High Dudgeon

This nation’s media and our black leadership have their panties twisted in a bunch about the racists comments of the Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy (see:The Guardian Story.) and Donald Sterling, owner of the LA Clippers basketball team (see: Forbes Story.) Such naive and inappropriate utterances do deserve condemnation, but, for once, I would love to see the same media treatment of the equally offensive comments made by the likes of Louis Farrakhan, Jessie, Jackson, Bill Clinton, Al Sharpton, Harry Reid, Eric Holder, Jay-Z and Jeremiah Wright. I’m sure with a little thought or Goggling dear reader you can recall of what I write.

Such a narrative has always seemed to me to be strangely disproportionate when prominent blacks say offensive things. The media subtext usually reduces itself to “boys will be boys” and, with a wink and a nod, their mild discomfort never lasts more than one news cycle. And, even weirder, very often those actually condemning such hypocrisy receive the brunt of the media’s tsk-tsking. (And I am reasonably certain that many of you have already classified me as a racist for pointing out this gross disparity.) 

Very strange and diabolical indeed!