12 Very Naïve Celeb Quotes On Race - Page 11

If you want to make people uncomfortable, talk about institutionalized racism in America. It’s a topic that has found Common and A$AP Ferg on the hot seat for their seemingly tone deaf responses.

These 12 very naïve celeb quotes on race are a reminder we pay some famous people to perform a singular act well and nothing more. It may hurt to call your favorite star an idiot savant, but if the best thing they can do is spark a dialogue before getting the #ByeFelicia treatment, so be it.

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Photo: Fuse

A$AP Ferg

After hearing Ferg tell NPR, “There’s no racism with the Internet. Racism only was—is probably like five generations ago,” we might need him to have several seats. A small sample size of anecdotal racial harmony is a classic uninformed argument.

photo: WENN

Kanye West

There’s truth in Kanye statement of racism being a dated concept in his interview with Clique TV. But him saying “there’s been so many leaps” implies he forgot all the racial slurs people were calling him after he bumrushed Taylor Swift. It’s not like 2009 was that long ago.

photo: WENN

Common

We haven’t been this upset with Common since he was wearing knit pants and Apple Jack hats. After discussing institutionalized racism on The Daily Show With Jon Stewart, Com offered a passive, turn the other cheek mentality saying he preferred to extend his hand in love and forget about the past.

Trinidad James

Not only did Trinidad James say he preferred to give a pass to the old, racist frat mother who dropped some hard Rs onto his “All Gold Everything” phrase, he told CNN’s Don Lemon we shouldn’t be upset at outside use of the N-Word.

Nicole Wallace

Sometimes you have to let the ignorance speak for itself. Take it away, Nicole. “I think a country that elects an African-American President twice…I don’t think every American is racist.”

Bill O’Reilly

Good lord, where does one even begin? For starters, O’Reilly doesn’t believe in white privilege. He also has a long history of implying the “welfare queens” he so often refers to are people of color, despite evidence to the contrary.

photo: WENN

Don Lemon

So Don Lemon thinks incidents like the Michael Brown and Eric Garner killings won’t happen if black people collectively pull up their pants and stop using the N-Word? That’s really the platform on which you want to run?

Anne Coulter

“We know who the homicidal maniacs are. They are the ones cheering and dancing right now. We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity.”

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Will Smith

Queue up the straw man argument Big Willie Style: “There are racist people who live there, but I don’t think America as a whole is a racist nation. Before Obama won the presidency I wasn’t allowed to say that out loud because people would say: ‘Oh yeah, of course for you, Mr Hollywood!’”

photo: WENN

Rush Limbaugh

Limbaugh once said slavery had its merits.

photo: WENN

Supreme Court Justice John Roberts

When the Supreme Court gutted the 1965 Voting Rights Act in 2013, Roberts called racism a problem that had been solved in his ruling. Maybe he’s just as blind as Lady Justice.