Glenn Beck in a headdress

The reason Glenn Beck wore a Native American-style headdress this morning

By Erica RitzThose who watched Glenn Beck’s radio program on TheBlaze TV this morning may have caught Beck wearing a Native American-style headdress early in the broadcast.

“This is actually from the first … resurrection of the Tea Party,” Beck explained. “When the founders went, they dressed to disguise themselves as Native Americans and they dumped the tea away. Around the last century, everybody said, ‘Our country is a little out of control and we should get back to our founding roots.’ This is a headdress from that Tea Party movement that happened in the late 1800s.”

Beck joked: “For anybody who says, oh, geez, they’re dressed as Founding Fathers. It could be worse. We could have all gathered and dressed like this.”

Growing more serious, Beck added: “But it also shows you, this was a very elaborate and national movement. This was a big movement and it’s completely gone. Have you heard of that movement? Did you even know it was going on?”Glenn Beck Dons Headdress: 'I Think it Works on Me'

By Simon Moya-SmithOnce the video circulated on the web, prominent Native Americans berated Beck’s insensitive behavior.

“The reason that Glenn Beck wore a headdress illustrates the lack of respect that he has not just towards indigenous people, but towards basic human decency,” Johnnie Jae, Jiwere-Nutachi and Chahta and managing partner of Native Max Magazine, told ICTMN. “He has consistently taken controversial stances in the past such as claiming that we should be proud to have a slur towards indigenous people used as a team name,” she said.

Tara Zhaabowekwe Houska, Ojibwe and a tribal rights attorney, criticized Beck’s “jocular behavior” and added “headdresses are earned.”

“I wonder if Mr. Beck would be comfortable casually putting on a Medal of Honor while laughingly stating he ‘feels more important’?” she said.

Facebook comments

Comments from Natives and others on Beck's display:I have no words....

Attention whore? "Hey, everyone else is getting publicity out of doing this, I should, too!"

Turkey feathers like the turkey he is....

Just when you think Glenn Beck couldn't be more sickening...

The icing on the cake is the smug look on his face. He knows exactly what he is doing. Courting controversy so people will pay attention to him. Gross.

We're just props for people like him. Trotted out to make a point and then put away afterwards.

The wind has lost the bellows in his bag of hot air so he bottom feeds like a heckler media-personality -- #noaudience.

He's not complex. He's an opportunist milking whatever issue or angle necessary to boost himself into the central light in order to stay relevant in order to feed his ego.

Douchebaggery!

Ignorant soul!!

I will never run out of reasons to hate Glenn Beck.Comment:  Needeless to say, Plains Indians and their headdresses had nothing to do with the Boston Tea Party. The colonists didn't know these Indians existed when they staged their protest.

For more on the subject, see Teabaggers = Indians?! and Teabaggers Misuse Indian Imagery.