There is so much disdain for our personhood by the Right, that again, I am often speechless. And I use "personhood" with great emphasis because the idea of a black family in the White House is a symbolic shift that racists (be they latent, colorblind, or active) cannot accept.
I wonder if "fair and balanced" Fox News will cover this one?
Courtesy of The Vancouver Sun:
"A typical street whore." "A bunch of ghetto thugs." "Ghetto street trash." "Wonder when she will get her first abortion."
These are a small selection of some of the racially-charged comments posted to the conservative 'Free Republic' blog Thursday, aimed at U.S. President Barack Obama's 11-year-old daughter Malia after she was photographed wearing a t-shirt with a peace sign on the front.
The thread was accompanied by a photo of Michelle Obama speaking to Malia that featured the caption, "To entertain her daughter, Michelle Obama loves to make monkey sounds."
Though this may sound like the sort of thing one might read on an Aryan Nation or white power website, they actually appeared on what is commonly considered one of the prime online locations for U.S. Conservative grassroots political discussion and organizing - and for a short time, the comments seemed to have the okay of site administrators.
Moderators of the blog left the comments - and commenters - in place until a complaint was lodged by a writer doing research on the conservative movement, almost a full day later.
"Could you imagine what world leaders must be thinking seeing this kind of street trash and that we paid for this kind of street ghetto trash to go over there?" wrote one commenter.
"They make me sick .... The whole family... mammy, pappy, the free loadin' mammy-in-law, the misguided chillin', and especially 'lil cuz... This is not the America I want representin' my peeps," wrote another.
Such was the onslaught of derision on the site that the person who originally complained about the slurs, a Kristin N., claims only one comment in the first hundred posted actually criticized the remarks as inappropriate.
A note on the front of the blog reads, "Free Republic does not advocate or condone racism, violence, rebellion, secession, or an overthrow of the government," but one comment on the thread read, "This disgusting display makes me more and more eager for the revolution," while another read, "I never actually wnated [sic] to be a pistol before but..."
After attention from other blogs, the thread was suppressed and placed under review, but before long it was returned to the site intact, and attracted a new series of racial slurs when the original complaint email was posted publicly to the site, with the sender's email address intact.
"The writer has a point," wrote site owner Jim Thompson sarcastically. "We should steer clear of Obama's children. They can't help it if their old man is an American-hating Marxist pig."
"I agree Jim," wrote commenter, by the nickname NoobRep. "The kids didn't pick their commie pinko pansy of a father. Nor did they choose to be put into the spotlight. But Obama/Soetoro is fair game and so is his witch of a wife."
"Poor kids. I hope they're not 'punished with a baby'," wrote another. "Hopefully they won't deal cocaine like the Kenyan."
"DIRTBAGS! All of them. Our [White House] is now a joke to the rest of the world. We have no respect and this is not going to turn out well, mark my words. We will be hit, and much worse than last time. We are now seen as weak and vulnerable. Ghetto and Chicago thugs have taken over."
Only after significant negative attention from a host of left wing political blogs did the maintainers of the Free Republic site place the thread under review for a second time, before finally pulling it.
In the wake of the controversy, some Free Republic posters complained about the vitriol.
One poster by the name of "fullchroma" wrote, "To Jim Thompson: The recent uptick here in racist vitriol, aimed at Barrack, Michelle and their children has made me wonder if I belong. My objection to Obama has nothing to do with skin tone. Is the ugly stereotype of Conservative racism true?"
Another, going by the name of TChris, wrote, "Free Republic is a political discussion forum. It SHOULD be beneath us as a group to stoop to such juvenile tactics as I see increasing here lately. Do we REALLY have to insult Mrs. Obama's appearance like a clique of nasty 14-year-old girls?"
But such opinions were not shared by all. Said Roses of Sharon, "Poor libs .... Too late, the battle has been joined."
11 comments:
Assholes. I won't read the whole thing because if I do, I will become extremely enraged and that is not pretty.
Oh yeah - sickening, despicable and disgusting.
Well if the shoe fits.....
Negros hate white people. Why should whites by subject a gag rule?
Thank you for posting this. I'd seen a Kos diary that exposed this FreeRepub thread (and apparently closed it down -- last time I looked, the FreeRepub thread had been replaced by the word "Okay," which was linked to the Daily Kos diary -- which was by a writer pseudonymed "The Halfrican"). It's great to see that this latest eruption of Republican racism is getting some "real press" attention. My personal experience with white Republicans is that while such sentiments are rarely expressed, they're really quite common.
How will the Republicans EVER pull themselves together as a cohesive party? Can they ever convince a significant portion of the other 80% of Americans who do not currently identify as "Republican" that doing so isn't basically like smearing crap on oneself in the eyes of others>
Sigh. This is just sad. No, I stand corrected. Verbally attacking someone who neither did nor said anything offensive is sad. Adults (and I use the term loosely) verbally attacking an 11 year old child who neither did nor said anything offensive is just pathetic. And the Republican Party wonders why the black community overwhelming votes Democrat? Not that the Democrats are automatically less racist, but dang at least their racist elements aren't repeatedly on display for all to see.
The Republicans I know have issues with Obama based on ideology and difference in opinion on how best to handle America's problems, not because of his skin color. But stuff like this is only going to reinforce the idea that the Right is racist. The non-racist elements of the Right (and by extension the non-racist elements of the Republican Party) need to do some soul searching as to why the racist elements/members have been allowed to slowly but surely marginalise the Party. America is too diverse for a party to continue to survive on the votes of extremist and racists. I've said it before and I'll say it again: in politics, the middle/moderates matter.
@ Anon at 10:03 - I can already tell from your use of the word "negro" that you're stuck in 1950s. Not all black people hate white people.
I will agree with you that I don't think one race should be subjected to gagging while another is free to say exactly how they really feel. I prefer my racists out in the open anyway. At least then I know where I stand from the beginning. But with that freedom of speech comes responsibility. If you say something, you have to own it/stand behind it and be willing to accept the consequences if the proverbial sh*t hits the fan. I can't expect to yell "Fire!" in a crowded theater and not accept the consequences of those words. The same should be applied to folks who spout racist crap.
It puzzles me how the right fails to see the irony in denigrating this Ivy League educated couple while celebrating that hillbilly show coming straight out of Alaska.
At this point the right is stewing in the juices of its own ignorance. For years they were buoyed by empty rhetoric, and their followers seduced by propaganda. But crisis woke up much of the nation to their duplicity, and now they find themselves on the outside looking in.
So in the place of any real agenda or any real ideas, they fall back on that opium for the masses, racism which only manages to push them farther and farther away from the table.
It has been made abundantly clear by that Algonquin Round Table of posters that Ivy League educations only have significance when the recipients are white. Any non-white graduate from an Ivy League institution is considered an affirmative action/identity politics parasite that is clearly not worthy of respect, while an anti-intellectual 70's Playboy centerfold disguised as a state governor who flunked her way through multiple colleges and married a secessionist is part of the "real America." I see.
It's a very disturbing time, in many ways. Without the anonymity of the Internet, such talk would be relatively confined because of the social costs of doing so publicly. With the Internet, the anonymous mob feels empowered to voice their worst hates and fantasies. Ugly racial bigotry and explicit threats of violence undermine it. It is a level of hate and intolerance scarcely different from the terrorists these people claim to despise.
Careful now.
http://gawker.com/5312952/hate-speech-against-malia-obama-on-conservative-blogs-reported-by-hate-speech-planting-journalist
How many liberals got upset when Hillbillies from Alaska had their children attacked?
Please don’t say that is different. Children are children!!!
How many liberals got upset when Hillbillies from Alaska had their children attacked?
Please don’t say that is different. Children are children!!!
Brought to you by a moronic conservative. This was BEFORE the fiasco with that idiot Palin and her kids you moron.
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