Which (if everything else these kids did is ignored) leads to the current dialogue about whether the MAGA hat, by itself, is a racist symbol or just a red baseball hat with a pro-America slogan on it. Two years into this, and I think very few Americans would disagree that it’s inherently supporting a racist agenda. Those who don’t are working really hard at remaining ignorant.
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Hence why symbols are inherently dangerous. They can carry multiple meanings, have multiple interpretations, but are ultimately objects that people imbue power unto that have no inherent power of their own.
Again why I keep saying that it is the look on his face, his expression, his willful actions, as well as the collective actions, words, and behavior of the other teens that is what should be the focus. Would any of this been ok if they were wearing NWA/Fuck the Police hats? or some sports teams hats? nope.
Those hats do matter. They’re basically today’s Confederate flag. And in this particular context, they’re also the icing on a very rancid racism cake.
Of course it matters that these racist-ass kids are wearing that dumbass, racist-ass hat.
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Or working at the Wall Street Journal to keep other people ignorant.
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The WSJ obviously has a strong commitment to maintaining its op-ed page’s reputation as Konservative Krazyville.
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Ah, creepy neocon Lee Smith of the Hudson Institute. Always a reliable source of The Crazy.
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@anon15383236 @anon61833566 @nungesser @alahmnat @knoxblox racchus @DukeTrout:
Have an unofficial ‘like’ since I’m currently all out.
What a crock of bullshit.
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Owned by Rupert Murdoc. what else would you expect?
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Sadly, it was that way long before Uncle Rupe took ownership. I remember asking a WSJ reporter about it back in the 1990s, and he just responded with a sigh and a shrug.
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I guess there are two points about that. One, It is possible to support Women’s choice, Indigenous rights, and oppose the Catholic Church, but still acknowledge that Elder Phillips at least misread the situation, and that the people who edited, annotated, and spread the original post misrepresented the events that transpired. we got played. Doubling and tripling down on what can be shown to be objectively not true is not going to change that.
I see Elder Phillips as a victim here as well. This level of controversy was sure to have people asking questions about all those involved. I can see why those who spread the post would not care about the effects on the Catholic kids, but they left Elder Phillips in the breeze as well.
Secondly, the hat thing. I can see that it might seem a clever strategy, with several years foreknowledge of the 2020 republican campaign slogan, to work towards identifying it as a “hate” symbol, and shame people into voting democrat or socialist or whatever. That too could easily backfire.
But I think the hat issue is it’s own topic.
Not really. He stepped in, defused a potentially violent situation, and positioned himself between rowdy kids wearing MAGA hats and a group of shouty protesters. I’ve seen the Hebrew Israelites other places; their whole shtick is to be loud and nasty and insult everyone for attention. We didn’t get “played”.
MAGA hats are already seen as a symbol of hatred, ignorance, and racism by most Americans. There’s no ‘strategy’ involved. The people who wear them created that association by their words, deeds, and actions.
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Do you trip and fall much, walking around with your eyes shut like that?
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The videos, again, show the kids surround Elder Phillips and still use the tomahawk chop in response to the drumming once they do. Considering the amount of spin the school and kid is using to ignore those pesky actions and racist remarks, it’s odd that “we” got played is your evaluation of the situation. That’s on top of using fake maori dances and blackface casually with a history spanning back years, all of which is currently trying to be scrubbed to save face and present the school as not being a place wear racism is rampant.
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But we NEED to give them the benefit of the doubt here… because reasons! /s
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I’m willing to concede the point; it is not fair to make Mr Sandmann the focus of what was collective behaviour on the part of the young gentlemen, some of whom were making utterances and gestures at which offense was taken.
All of which is secondary to the main point of the original post, which was about how people here were showing commendable restraint in their calls to hold the group to account.
Have I now navigated the shoal to the point where you can see the original point?
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What you seem to be missing, across multiple threads, is that it’s not a strategy. It’s not up to the people who use a symbol to define what the symbol means, once it’s out in the public. It’s the people who see the symbol, interact with it, with the people who wear it, that define its meaning. MAGA hats may have started out as a political advertisement, but now they symbolize something else: white supremacy with a heaping side of sexism. When the people who wear it commit acts of violence and hate against people of color, when they attack and harass women, and when they gaslight for those who commit such acts, it changes the meaning of the symbol.
A significant portion of the American people now associate the MAGA hat with white supremacy. People of color aren’t going to take the chance that someone wearing a MAGA hat is just a clueless dupe, rather than James Fields. You can’t reasonably ask anyone to take that risk.
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