I see that NPR has fired Juan Williams for remarks he made regarding Muslims on Bill O’Reilly’s show. This is what Williams said during that particular appearance on O’Reilly Factor:
“I mean, look, Bill, I’m not a bigot. You know the kind of books I’ve written about the civil rights movement in this country. But when I get on the plane, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous.“
My first reaction upon hearing the statement in question was “C’mon Juan! You’re supposed to be better than this!” My second thought was “Juan must be spending a little TOO MUCH time with his Fox News brethren because the bullsh*t has rubbed off on him. ” I met Juan Williams a few years ago, coincidentally, at an NPR event. He’s a nice, friendly, intelligent guy. It sucks that he went on TV and inserted his foot in his mouth in front of millions of people. Then again, I guess when your job is to talk sh*t on television for a living, you constantly run the risk of saying too much and making an ass of yourself with a misguided or uninformed opinion.
First of all, whenever someone prefaces a statement with “I’m not a bigot” it means they are about to say something very bigoted. The preceding sentence only exists to shield one from being labeled for making such a remark. That would be like me saying “I have nothing against fat bitches, but when I see one, I think these f*cked-up repulsive individuals eat way too much food, take up too much space on Earth and breate up all the God-damned air that skinny people could be breathing.” The second part completely outweighs the so-called disclaimer at the beginning.
Secondly, as a black person, I’m disappointed in Juan Williams for writing so much on the topic of civil rights, yet immediately falling back on stereotypes and engaging in this type of profiling. By that logic, I should be OK with white women clutching their purses closely whenever I’m on an elevator with them. After all, I’m black, so I obviously want to rob, rape and murder them since that’s just what us niggas like to do in our spare time. Ask O.J.
For someone entrusted with a position of influence to not see how stupid that train of thought is, it’s pretty scary. NPR had every right to fire Williams and disassociate their brand from offensive and inflammatory comments like the one he made. At times, the stuff I hear on Fox News is kind of like watching “Birth of a Nation” except they actually pass the hatred off as “news” to those people out there who lack the ability to think critically and see that most of the network’s programming is more opinion than anything else.
While I’m on the subject of token black guys in positions of influence, let me go on the record and say f*ck Clarence Thomas and his wife, Virginia Thomas. In the past three days alone:
- Thomas hung out with the Koch brothers & had a strategy session
- His wife is a Tea Party activist
- Virginia Thomas had the nerve to call Anita Hill 19 years after the fact asking her to apologize for accusing Thomas of sexual harassment
I try to reserve the term “sellout piece of sh*t” for those who completely deserve it. In this case, it completely applies.
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ALL OF THIS!!! And the messed up part is that many [Black] folks are saying he wasn’t wrong and was just “giving his opinion.” But those SAME FOLKS would be ready to have a non-Black person’s head if the same type of bigotry came out of their mouths.
I expect(ed) more out of Juan Williams, but at the same time, he’s not exempt from open mouth, insert foot syndrome.
Oh well…..
True. As long as no one is directly alluding to black people, most folks don’t give a sh*t.
Leon, I completely agree with you. I’m not a huge fan of NPR and I definitely am not a fan of Fox News, so I wasn’t familiar with Juan Williams. For any person to say some old random shat like this is sad. Look, you can say whatever you want in your house, but for this clown to say this on a national network and to have black folks DEFENDING him? WTF? Two chicks in our office (over 50 too!) were trying to defend this clown. It’s sad. Black folks really need to pick and choose their battles.
Also, this is just my two cents – I’ve noticed most of the black folks I’ve come across defending this idiot have never traveled anywhere. Mofo’s haven’t experienced any other cultures besides the Caribbean folks selling bootleg jewelry. Try traveling to Morocco, Tunisia, Southern Spain, the Netherlands – ton’s of Muslims on the buses, airports, trains – so I guess these same people would have a HEART ATTACK.
Kindra also raises a good point – Imus said, “Nappy headed hoes” and look what happened to him. So because this clown is black he’s supposed to get a free pass?
Yeah man, they call this shit “terrorism” for a reason. People are scared of anything different from them, so therefore, Muslims are the scapegoats in this situation. A large number of folks aren’t willing to admit that many people in power manipulated the f*ck out of them post 9-11 and built fortunes off of the fear that gripped the nation in it’s aftermath. It’s more convenient to just blame the people with brown skin who speak another language and follow a different religion.
Does it really matter? This is a free country. Juan or anyone else has the right to say what ever they desire. At the same time, NPR completely has the right to fire him. BIG DEAL! Juan got fired one day and hired with a $2mil contract the next. I agree with the comment that Juan made, as I suppose most Americans do. But in the big picture, does it really matter?
Juan got a raise out of the deal, so in the end, it doesn’t matter to him. It just sucks that we’re living in a time where fear is used to justify those type of judgments involving a religious group consisting of over a billion people.
I don’t think MOST Americans feel that way. If so, Islam would be banned. It’s just that right now, the people who feel that way are making the most noise. Thanks for sharing your viewpoint though. I like to hear from folks with opposing viewpoints who are willing to share them in a respectful manner.