It’s a joke, right? I can’t be a bigot, I have black friends, gay friends, Hispanic friends?I mean, listen to this asshole:
“Well,” Yelton paused. “I’ve been called a bigot before. Let me tell you something, you don’t look like me but I think I’ve treated you the same as anybody else. As a matter of fact, one of my best friends is black. One of my best friends.”
Just once I would like to hear from these friends. I would like to read the interview headlined SOME OF MY BEST FRIENDS ARE RACIST BIGOTS.
What continues to get to me about this pat, clichéd defense is how it’s obviously framed as the racist bigot doing this black person, this gay person, this Asian person, whatever, a favor. It’s one thing when people cite family: I have a gay sister, or a black brother-in-law. Those associations aren’t of the racist bigot’s choice. That’s happenstance.
It’s the friend thing that trips me up. Friend implies someone chose to hang with you, knowing what a fucknut you are. Friend implies they spend time with you in spite of your views, just as you clearly rise above yourself to befriend someone who you clearly consider inferior. So where are they, in our stupendously idiotic conversation about race? Why do we never hear from them?
The easy answer, of course, is that they don’t exist, or that the racist bigot offering them up is citing some minor acquaintance in an effort to silence critics. But let’s be generous, and assume there is a real person being talked about here. Where is he? What does he think about all this? Or is his opinion not important? Is it enough that he exist, so as to be pointed at when his friend is faced with criticism?
A.
Can all of these GOP bozos consider Clarence Thomas as “a friend”?
I’ll never forget the Colbert schtick where he held a contest for someone to be his black friend.
To the Article, of course this is the NC of Jessie Helms. While they go hand in hand, and anyone in the know is unlikely to talk (I assume in NC his post was party appointed).
But I really, really wonder if he was removed (/ dismissed / or whatever they want to call it) because of his bigoted statement. OR if being bigoted was A-OK (after all, bigots oversaw the polls under Jim Crow and literacy tests) and he was removed because he was a GOP official admitting that the intent was voter suppression.
Shame he isn’t a higher level official. That statement has potential of being used in court reviews of similar voting laws in so many other states.
Actually, the evidence that they don’t actually have these friends, or these people they know are NOT really their friends, is if they did, they would not have these racist opinions.
I mean, why do you think the social attitudes towards homosexuality and gay marriage have abruptly changed over the last 20 years? It’s because so many homosexual people have been brave enough to be themselves publicly. So many people have changed their minds (those who aren’t too far brainwashed by religion or suffering from terrible latent homosexuality) because they know someone. They know a gay person who has been treated wrongly. They know a gay couple that deserves to be treated equally.
If this person really had a close “black friend” then he would be the one fighting the bigots, not endorsing their wrongheaded opinions.
“You don’t look like me but I’ve treated you the same as I would anybody else.”
If that doesn’t explain the bigotry better than any speculation on earth, I’m Chuck Norris’ stunt double.