This’ll likely make the rounds of the blogs the next few days. At the NBC telethon for hurricane relief, rapper Kanye West appears with comedian Mike Meyers and says (surely off the teleprompter) “George Bush doesn’t care about black people.”
Video here, first video link on the left-hand side.
Americans should always be able to pride themselves on their civility. We are justifiably horrified by the images we see on TV, we are hurt, we give of our time and money. But we cannot afford to create hate. We cannot. It is too important to work together. We may criticize the President’s response as inadequate, too late or as not being proactive. But the President is not Satan. I have no doubt that, however flawed his decisions may sometimes (okay, often) be, he has the best intentions, especially when his people are in pain. Kanye’s comments do nothing but take away from the genunely good goals the telethon was trying to achieve and, worst of all, may have caused many Americans to turn their televisions off before making that phone call.
Hey, fuck you Chase. Here’s what Kanye West said, in full:
“I hate the way they portray us in the media. You see a black family, it says, “They’re looting.” You see a white family, it says, “They’re looking for food.” And, you know, it’s been five days [waiting for federal help] because most of the people are black. And even for me to complain about it, I would be a hypocrite because I’ve tried to turn away from the TV because it’s too hard to watch. I’ve even been shopping before even giving a donation, so now I’m calling my business manager right now to see what is the biggest amount I can give, and just to imagine if I was down there, and those are my people down there. So anybody out there that wants to do anything that we can help — with the way America is set up to help the poor, the black people, the less well-off, as slow as possible. I mean, the Red Cross is doing everything they can. We already realize a lot of people that could help are at war right now, fighting another way — and they’ve given them permission to go down and shoot us!
…
George Bush doesn’t care about black people!”
He’s fucking right. The media has been racist in its depiction of blacks versus whites in scavenging situations. It is hard to watch. Those are his people, color-wise. (I think they’re my people to, but I’m just an old-fashioned American.) The way this situation was handled was incredible bullshit regarding the poor, who are overwhelmingly black in NO. And Bush did publicly call for zero tolerance for looting, even when that looting is to fucking survive. So fucking blow that shit out your ass and stop trying to pander to the middle-of-the-road idiot who can’t fucking tell his ass from his elbow. George Bush doesn’t care about black people, just like he doesn’t care about anyone, or at least not enough to get him off his jolly feel-good bullshit talking points. Don’t defend him, and don’t rationalize your inability to deal with race issues.
Drew,
I was still under the belief (okay, I am still under the belief), that I can defend anyone I choose to, and that I can defend the character of a person without defending his policies (just as I can defend the intentions and bravery of the troops without necessarily defending the tenets of a war.) I stand by my assertion that the President of the United States isn’t a racist, and would continue to say that I do believe he genuinely cares about people. I don’t think there has been a President who hasn’t. I may believe that the person in that position was easily manipulated (Nixon), or adhered to an antequated doctrine for some policies (LBJ, Reagan), but making the outragous claim that the other side doesn’t care about people at all does a disservice to your intelligence and does a disservice to the very important debate about whether the federal government should have done more.
Racism is a very serious issue, and I don’t expect to be an American citizen and have an inability to deal with it. But the only way to have solved it fully is to hop into a time machine and go back to 1560 and make sure slavery never happened. So, instead, we need to have a levelheaded discourse about how best we can help people with low income in disaster situations (for instance, anyone who has seen the hundreds of school buses under water probably wonders why they weren’t put to good use.) And the media’s always been racist in their portrayals of groups. If you made that discovery only this week, then you missed a lot.
But I’m always gonna call it like I see it. (And, in a strange bit of serendipity, the last WTF moment I called was when Louis Farakan backed up the words of a racist Vicinte Fox) I will tell you right now that I honestly believe that Kanye took publicity for himself at the expense of the relief effort by making an outrageous claims. If you don’t believe that, look at the headline on that telethon story. I’m watching Jesse Jackson on MSNBC right now. He is pointing out the legacy of slavery, how African Americans have a lower life expectancy and higher poverty rate generally. He also says that we cannot afford to be angry about it, but we do have to learn to deal with it. That is the approach I’m advocating.
I think you’re both right. But I’m pretty damn sure that the leadership aspect of this entire situation, as represented by President Bush, is pathetic and downright on the verge of racist. Moreover, I’d even call the whole treatment of those folks anti-American because it seems like the federal government could’ve given two shits until the media started getting on their case (the irregular times where the media steps up always amazes me).
Drew, thanks for the quote in context. It gives substantiation and context to Kanye’s quote (and it wasn’t lies or assertions either).
Chase, race discussions don’t just magically emerge out of levelheaded discourse. As much as Jesse Jackson has tried to have one over two decades through niceties (which isn’t always the way he’s gone, but for the most part) it hasn’t worked. Good discussions can arise out of controversies like this and I hope they do.
Anyway, this shit is just bugled beyond all fucking belief. Everyone can admit that.
Perfectly justified comment by West in my opinon. People like to say it isn’t true because in the end it makes them take al ook at themselves. It’s true though . No doubt about that.
Not for nothin’ , Cooper, but … why?
Quite frankly because it is. If for one instant anyone really knew what it was like to be an economically challenged person one would have understood that there would be a large number of people without transportation, or money. One would not immediately presume all black people taking food were looters, one would not be so vehement in their call to “take care of “looters. The tragedy was predicated, things could have been done but knowing that most upper middle class people would be at other homes or in hotels they could well afford there seemed to be no urgency. Hell five days later there was no urgency. Look at the big picture, take it all in. He said what he said under duress and stress but what he said was true and hit home with more people than will admit to it. What he said made people and our government feel ashamed and that is why everyone is so pissed off. I’d elaborate but I have first day of classes tomorrow and I’m tired.
That’s ignorance, though. Not knowing that thousands would be without transportation is ignorance. That ignorance is a great injustice in-and-of itself, but the first step towards fixing it is correctly identifing it.
I’m still not so sure that if the hurricane took place in the Appalacias and thousands of poor whites were unable to escape, we would have been any better prepared or the President would have been any more callous.