Death and taxes used to be the only two certainties in life — but no matter how much progress it feels like we’re making sometimes, the sad fact is you can probably slide racism into that list. Are we in a moment of uprising that feels like it has the potential to create real, systemic change? Yes. Do people and organizations still show their ass on a daily basis? Oh, most definitely. And to keep tabs on all that ass-showing, we’re pleased to introduce our weekly racism surveillance machine. If you already get our newsletter, Minority Report, you’ve likely seen this — but now the rest of the internet can get a taste.
🗑 Just in case you needed to settle this whole “racism is learned” thing
Meet Daniel Sims. Daniel Sims was one of two dozen or so folks who showed up at an Alabama county commission meeting last week to protest the possible removal of a Confederate statue outside a nearby courthouse. Daniel Sims is a member of Captain John Rayburn Camp 452 Sons of Confederate Veterans (which is a very long way to say “we like to play with cannons”). Oh, and Daniel Sims is Black. If you’re looking for an explanation for this Clayton Bigsby–ass tale of woe, let him tell you himself: “My whole family’s White. I went to all-White school. Grew up in an all-White neighborhood. My grandfather was White, and he was the main one that fought in this war here, and he’s taught me everything I know.” To which we say… wait, your grandfather was in the Civil War?! No wonder you’re on this bullshit, you’re 112 years old! (WHNT-TV)
🗑 Days since someone talked slick about Kamala Harris: forever 0
It’s not like we didn’t see this coming, but the political cartoonists are lining up to show their ass at the prospect of a Black woman being on a presidential ticket. The Australian, which is basically the New York Post of Down Under — owned by Rupert Murdoch, fond of op-eds that complain about “condescending identity politics” — published a cartoon that depicted a grinning Joe Biden referring to Harris as “this little Brown girl.” The paper’s editor said that it was using Biden’s own words against him, and that the cartoon’s intent was to “demean racism, not perpetuate it.” That’s great, because if you’re trying to find a country best equipped to sniff out clever satire, it should definitely be one that seems to still find blackface acceptable. (New York Times)
🗑 Wow, guess someone really didn’t like ‘The Office’
Black fans of NBC sitcom The Office know that beloved character Stanley Hudson is a real one — he’s here to do a crossword, eat a pretzel, and go the hell home. But when actor Leslie David Baker launched a Kickstarter campaign for a spinoff show called Uncle Stan, not everyone saw the light. As Baker shared on his own Instagram page, a mouthbreather going by the name “fuhrerjeremy” let loose with a torrent of what is clinically known as Wild-Ass Racism. N-bombs flew. Photos of lynchings were DMed. Of the 21 sentences typed in the dissertation of hate, the only one we can bring ourselves to type is “You won’t get any of my White dollars.” That account has now been taken down, either because Instagram banned it or because ol’ fuhrerjeremy drowned in his own White tears after realizing that his White dollars couldn’t come close to the Black dollars Leslie David Baker was stacking in syndication checks. (USA Today)
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