Saturday, July 17, 2010

Telling It Like It Is

Dave notes the following ridiculous statement from Tea Party Patriot leadership:

The NAACP has long history of liberalism and racism. If you are a conservative -- including a conservative African-American -- there is no room for you at the NAACP. If you have opinions that differ from the NAACP and the liberal establishment, and if you are African-American, you are an "Uncle Tom," a "negro," "not black enough" and "against our people."

Citing his own posts, Dave asserts:

When I said the NAACP's move would backfire, I meant things like this would happen. I didn't mean they were wrong to go down that road. It's just that they should know that calling out a group for "racism" is pointless -- whoever's been targeted will simply claim to have been attacked unfairly and had his free speech threatened.Remember what happened when Eric Holder said that America had been a "nation of cowards" in discussing race. Boom: Backlash. Anger. Debate over why he said it, but not what he meant. A year and change later we have a ridiculous national debate over whether Holder's department hates white people because it won't draw and quarter the New Black Panther Party. This stuff is what he meant, of course. But saying it isn't actually starting the debate. It's pretty obvious that the NAACP failed here.

One way of looking at the Tea Party Patriot statement on the facts. It is true that NAACP is fairly liberal. It is also true that Michael Steele is arguably the most prominent black conservative in America. He is also--among many other things--a member of the NAACP, and thus presumably part of a racist group.

No comments: