Tag: black people
Glenn Beck's Online Network Promotes Notorious Antisemite

Glenn Beck's Online Network Promotes Notorious Antisemite

Right-wing commentator Jason Whitlock used his show on Glenn Beck’s TheBlaze to host a notorious antisemite who used the platform to denounce “the Jews” for “undermining the moral fabric of the American people,” dominating the Biden administration, and “tak[ing] control of the black population” through “sexual liberation.”

Whitlock responded to the hateful rant by saying, “The man is speaking facts, and I know the intent of what he just said, and I got no problem with it.”

Whitlock hosted E. Michael Jones, whom he described as “a celebrated author, a public intellectual, a ardent supporter of the Catholic faith,” for a lengthy taped interview that aired January 18. Jones was there to discuss his book, which aligns with Whitlock’s own view that “sexual lust … has been turned into a tool to control all of us” and describes the sexual liberation movement as a vehicle for achieving political control.

But the conversation kept coming back to the group Jones blames for that movement: the Jews, who he claimed “have always been involved in pornography as a way of gaining control over the population where they're always a minority.” At one point, he went on a lengthy rant, which began with his argument that for most people, marriage is the path to happiness and salvation.

“And I’m saying, the Jews know this, and they have spent their entire time here in the United States of America undermining the moral fabric of the American people,” he explained.

“I get it, and I can’t say that I disagree,” Whitlock replied, “but I’m just – aren’t you letting Joe Biden and a lot of other politicians, left and right, off the hook?”

“First of all, Joe Biden is not in charge of the government,” Jones responded. “It’s called Biden’s minyan — you can look this up too — there are 457 Jews who are running the Biden administration. They’re the people who are in charge, OK? So there’s no point in talking about Joe Biden. We have to be able to identify these people, and we have to call them out and hold them responsible.”

Jones went on to say that “the Blacks have suffered more in this regard than any other group in this country,” arguing that “the Jews took over the Blacks early on” by encouraging the Harlem Renaissance and the creation of the NAACP, which he said were intended to destroy Black nationalism.

“They got this guy, W.E.B. Dubois or Dubois or however you want to pronounce it, Harvard guy, and he was the front man,” Jones said. “The Jews had taken control of the Black population, they destroyed Black nationalism under Marcus Garvey, and then they created this plantation for Black people known as sexual liberation.”

Jones wrapped up his rant by claiming that basketball player Kyrie Irving and musician Ye (formerly Kanye West) had been unfairly persecuted for speaking out against Jewish control of the NBA and the music industry.

Whitlock’s expressions during Jones’ screed at times suggested that he found his comments stupid or beyond the pale. But after it concluded, he said, “Mr. Jones, you are fearless. You are fearless. My God,” adding that while he knows some people will criticize him for hosting Jones, “the man is speaking facts, and I know the intent of what he just said, and I got no problem with it.”

Whitlock acknowledged in the segment introducing the interview with Jones that “some of the audience is likely going to be offended by his conversation about Jews,” but said that he doesn’t believe in “silencing people” and mocked anyone who might criticize him for airing the discussion.

He initially promoted Jones’ comments about Jews on X (formerly Twitter) but deleted the post after it garnered attention.

Whitlock, in his introductory segment, also told viewers that Jones “is under attack by the Anti-Defamation League. He’s one of the first people to get canceled because of his writings.”

Indeed, the ADL describes Jones in an extensive report as “an anti-Semitic Catholic writer who promotes the view that Jews are dedicated to propagating and perpetrating attacks on the Catholic Church and moral standards, social stability, and political order throughout the world.” It says he “reaches for tenuous connections to paint ‘the Jews’ as inherently wicked and prone to colluding openly or secretly to threaten other populations around them” and “argues that mass killings of Jews throughout history have been understandable reactions to Jewish beliefs and behavior.”

Whitlock himself previously defended Ye’s tweets denouncing “JEWISH PEOPLE,” writing, “You can't question black entertainers' unhealthy relationship with non-religious Jewish power brokers in Hollywood.” He also hosted a discussion about whether former basketball player and TV analyst Charles Barkley was under the nefarious influence of a Jewish “cabal.”

Beck, Whitlock’s employer, has a long record of promoting antisemitic tropes and conspiracy theories. But he typically responds to criticism on those grounds by stressing that he is a philosemite who supports Israel.

Whitlock’s cozy interview with Jones follows a recent trend of prominent right-wing commentators engaging in unusually explicit antisemitism as high-profile figures detail their grievances with the Jews. Those bigoted outbursts have drawn cheers from white nationalists who are ecstatic at their talking points entering the mainstream right.

Reprinted with permission from Media Matters.

How To Talk To Black People In Eight Easy Lessons

How To Talk To Black People In Eight Easy Lessons

Today’s column is presented as a public service.

It is for serious politicians both Democratic and Republican — and also for Donald Trump. The urgent need for this service has been painfully obvious for many years and never more so than today. So, let’s get right to it. This is: How to Talk to Black People in Eight Easy Lessons.

1. Go where we are.

You’d think that pretty obvious. Then you remember Trump purporting to speak to black people whilst addressing audiences whose aggregate melanin wouldn’t fill a Dixie cup.

2. Don’t act as if going where we are requires machetes and a supply line.

“Some have said that I’m either brave or crazy to be here,” Republican Sen. Rand Paul once told a black audience. He said this at Howard University, which is about 15 minutes from the White House. They have cell service there and everything.

3. Stop confusing the NAACP with the Nation of Islam.

Donald Trump recently snubbed an invitation to address the venerable civil rights group. Bob Dole once did, too, claiming they were trying to “set me up.” Right. Because the NAACP has such a long history of incendiary rhetoric. As one of its founders, the great scholar W.E.B. DuBois, never really said, “I’m ’bout to bust a cap on these honkies if they don’t give me my freedom.”

4. Don’t use Ebonics unless you are fluent.

I still have nightmares about Hillary Clinton crying out, “I don’t feel no ways tired” in that black church in Selma. Stick to Ivorybonics. Most of us are bilingual.

5. Don’t make a CP time joke unless you are a CP.

When candidate Obama sauntered onstage about 15 minutes after the start time of a black journalists’ event and quipped, “I want to apologize for being a little bit late — but you guys keep on asking whether I’m black enough,” it was cool and funny. When Bill de Blasio joked in a scripted exchange with Hillary Clinton about running on “CP Time” — “cautious politician time” — it was, well, not.

6. Don’t make a slavery joke, period.

Joe Biden once warned a black audience that Republicans are “going to put y’all back in chains.” Can you imagine him warning a Jewish crowd how the GOP is “going to put y’all back in the gas chambers”? Can you imagine how offensive that would be?

7. Don’t talk to the black people in your head.

This is what Donald Trump was doing when he told black people they lived in the suburbs of hell and had nothing to lose by voting for him. He was speaking, not to black people, but to black people as he imagines them to be, based on lurid media imagery and zero actual experience. In this, he was much like Bill O’Reilly, in whose world black folks all have tattoos on their foreheads.

8. Know what you don’t know.

“I’m here to learn,” said Trump at a black church in Detroit a few days ago. It was a powerful expression of humility — or would have been, had it been said by someone who wasn’t an OG of the birther movement, a serial re-tweeter of supremacist filth and the star of David Duke’s bromantic fantasies. Still, he had the right idea. Politicians too often purport to lecture us about us without having the faintest idea who we even are.

The truth is, How to Talk to Black People isn’t all that difficult.

The candidate who wants African-American support should pretend black folks are experts on our own issues and experiences — because we are. He should learn those issues, tap that experience, formulate some thoughtful ideas in response. Then he should do what he would for anyone else:

Ask for our vote. Tell us what he’d do if he got it.

(Leonard Pitts is a columnist for The Miami Herald, 1 Herald Plaza, Miami, Fla., 33132. Readers may contact him via e-mail at lpitts@miamiherald.com.)

Photo: Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump attends a church service, in Detroit, Michigan, September 3, 2016. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri