The George Floyd statue outside the Newark, NJ. City Hall.
I was introduced to sportswriter Jason Whitlock 20 years ago, when he was the featured speaker at a Kansas City legal convention I was attending. He was a forceful and entertaining speaker, and quick and witty in his question and answer session after his remarks. Since then, I have followed his career with interest, especially his recent emergence as a black conservative with the courage to be direct unequivocal, and not only regarding sports.
Commenting on the epic rant by a black parent and radio pundit about Critical Race Theory I featured over the weekend, esteemed Ethics Alarms commenter Humble Talent opined,
“One of the worst trends to come out of conservative politics in the last couple of years is to put up on a pillar any minority person that will say things that conservatives agree with. I think it’s a reactionary measure; Progressives say we’re racist, sexist, or homophobic, so we go out of our way to find female/minority/gay people to platform in order to prove we aren’t…Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think they’re bad people, I just don’t think they’re smart, funny, or talented enough to get space in conservative media absent these identity markers that conservatives seem especially hungry for….”
That point is legitimate, but it can’t be fairly applied to Jason Whitlock. Yes, I believe he has received special attention because he is a black man standing up to The Great Stupid, but he also deserves special attention because he is unusually astute, persuasive and eloquent. A white analyst, like, say, me, can be automatically squelched as biased when noting, for example, that George Floyd is an absurd and intellectually indefensible martyr for the Black Lives Matter movement since there was no evidence that his death was a product of racism, systemic or otherwise. When an astute, persuasive and eloquent black critic makes a similar argument, it demonstrates that my conclusion was not necessarily motivated by racial bias.
I know: people will say it anyway.
Whitlock has made a different argument regarding Floyd in his latest essay, but it is an excellent one. Indeed, if there were any integrity at the major newspapers, Vanity Fair, The Atlantic, New York Magazine and the Usual Suspects that have destructively carried the banners of those who have, quite successfully, exploited that neatly symbolic manner of Floyd’s demise, he would not have had to seek publication in the relatively marginal Glenn Beck website, The Blaze, where he hosts a podcast called “Fearless.” The essay is titled, “The Veneration of George Floyd is racist and must be stopped.”
Read it all: my listing of excerpts is not fair to either Whitlock or his powerfully presented argument. But here are some excerpts:
- “The statues unveiled last week in Newark, New Jersey, and Brooklyn, New York, that memorialize the final nine minutes of George Floyd’s life denigrate and diminish the reputation of black men.”
- “George Floyd was a victim — of his drug addiction, self-destructive behavior, and Derek Chauvin’s misconduct….Floyd isn’t any of the black men I know who are terrific fathers, husbands, providers, and protectors.”
- “George Floyd is a prop corporate media uses for attention, a pawn liberal politicians use to push policy, and a punching bag social activists use as a symbol to explain black people and promote themselves.”
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“The politicians, activists, celebrity influencers, and media personalities — the exploiters of George Floyd — are determined to transform an amateur porn star, violent criminal, and drug abuser into a national hero. They do so because they have no respect for black men or black people. Yes, I’m talking about Nancy Pelosi, Maxine Waters, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Shaun King, LeBron James, Don Lemon, Anderson Cooper, Rachel Maddow, Jemele Hill, Michael Eric Dyson, Al Sharpton, Joy Reid, Joe Scarborough, Chris Cuomo, Jack Dorsey, Colin Kaepernick, and the editors and writers at the New York Times, the Washington Post, Buzzfeed, and the Daily Beast.”
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“George Floyd is relevant only because of the actions of Derek Chauvin, a white police officer. The new fixation on the “Tulsa Massacre” is a story about what happened to black people. The new Juneteenth national holiday is a story about what happened to black people. No one who wants to promote a positive self-image and inspire young people to achieve would explain their journey the way black people are being coerced into explaining theirs.”
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“The statues of Floyd need to be torn down immediately. They’re racist. They’re designed to symbolize that America turns black men into lazy, criminal drug addicts. I reject that in the name of Frederick Douglass, Richard Allen, Booker T. Washington, Benjamin Banneker, George Washington Carver, Thurgood Marshall, Clarence Thomas, Colin Powell, Muhammad Ali, Jackie Robinson, Ben Carson, Nat Turner, and so many more. I reject it on behalf of my father, my brother, and so many of my friends.”
Read it all.
Ethics Alarms 
“One of the worst trends to come out of progressive politics in the last couple of years is to put up on a pillar any minority person that will say things that progressives agree with. I think it’s a reactionary measure; Conservatives say we’re overly obsessed about racism, sexism and homophobia, so we go out of our way to find female/minority/gay people to platform in order to prove we aren’t…. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think they’re bad people, I just don’t think they’re smart, funny, or talented enough to get space in progressive and liberal media absent these identity markers that progressives seem especially hungry for… you know, like, oh say, that clean and good looking and articulate young Obama fellow and that Joy Reid woman.”
Yep, HT, people like Thomas Sowell and Justice Thomas. They’re Uncle Toms and house niggers.
By the way, Commies use “reactionary” to describe anything or anyone who doesn’t toe the party line. It’s crafty and effective but it’s an absolutely meaningless term. It carries no weight among any people who have any critical skills. Do you react negatively to bad things? By golly, you’re a reactionary!
Well, Bill…. Funny you should say that. See, those […]s do a lot of heavy lifting. My full quote was:
“One of the worst trends to come out of conservative politics in the last couple of years is to put up on a pillar any minority person that will say things that conservatives agree with. I think it’s a reactionary measure; Progressives say we’re racist, sexist, or homophobic, so we go out of our way to find female/minority/gay people to platform in order to prove we aren’t.
And don’t get me wrong, there are great examples of conservative women, Nikki Haley is my spirit animal. There are great examples of black conservatives, Clarence Thomas, off the top of my head. And there are great examples of gay conservatives, like
Me, obviouslyWithout this phenomenon, we wouldn’t have people like Candace Owens, and Dave Rubin wouldn’t be nearly as successful as he is. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think they’re bad people, I just don’t think they’re smart, funny, or talented enough to get space in conservative media absent these identity markers that conservatives seem especially hungry for. In the same category, but much more damaging, are people like Milo Yiannopolous, who fell from grace after saying that it was the altar boys that were preying on the priests (I’m only slightly exaggerating), or Kim Klacik, Who inferred on Twitter that we couldn’t trust Mitch McConnell, and a slew of other people, because their spouses were Chinese (Which is both ignorant and factually wrong… Despite Klacik also writing “I just write facts” in each Tweet, McConnell’s wife is from Taiwan.).”
My point was that Ty Smith shouldn’t have been newsworthy enough to get on Fox, not that Clarence Thomas was a “House Nigger”. You boob.
HT, I’m not really super familiar with Candace Owens. But I’ve not found her an idiot particularly when she’s been quoted. I just don’t think it’s worthwhile to single out a Candace Owens who may be marginal when there’s a Don Lemon with a nightly show on CNN or the nitwit Squad is in Congress, for Allah’s sake. I just don’t think it’s a good idea to say someone like Candace Ownes is there only because of her being black and being conservative. Why is Van Jones on CNN? He’s black and lefty. I think it would be much better of we let these people succeed or flop on their own. It’s so common on the left, the phenomenon you’re talking about is not worth someone of your intellectual horsepower, astuteness, articulateness, energy and youth mentioning. Capice?
You know, I find “Uncle Tom” and “house nigger” even more offensive concepts and slurs than plain “nigger.” They force people of color back into the box they were supposed to have been released from on Juneteenth.
This is pure whataboutism. Is Don Lemon, The Squad, or Van Jones being platformed from the right? In your opinion, is it ok to tokenize black people because the Democrats do it? Should our standards only be as high as how low our opponents are willing to go?
I know how shitty CNN is. I spend gallons of digital ink on them on a regular basis. Their shittiness does not make our shittiness good. I’m asking you to walk and chew gum at the same time. Right now, I’m talking about conservative media, and how we have a habit of putting people who have no business being in the spotlight into the spotlight because we see them not as being a good product, but as being a good package. And that’s ugly.
The retelling of the black American journey as a narrative of victimhood rather than victory is the central strategy in painting the American experiment as a failure in need of a Marxist overhaul.
Bing-Fucking-Go. It’s not The Great Stupid. It’s a well thought out plan.
Last night I stumbled across a streaming of a collection of American, Brit and German propaganda films brought out to inform the respective publics about the then ongoing Battle of the Bulge. The German film featured extensive clips of captured GIs being marched off to likely be machine gunned into open graves. (I had not realized over twenty thousand Allied troops were captured when they were surrounded and overpowered by the advancing Wermacht forces. Brutal.) The German announcer intoned something along the lines of “lines of black and white American soldiers are marched eastward” (there were subtitles). I was stunned when twenty or thirty, at least, perhaps the majority of the prisoners shown, black American GIs were indeed among the prisoners. I suspect they were part of the Red Ball Express, truckers who ran supplies from Antwerp to the front. Why aren’t there more monuments to those guys? Why don’t we even hardly know anything about them? How many of them were murdered in captivity?
I’m pretty sure the veneration of Floyd is a deliberate “fuck you” to America generally and white America in particular.
“Look,” it says, “We can canonize even a dirtbag drug-addicted multiple felon and force you white fools to like it. You can’t even convince your own people that Floyd is anything less than Mother Theresa-like. You deserve exactly what you’re getting, and the beauty is, you don’t dare say boo if you have any kind of job or life that’s subject to social media, because we will make you pay.”
Yep. That’s a “fuck you,” all right.
You are being much too simplistic. When they venerate George Floyd while simultaneously rebuke Fredrick Douglass, your argument falls apart. Some kids talked to me about the Critical Race Theory they have been getting in school. They said the teacher really, really hated Frederick Douglass. The teacher blamed Douglas for Jim Crow and all discrimination against blacks since the Civil War. They said the teacher tried to paint such an overarching portrait of how destructive Douglass’ teachings were that a large section of the class believed that Frederick Douglass was responsible for the Holocaust. They aren’t just elevating George Floyd, they are also tearing down all of the traditional black role models, deeming them ‘sellouts’ and presenting them as examples of blacks who gave in to whiteness. CRT rejects Western Civilization and all those black men, from Douglass to MLK, are all judged by ‘white’ standards. CRT seeks to reject ‘white’ standards and implement new standards (reference the Smithsonian’s handy poster on ‘whiteness’).
Wow, that really is an awful, tone-deaf sculpture. Who decided “lounging on a bench in a ‘wife beater’ undershirt” was the way to go?
Just imagine all the grotesque, in-poor-taste “sitting next to George” selfies that thing is going to be featured in.
Is it my imagination or does George look really high? Like, almost pass out high. But maybe he’s just reached a higher level of consciousness. You never know.
The Mayor of Newark already took one as it was dedicated. It’s the thing now.
Wait til some yokel takes a selfie with his foot on George’s neck. C’mon, you know it’ll happen.
In the majority-minority City of Newark? Not a chance if whoever wants to keep breathing.
Look on the bright side he will be covered in pigeon crap in short order.
You’d have to make a sign-up list for the volunteers who would scrub it off. Until the statue of Harriet Tubman which is supposed to replace the statue of Christopher Columbus is complete, this is going to be the holiest shrine for Newark’s black community.
Didn’t somebody warn against having false idols?
I am familiar with the First and Second Commandments. I’m also aware of humanity’s tendency to want a unifying figure, a hero to rally behind, and sometimes to worship that hero to the point of brooking no criticism. Right now George Floyd is one such figure. I don’t think he’s worthy. He didn’t lead a successful revolt against foreign rule like Michael Collins, make a world-altering voyage like Columbus, or rebuild a nation from the ashes like Ataturk. All he did was die at the hands of police misconduct after a lifetime of being a less-than-wonderful citizen. However, since right now the favored narrative of the left isn’t heroes who do good things, but rather villains who do bad things and victims they do them to, he’s perfect.
Iconic would be the word indeed. But he’s still a false god. Some day the aura will wear off. “So who is George Floyd, Daddy? What did he do?” “Well son… it’s problematic.”
When do we see the statues of Al Capone or Lucky Luciano, Italian-American heroes? Where will the statue of the Jewish-American heroes Bugsy Segal, or the Myer Lansky, be placed? We have lost our understanding of heroics!