Rightwing Race Hustlers On Ferguson Shooting

The idea that WND somehow has racist motivations is bizarre, especially when fully 20 percent of the site's regular weekly columnists are black – including Sowell, Star Parker, Walter Williams, Eric Rush... ~ Joseph Farah, founder of the website World Net Daily (and head birther) making the Black Friend argument as to why their excessive reporting on Black Mobs isn't racist. (as reported in a 2/8/2014 Gawker story).

As is ALWAYS the case, when some crime occurs in which racism may be a factor, the Right must present incidents where the roles are reversed (AKA "The Fallacious Flip"). As those who follow the news know, a White Ferguson MO cop shot and killed an unarmed Black teenager. So guess what? You probably already know. The Right finds a case in which a Black cop shot and killed a White teen.

Proof that racism wasn't a factor in the Ferguson shooting, right? Whether it was or wasn't I do not believe is clear, but I think at least some (if not many) of the protestors believe it was... and for good reason (it's called "institutional racism"). Whatever the truth is (whether or not racism was a factor), it certainly strikes me that the number of shots fired might have been excessive (the 18-year-old Michael Brown was shot 6 times).

Although CNN reports "dueling narratives in Michael Brown shooting", and, after reading the story, I can report that the witnesses accounts are at odds with one another in key areas. So an investigation is definitely needed, and no conclusions should be jumped to until it is complete.

I do, however still believe there is a problem in general with cops shooting - or by some other method killing - unarmed suspects (a police killing via a choke hold for example). And MANY of the examples of this ARE of a White cop killing a Black victim, so there is cause to believe that race may be a factor (in general and not necessarily in regards to this case). And there is also the fact that a majority of the Ferguson MO police are White, while the community they are policing is majority-Black.

But the Ferguson community protests in regards to problems of (White majority) cops using excessive force (which is how they view this case) - and the problem of the police force not being racially diverse - is spun by WND as lies serving an agenda of the "Leftist Media"... as usual. This time WND reports on fellow racist Limbaugh's take on the subject...

Rush Limbaugh: There's a mindset out there, and the way it works in situations like this [is] only people of color can be victims. A white person can never be a victim. It just can't happen. That's not permitted, that's not allowed because it isn't the case. The whites are the oppressors. They're the majority. In the liberal worldview, every majority is an oppressor... They're all oppressors. The minority is always the victims, and the victims are with whom we should always sympathize, no matter what. And the victims are permitted to do anything precisely because they're a minority... They're outnumbered. The evil majority does horrible things to the minority. And so the minorities... [are] always victims. And so anything they do is justified and we must try to understand the rage. But in the current climate in the United States, a black person can never be the oppressor and a white can never be the victim. And that's how you have a corrupt or perverted news business in Salt Lake City, refusing to identify a black cop who may have shot an innocent person. That destroys the whole picture we've been creating here for centuries. That could totally destroy the image that we've been trying to concoct... (Rush Limbaugh comments via World Net Daily, 8/20/2014. "Black cop kills White Man, Media Hide Race" by Joe Kovacs).

The Media was "hiding" the race of the Black cop who shot the White teen? The WND article notes that "Utah's Desert News reported the police chief saying the officer is not white [and] The Salt Lake Tribune noted, the officer involved was not white". Seems pretty clear to me that they said the cop wasn't White. And it did come out that the cop wasn't Hispanic or Asian or whatever. But two papers saying the cop wasn't White (info that came from the police chief) amounts to the Media "hiding" the officer's race? Right.

What this REALLY amounts to, IMO, is (yet more) racism from the Right. As well as opportunism. An opportunity to shamelessly attack the "Leftist Media". This time with bogus claims of hiding the fact that the cop was Black. Similar to what happened with George Zimmerman, that he was "White" was info that came from the cops. In both cases the media reported what the police told them!

As for the rest of Limbaugh's racist tirade, it is complete BS, of course. A White person can be a victim, but Whites ARE the oppressors. They're the majority (police force in Ferguson is mostly White, while community they are policing is majority Black) and we also have a long history (that began with slavery) of racism... against Black people.

Yeah, racist Whites like Limbaugh and those at the Black-mob-obsessed WND find that history inconvenient and work hard to deny that our past influences our present. But it *is* our history. So, no, a Black person can't be an oppressor. A minority can belong to an organization that sometimes acts as an instrument of oppression (the police), but this does not make them an "oppressor", but simply an instrument of the organization (in this case the police) that acts as oppressors for the White majority (again, it's called "institutional racism").

And there is also the fact that the police are becoming increasingly militarized, and what this points to, I think, is a mentality that says excessive force is what is necessary. I mean, another issue that concerns me is the police killing of pet dogs when those pets react to the police busting down doors (sometimes the wrong ones) to arrest people. And surely that has nothing to do with racism.

In any case, a minority is NOT "permitted to do anything precisely because they're a minority". And this "image that we've been trying to concoct" that Limbaugh refers to is REALITY. And YES, the "Leftist media" does NOT want that "image" destroyed, you lying racist tool!

So, in conclusion, I'd say that we definitely have a problem of police using deadly force not as a last resort, but drawing their guns and shooting to kill when they shouldn't be drawing their guns at all, or, if they do, shooting to wound. Racism may be a factor (and I believe it sometimes is), but if it was a factor in the Ferguson shooting is not known.

And I believe it probably won't be a factor in the investigation. Only the question of whether or not the shooting was justified will be asked. But, as you can see from the Limbaugh spin as reported by WND, the Right misses no opportunity to inject race into a news story. Injecting it via false accusations against the Left of "playing the race card" and "concocting" a history of racism for the United States.

"Concocting" being code for reporting the reality of the situation. A reality the Right wishes to deny because it aides THEIR concocted narrative regarding their racism being a "fair and balanced" reporting of the facts. "Facts", that when it comes to WND, often include the violence of "Black mobs".

A 2/8/2014 article from the blog Gawker by Adam Weinstein says that WND is battling Google for "its right to be racist". According to the article, Google "has accused WND of using hate speech and has threatened to block ads on the news site over its use of the term black mobs in news stories and columns.

Yeah, no kidding. As a subscriber to the WND newsletter, I noticed this some time ago. Google cites a figure of 670 "Black mob" stories and bases it's objection on it's AdSense policies against using "derogatory racial or ethnic slurs to refer to an individual or group". Although, over how long a period of time the article does not say. Still 670 is a big number... and kudos to Google for calling out WND. And Google, being a private company, does not have to respect WND's "free speech rights".

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Something else the Right likes to complain about in these situations is when Black leaders show up on the scene to offer their support and assistance. People like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson, in doing so, are "race baiting", they say. The Reverend Sharpton, I should note, went to Ferguson and discussed the problem of the police force not being racially diverse. His solution was for more Black voters to show up on election day.

Catching the end of his MSNBC program the other day, I saw Mr. Sharpton note the fact that when it was time to elect Mr. Obama a second time, Black turnout was high. But for the next election - one which also had local officials like the chief of police on the ballot - turnout was pathetic (2 percent, if I remember correctly). Sounds like good advice to me and certainly NOT "race hustling". Advising the Black community to vote, that is (which is a good way to at least begin to curb the institutional racism problem).

"Race husting", IMO, is a term used by White racists, or "right-wing white-grievance mongers" who are "stoking racial tension for cash" (wording as per a 7/23/2013 Salon article). People like Limbaugh... and organizations like WND (even given the fact that they have "Black friends") are real "race hustlers", and I think the evidence overwhelmingly shows this to be true. It isn't the Black leaders or Black MSNBC personalities who "race bait", but the racist right and race hustling and racist-pandering Rightwing media.

Video: Ferguson Cops Busted? New Video Seems To Show Brown Paying For Cigarillos (0:42) Link. (H/T to Shaw Kenawe of Progressive Eruptions for pointing me to this story & video from Crooks & Liars).

SWTD #270. See also TADM #56.