December 15, 2013

Kelly: Jesus and Santa are white

Pretty much everyone in America has heard what Megyn Kelly of Fox News said about Santa Claus and Jesus. Here's the money quote:



Okay, sure. Only old white men watch Fox News, not kids, but never mind.

In related news, God is white. Everyone in the Bible is white. The Easter Bunny is white, and so is the Tooth Fairy.

Also, presidents are white--legitimate presidents, anyway. Popes are white. Movie and TV stars are white--except Oprah. Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela weren't white, but they were conservative patriots, which is like honorary whites.

Basically anyone good or important is or was white. These people made the world what it is today, which is civilized and white.

Just a joke?

As America mocked Kelly mercilessly, she tried to explain herself:

Megyn Kelly doubles down on ‘white Santa’: I did it for the kidsAfter Kelly sparked outraged on the Internet and became fodder late-night comics, she responded to the controversy on Friday.

“I offered a tongue-in-cheek message for any kids watching,” she explained. “Humor is a part of what we try to bring to this show, but sometimes that is lost on the humorless.”
In other words, she went with a classic excuse: "My racism was just a joke."

If it really was a joke, wouldn't a proper response be: "Obviously, Santa is a fictional character and could be any color--black, brown, or whatever. And Jesus, as a Middle Eastern Jew, probably was dark-skinned, not white. I was just joking about their being white, and especially about its being a verifiable fact.

"Sorry I didn't make it clear that I was sarcastically saying the opposite of what I meant. Clearly Santa and Jesus aren't verifiably white and their skin colors are not any kind of a fact."

Below:  White Jesus, black Jesus, and our best guess about what the historical Jesus looked like (if he existed).



Doubling down on racism

Conservative racists doubled down on Kelly's racist claims:

Libertarian Radio Host: Santa Is White Just Like MLK Was BlackLibertarian radio host Neal Boortz on Monday defended Fox News' Megyn Kelly's insistence that Santa Claus is white, Buzzfeed reported.

"I'm sorry. Santa Claus is white, okay? Deal with it," Boortz, who was filling in for Herman Cain on his radio show, said after a caller asked about the controversy surrounding Kelly's statement.

"I'm gonna scream and complain because Martin Luther King is always portrayed as black," Boortz added.
New Mexico teacher chides black student for costume because ‘Santa Claus is white’A New Mexico teacher was disciplined this week after the parent of one of his students complained that he had told his black son that Santa Claus is white.

According to Michael Rougier, the parent, the unidentified teacher approached his ninth-grade son, Christopher, who was wearing a Santa hat and fake beard and said, “Don’t you know Santa Claus is white? Why are you wearing that?”
The teacher probably added that the boy could play an elf (slave) or reindeer (animal). Brown roles for brown people, right?

As for Boortz, King was depicted as black because he was black. Santa Claus and Jesus are fictional characters who have fictional skin colors. The two cases aren't comparable.

Some conservatives pointed to St. Nicholas, the supposed source of St. Nick aka Santa. Nice try, but wrong:



As a native of Asia Minor, Nicholas's skin was brown, not white. As church depictions of him indicate.

Archie knows best

If real people don't understand Jesus and Santa, perhaps we can rely on fictional characters.

For instance, the worst bigot in TV history agrees with Megyn Kelly:



Fortunately, Santa himself showed up to set the record straight:

‘Black As Hell’ Santa Appears on SNL to Address Megyn KellySanta explained to viewers that it’s really much easier if everyone thinks he’s white–after all, he can’t get the toys delivered if he keeps getting pulled over, can he?

Santa ended with a request: when you see him in your house, don’t call the police.

3 comments:

dmarks said...

Not sure if Bunker is the worst, since O'Connor himself was not a racist, and the show's creator, Lear, used Bunker as an example to deal with racism, not promote it.

There are other examples that might be worse, such as Toure on MSNBC. I know you and I disagree with whether or not his promoting the idea that black men are typically sexual predators is racist or not.

Rob said...

Touré promoted the idea that conservatives think black men are typically sexual predators. You stupidly misunderstood his point.

More important, Archie Bunker expressed nine years of bigotry. How in the world does that compare to Touré's comment, which was literally a one-time event? It's inconceivable to anyone except an apologist for conservative racism--like you.

If I wanted to find the second-worse bigot on TV, I'd look to the racists who throng Fox News. Like the ones who declared Jesus and Santa Claus are white. Bill O'Reilly, Glenn Beck, or someone like that is infinitely worse than Touré and in the same league as Archie.

That you think Archie and Touré are comparable says nothing about Touré and everything about your desperate attempts to prove liberals are as bad as conservatives. Too bad you can't come up with another example besides him, Bill Maher, and the Michigan mayor. Three examples versus the hundreds I could come up with...pathetic.

Next time you waste my time with your ridiculous repetition of the one-time Touré incident, I'm deleting the comment. No way do I let you paint tolerant liberals as the equivalent of bigoted conservatives. I'm not wasting another second with your asinine attempts to deny the well-documented racism in your ranks.

Rob said...

Megyn Kelly claimed she was just joking, but I doubt it. These people seriously believe Jesus was white:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/19/volusia-jesus-was-white_n_4475383.html

School Teaches First Graders 'Jesus Was White'

According to Florida station WESH-TV, parent Horace Hymes was outraged when he learned that his 7-year-old daughter’s class had been reading a book that compared Jesus with candy canes and said Christianity's central figure was white.

Hymes said that when he asked his daughter what she learned in school Monday, she answered, "I learned that the white on the candy cane stands for Jesus, because he was white. And the red on the candy cane was for the blood that he shed, and if you flip it upside down, the 'J' stands for Jesus," he added to TV station News 13.

Hymes, who is African American, was upset about the racially charged content in the book and that the public school was bringing religion into the classroom, according to WESH-TV.

“If we are teaching you one thing and the teachers teaching another thing, confusion comes up,” said Hymes, who wants the teachers in question dismissed, according to WESH-TV.