Stop insulting our intelligence!
The spin that erupted after President Trump’s Truth Social page posted a “King of the Jungle” clip featuring the Obamas made my head hurt. First, let me be clear. Depicting the Obamas (or any blacks) as monkeys is extremely racist and extremely wrong. I condemn it. And I said that immediately on social media, even when the White House was still outrageously defending it. If you can’t see why it’s wrong, I can’t help you. The White House deleted the video (blaming a staffer), after defending it, and President Trump admitted it was wrong to a pro-Trump black pastor (according to the pastor’s post on X.) The monkey clip was a few seconds tacked onto a longer video about election fraud. Still very wrong.
Both sides went overdrive on the spin. It gave me an absolute migraine. So, let’s make a few things clear:
Ridiculous spin that insults our intelligence
1. Anyone who voted for Joe Biden trashing Trump’s video (see Biden’s long history of racist comments that they hypocritically ignored).
2. Anyone who didn’t criticize the racist slurs made to black ICE agents trashing this video (self-evident hypocrisy.)
3. “But the dishonest media are just showing a small part of the lengthy King of the Jungle video!” (um, Trump’s own page posted the small part, get real.)
4. “It’s a hoax!” (Then why did White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt defend it?)
5. “Other politicians are shown in the video as animals, too!” (The point here isn’t Trump being shown as a lion. It’s the nation’s first black president and his wife being depicted as monkeys, a long-time racist trope.)
6. “Get a sense of humor! Stop taking everything so seriously! You must be fun at a comedy club.” (Oh, okay, so racism is now funny? If it’s so A-OK, why did the White House delete it, “blame a staffer,” and why did Trump himself say it was wrong to a black pro-Trump pastor? Why did Tim Scott, the only black Republican senator, have a problem with it? PS: I give wide latitude for humor. Most of the things Trump says that drive the media and the left nuts, I find hilarious. The monkey clip was wrong.)
7. “See! Trump has always been a racist.” (False. He is not a racist. Just like he is not a pedophile. I will alter those statements if I ever see any credible evidence of it. They twisted his words on Charlottesville, he enjoyed strong support from black and Latino men, he named a Latino his Secretary of State, and go research the First Step Act and Alice Johnson, for starters. For God’s sake, the man commuted the sentence of LARRY HOOVER… which I opposed, by the way. LARRY HOOVER.)
8. “Stop making everything about race! We shouldn’t see race in today’s world!” (yes, of course, but depicting blacks as monkeys has long been a horrible racist trope.)
9. “You’re a Nazi! This proves Trump is a Nazi.” (Trump and his supporters are not even remotely like a regime that murdered millions of people. And this is often thrown around by liberals who traffic in anti-Semitic tropes. PS: It’s not fascism to enforce immigration laws like every other country on earth. And as repugnant as it was, it was a f*cking meme, not a gas chamber. Seriously, anyone who uses Nazi analogies so cavalierly should get mental health treatment.)
Spin that isn’t as disingenuous
1. “It was a careless autoplay screen capture jammed at the end of the election fraud video.” (fair point that takes away intentionality. But why did they initially defend it?)
2. “The staffer did it accidentally!” (Sort of the dog ate my homework, but takes away intentionality and makes the failure carelessness or an oversight issue, not racism. It better be true, though. Also, which staffer? PS: I expect the leader of the free world to have a better social media team.)
3. “Trump doesn’t post his own videos!” (Great. Removes intentionality, but not a great admission considering voters value the perceived authenticity.)
4. “There are more important things in the world! Move on!” (Sure, I am about to. And we can all walk and chew gum at the same time. It’s only been a few hours. We would have all moved on faster if the White House hadn’t spent hours defending this.)
5. “This was 5D chess! It means millions of people watched the election fraud video!” (plausible albeit unlikely, but a scummy strategy if so, that could do just as much damage in the midterms.)
True statements
1. Worth saying again that anyone who voted for Biden should put a sock in it due to his lengthy history of racist comments. Also, yes, the media downplayed those statements that came from Biden’s own mouth. All hypocrites.
Conclusion
My head hurts. Just an unforced error. Interesting that many top Republicans (senators, represenatives etc) are now criticizing this, as is Trump himself to a black pastor, but the “influencers” are in full swing defending it. It is easy to see the grift.
I got trashed by the right for criticizing the trope and by the left for pointing out their total hypocrisy… Fun day, but I guess I signed up for this rodeo.
The staffer scapegoat argument and the compressed modern-day news cycle mean this will likely be replaced in the news cycle by morning with some other drama.
Thank God.
My opinions are my own and don’t represent any institution.
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