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Promoted from the diaries by streiff. Promotion does not imply endorsement.
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Candace Owens, of Turning Point USA, has apparently created a firestorm of controversy, to hear the Left blogosphere speak. Salon calls her the “toxic right’s newest African-American star.” The Daily Beast has declared she, an African-American, has “a minority problem.” The Washington Post said Kanye West fell for the “worst Republican sales pitch.” NBC has declared her “YouTube tested and Trump approved.” Recently, she addressed the annual CPAC conference and said that America was “not a racist country.”
Now for some of the backstory. At the 2019 CPAC conference, Owens made this apparently controversial proclamation. The Left was quick to pounce on it because while a high school student, Owens’ family won $37,500 settlement in a lawsuit against the City of Stamford, Connecticut where she was a student. According to accounts from the local papers, one of five teenagers left voicemail messages on the phone of Owens, then a student, threatening to kill her and using racial slurs. One of the teenagers involved was named Sam Malloy who happened to be the son of the mayor, Dan Malloy, who later went onto become governor or Connecticut.
Two days before the phone incident, Owens and another student, Evan Kopek, had a shouting match in class. He was suspended for his part. The school, however, refused to suspend the others involved in the phone calls since it happened off school grounds and police had not made an arrest. This drew criticism from the state NAACP who then intervened on behalf of Owens who had to miss six weeks of school out of fear (they made death threats, threatened to burn down her house, and tar and feather her). After the arrest of Kopek, the school then suspended him. It was the contention of the state NAACP that their failure to act earlier was tantamount to not protecting Owens. However, it was the contention of Owens that nothing was done because the mayor’s son had been involved, not because of her race.
The Left was quick to pick up on the apparent alleged irony and/or hypocrisy of Owens who said that “America was not a racist country” while collecting $37,500 for an racist act directed against her while in high school. As such, the Left is making absolute fools of themselves. The following is a sampling of some of the comments she received from the righteous Left:
- Jemele Hill of The Atlantic: So I guess when she sued — and won — a lawsuit after receiving racist threats then she must have been in some other country;
- Dr. Johannon R. Tate: Define irony: Candice (sic) Owens made money off of being taunted by racists, now she seeks to support them at all costs
- J. Emma: She makes no @%#** sense. Antithetical, hypocritical blather. How does she have such an enormous following? Is black America broken or not? Does racism exist or not? What’s your idea of ‘hand-ups’? A living wage? Affordable, accessible healthcare?
- Selena Myers: Now did racism die before or after she used the NAACP to sued her high school for racial discrimination?
- Someone else: I’ll never understand how she could suffer racists threats when she was younger and now has a platform to say it’s just a victimhood culture
What these dolts do not understand is that there can be incidents of racism without a country being racist. They also lack an understanding of the backstory described above. Note that it was not Owens or her family who sought out the help of the NAACP; it was the NAACP who interjected themselves into the local controversy. Note also that the main complaint of the Owens family and Candace herself was not that the comments were racist, but that nothing was being done because one of the alleged perpetrators was the son of the mayor of Stamford at the time.
This is the same mentality from the Left we saw in the aftermath of Charlottesville and Trump’s failure to bow at the altar of political correctness. By saying there were good people there, the Left pounced on the statement to make it appear that Trump was saying racist white supremacists were “good people.” In fact, we know that there some white supremacists, some neo-Nazis and some people who felt strongly about not removing a historical statue. We know that there were some antifa loons, Leftist extremists and some people who felt strongly about removing a statue they strongly felt celebrated a legacy of oppression. In short, there were some good people on both sides. Of course, the mainstream media needs a good story so they focused on only the bad on one side.
In the case of Charlottesville, the smaller example was writ large. In the case of the attacks on Owens, the larger assertion is being writ smaller. Thus you get the wonderment of the Left: How can you say America is not racist when you were the victim of a racist act? This is the same mentality that allows the Left to make accusations of a “racist country” in response to individual, essentially local issues.
For example, we see this tendency whenever a black unarmed victim is shot by police. To hear the Left speak, one would think that blacks are being hunted and killed by police every day in this country to genocidal proportions. It would surprise many to learn that in 2018 according to the Washington Post, only 15 unarmed black suspects were shot and killed by police. Conversely, in just three of the country’s largest cities, over 620 blacks were killed at the hands of another black perpetrator, yet there were no protests, no athletes taking a knee, no candlelight vigils, and no attention from Democratic politicians.
I have always found it amusing that the Left tries to portray every verified racist act or comment as the norm. I find it amusing they depict this country as rotten to the core with racism yet there are literally millions who want to enter this racist country. Unless they are masochists, no one wants to endure the ill effects of racism, but apparently caravans of Hondurans, and Mexicans and Africans and Asians are masochists when they try to enter the US. Are there racists in America? Of course, there are but that makes us no different from any other country. Are racist acts perpetrated? Of course, they are but not to the degree documented by the Left or the SPLC. Is this a racist country? The diversity the Left celebrates answers that question: absolutely not!
In conclusion, I would refer everyone to the graphic at the end of FP writer Mike Ford’s article earlier today. That basically says it all when it comes to charges of racism.
The post Candace Owens at CPAC Creates a Stir appeared first on RedState.
