Check out this video — on the bottom of the screen for their New Year’s Eve coverage, Fox News is scrolling Happy New Year messages from viewers. This one is particularly, um, racist:
Coupled especially with the current outrage over the revival of the “Barack the Magic Negro” song by the Republican Party, there’s no question over who is being referred to in the message “HAPPY NEW YEAR AND LET’S HOPE THE MAGIC NEGRO DOES A GOOD JOB.”
There’s also no excuse for airing that message, no matter who was being referred to — and no reasonable explanation as to why Fox News would have run it. You know that they had someone sitting around reviewing the messages before they were aired. They couldn’t have just used a program that rejected those with swear words, what with all the variations in spelling and the huge possibility of other highly inappropriate messages, such as those that were overtly sexual, harassing, or violent.
Someone had to approve this thing. And apparently Fox News approves of racist language. What a huge fucking surprise.
I must say, I can’t wait till FOX news becomes utterly irrelevant. (It has been spiralling down that chute for a while now; but I think the downfall will be complete over the next few years… even months.. even weeks!).
Here’s a weird thought. What if FOX news becomes the only broadcast that is actually critical of Obama and finds a new relevance? But I ultimately don’t think this will happen because nobody at FOX news knows how to do any real reporting or actual journalism.
Anyway. Yeah, pretty shameless, tasteless (and deliciously clueless) scroll.
I hope that, sometime in my lifetime, the FCC gets some teeth and a spine, to fine the crap out of media outlets that pull that shit.
Yeah, yeah, 1st amendment and all that, but this is hate speech.
These are the people with the “Baby Mama” label for Michelle Obama, not to mention O’Reilly calling her an “angry black woman” or that “terrorist fist pound” at this point NOTHING they say surprises me. Perhaps one day they’ll just put their anchors in sheets…
I just got something scrolling on the imaginary marquee in my brain: “Roger Ailes is a fucking asshole.”
P.S. for you Wire-philes: Clay Davis in 2012.
I am not surprised at all that Fox News promotes this kind of blatant racism. They have done these racist shenanigans constantly for the last ten months, beginning with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright thing.
You can’t tell me they don’t screen these things. I tried pushing some “subtle” anti-war messages to the Cleveland Indians scoreboard (it’s a similar TXT interface) last baseball season–no luck. Yeah, someone’s definitely filtering for content before broadcast. That’s Fox being Fox!
Fox news will use whatever dog whistle it thinks it can get away with. I’m certainly not surprised.
This whole “magic negro” thing has gone way too far. I doubt that most of the people angry over it OR defending / propagating even remember what the phrase “magic negro” was originally about or why it was brought up — now it’s just floated loose from its moorings and has become a “hilarious” (offensive) way of saying “negro” over and over again.
it should be noted that the “obama as magic negro” meme stared with the LA times by one David Ehrenstein, who, as far as i can tell, is a progressive.
although presumably criticizing whites for needing racial redemption, ehresntein’s contempt for obama not being progressive enough, a contempt rooted in obama;s race, shines right thru. he’s repeatedly criticized obama, especially on the warren issue, in racialized terms.
its classic progressive racism, like the over-use of the the term uncle tom. in this closed system, poc who don’t embrace progressive views are really just enablers of white supremacy. but this view is also racist b/c it denies to poc a full diversity of opinion that whites take for granted. and in reality it has restricted to poc to some of the world most failed and oppressive ideologies, in a misguided belief that such systems would liberate us from western dominance.
i don’t necessarily begrudge people for using such terms as magic negro. and in the hands of subtle thinkers (like fanon) these concepts are worth exploring. but in the hands of ehrensten and rush (limbaugh and bobby) something else happens, not unlike the peculiar misogyny sarah palin had to endure at the hands of feminists (wendy doniger doubting her womanhood comes to mind)
i guess it took fox for so many to realize the new racism looks much like the old.
oops, my #10 was in response to Kristen in #3, specifically the “terrorist fist pump” ref
G G (#2).
It’s not hate speech.It’s mockery speech.But,if it ofends you in any way,it shouldn’t be allowed on the airwaves.
Manju: I agree with most of what you said. The original Ehrenstein article was ridiculous. (I had not read it before this whole fiasco went down.) By the end of the thing, I wasn’t sure if Ehrenstein was pissed at Obama or white people or white people who feel bad about being white or what. The huge leap in logic and reason it made by arguing that Obama was like Sydney Porter in terms of how they addressed race; just so much pile of nonsense. This is what happens when columnists try to be clever. It doesn’t work; then fools like Limbaugh make fun of you and it spreads.
mapaghimagsik, that’s not a dogwhistle. That’s a fucking airhorn.
Corwin #12, can you please explain exactly how this is NOT hate speech, when it is exactly the kind of language that dehumanizes Black people and encourages others to do the same, hence giving them the excuse / permission to kill / rape people of color?
GG,
Well,Dean wormer,if you’re going to falsely criticize fraternities,aren’t you implicitly criticizing the college students?And ,If you’re criticizing students,aren’t you criticizing the United States/I don’t know about you,but I’m not going to sit here and let you criticize the United States of America! (Rises,marches out with the Delta’s following.)
I think you’ll understand this kind of logic.
And,reme3mber,I did say,if ti offended you,it shouidn’t be allowed on the airwaves.
But seriously GG.
Can you give me some insight into your thought processes that link ‘Negro”,or “Magic Negro” to murders.
First,which is the offensive word?
Secondly,how is this hate speech?
Thirdly,how does one link this to violence?
And finally,what would you consider an adequate fine?
I do think FN is kind of a humourless lot,but would anyone care to chime in on the
“Hate Spech” aspect,and the fine?