Wallace, you know me as Morgan Freeman."

That reason and logic disappears with his race-based support of Dear Leader.

BevfromNYC said...

Oh well, I guess I'm a racist if Morgan Freeman and Samuel Jackson say I am. I mean, Freeman plays God so much, maybe it's going to his head. I've been called worse...oh, wait, no I haven't. I guess it should bother me, but it doesn't. I have had an affinity for only using white sheets for a very long time. Now I know why!

Anonymous said...

Tennessee: The Jackson rant was mentioned on some of the news networks, mostly in passing and with considerable editing. Fox was a little clearer about how Jackson was making it clear that only race mattered. But I really thought the original quote, complete with obscenities was worthwhile publishing, even if I had to bleep the expletives.

Anonymous said...

T-Rav: The left and the universities have been fueling this racial nonsense since the Civil Rights and Voting Acts became law and people started to treat each other with respect regardless of race. The race-baiting industry is big business, and they're not about to allow blacks or whites to think that reconciliation was almost accomplished.

Anonymous said...

Joel: They both made that abundantly clear. If you didn't get what they were saying the first time around, they kept repeating and expanding on the theme. Freeman concentrates on evil white people while Jackson extols thugs who are "genuinely black." But the ultimate message is the same. Race, and race alone matters.

Anonymous said...

Tam: Freeman had a long history of speaking about racial healing and the foolishness of making racial identity a motivator in anyone's life. I can only guess that he had a stroke recently, because his view hasn't just modified, it has changed 180 degrees. Maybe he had an argument with Bill Cosby. LOL

Anonymous said...

Bev: As long as you use them to sleep on, but don't wear them, you'll be OK.

Frankly, I'm getting sick of being lectured to and hectored by people who weren't anywhere near the Civil Rights movement. Half of these morons weren't even born yet. I know what black people went through, and that's why we, black and white, took our chances in the Deep South in the 60s. Hearing this racist blather is not what we fought for.

T-Rav said...

Tam, I didn't know about that Morgan Freeman interview. Sad. Even without hearing it, I expected more from him than I did from Samuel L. Jackson--although Jackson did have a movie recently called "Lakeview Terrace," in which his character was a racist who terrorized an interracial couple next door; kind of edgy in its own way.

tryanmax said...

Jackson's statement about what a n****r would do in office only serves to illustrate how race-blind he is. Does he seriously think that only a black man is capable of such behavior? For that matter, does he really think such behavior is admirable? It's not enough that whites don't feel threatened by a black man? We must elect a black man who is just plain scary?

Jackson bespeaks a set of values that are truly backwards. I won't pretend his values are representative of blacks as a whole; that would truly be denigrating. But he clearly subscribes to a value system where one rises through bullying, intimidation, and malice. Jackson speaks as a fool and ought to be regarded as such.

Tam said...

T-Rav, it is sad, isn't it? He seems so reasonable and decidedly not racist. And yet, apparently, he is.

Also, it seems to me that all these racists are unaware that "white" is, in fact, a race. So hating white people because they're white is, in fact, racism.

BevfromNYC said...

Tam - You are just wrong. Don't you know that only white people can be racists? Remember that and dont' make that mistake again. And since you don't like Obama, that makes you...well...smart, but a smart racist. Freeman and Jackson have spoken.

T-Rav said...

Hey, hey, hey! Asians can be racist too, Bev.

Anonymous said...

T-Rav: Freeman was unusually dyspeptic about the issue, and I'm not sure he would have reversed course the way he did if something else hadn't intervened between his original comments and the recent ones. But so far, he's not backing away from his recent ones.

Anonymous said...

tryanmax: I'm pretty sure Jackson knows that there are plenty of redneck thugs out there who would do the same thing. But they're irrelevant, since they're white. To behave like a street thug is a bad thing for whites but a good thing for blacks, at least according to Jackson.

I doubt that his is the view of the majority of black Americans. But it certainly has plenty of traction in the urban centers and the ghettos among the younger generation. How many times have you heard the expression "make it real," or "authentically black?" Behaving oneself and using civilized discourse is constantly being reinforced as "acting white."

Anonymous said...

Tam: I guess the confusion started when the appellations "Caucasian, Negroid, and Mongoloid" were traded in for less geographically (and racially) descriptive terms. Caucasian became white, Negroid became black, and Mongoloid became Asian. None of the expressions is particularly helpful in racial politics and are more often used as a sledgehammer to beat down the demonized other. But they did serve a purpose strictly for anthropological and historical investigation. As genetics have become more and more sophisticated, the differences between what used to be considered wildly different races have been reduced to a few obvious physical traits and a few different biological reactions to the environment. But those few obvious physical traits are the ones that the race-baiters hang their hats on.

Anonymous said...

Bev: And now that an affirmative action case is wending its way to the Supreme Court to revisit racial preferences in college admissions, you can just bet you'll hear that "whites can't be discriminated against."

Anonymous said...

T-Rav: In all seriousness, the worst examples of race phobia I have seen in the past twenty years have come from Asians. They have been singled out for physical violence in San Francisco by black gangsters, so I can somewhat understand their fear. But they have made the traditional mistake of judging an entire group by the horrific actions of a few.

Anonymous said...

Bev: There's a whole mistaken perception involved in that black feeling toward whites. They have been told by their teachers, their elected representative, and most of all their college instructors that they are oppressed. There simply aren't enough Asians in positions of power to "oppress" black people, so they are currently considered insignificant.

But there are exceptions. The Chinese (and other Asian) communities in San Francisco are extremely numerous, powerful and influential. So there, Asians are considered to be every bit as racist as whites.

But as we all know, in those urban gardens where blacks are in the majority or at least have considerable power, such racial divisions never occur. I mean, have you ever heard Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton or the Rev. Jeremiah Wright make a disparaging remark about people of other ethnic backgrounds?

T-Rav said...

LawHawk, I don't have any personal experience there. I know I've heard that if you want to see some real racial tension, go to where the black and Korean neighborhoods meet, but I haven't actually witnessed any of that.

Individualist said...

Lawhawk

I would get worked up about this but it is not about Obama but Orwell. These are democrats bought and paid for by the studios and to keep getting aprts they need to come out for the cause and throw the race card out there.

This is nothing new and quite frankly the public sees through this. The only people this affects other than hard core dems are the young people hooked by the nedia. This is a problem but the MSM is losing their franchisae on information and entertainment.

Anonymous said...

T-Rav: If you can find any pictures of the South Central (Los Angeles) riots during the Rodney King debacles, you'll see how much love there is between the Korean and black communities. The Korean community absolutely refused to surrender their homes and property to rioters even after the police stayed out of the area and roving gangs of looters were out to grab all they could (all in the name of racial justice, by the way). They were frequently stopped by Korean shopkeepers armed with automatic and semi-automatic weapons. And they knew how to use them. So obviously Asians can be racists too (he said, tongue in cheek).

Anonymous said...

Indi: I agree, but that's still a lot of future voters and current dupes.

T-Rav said...

"I mean, have you ever heard Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton or the Rev. Jeremiah Wright make a disparaging remark about people of other ethnic backgrounds?"

(Except the Jews, that is.)

Anonymous said...

T-Rav: Yeah, they just love Hymietown.

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