Trump: Elizabeth Warren Is Racist
So...
Trump (a) claims that Warren is racist for pretending to be an American Indian, and (b) continues to call her "Pocahontas."
As for (a): I don't see it. It's dishonest and shitty. But it isn't racist.
As for (b): well...is that racist? Lots of people on the left are saying it is...but...lots of people on the left say that everything is racist...so...
If you called somebody who was an American Indian 'Pocahontas', that's racist. But saying that to taunt someone who pretends to be...especially when they do so in order to gain an e.g. affirmative action advantage...I don't see how that's racist...
Anyway, even it if is obscurely racist somehow, what Warren did is worse.
Man, imagine the left if it were revealed that Trump had done what Warren did... ZOMG... MSNBC and co. would literally burst into flames. There'd be a mushroom cloud over Salon.com.
Anyway.
Next week on THAT'S RACIST!: Are you racist? Trick question! Even asking it is, of course, racist!
Trump (a) claims that Warren is racist for pretending to be an American Indian, and (b) continues to call her "Pocahontas."
As for (a): I don't see it. It's dishonest and shitty. But it isn't racist.
As for (b): well...is that racist? Lots of people on the left are saying it is...but...lots of people on the left say that everything is racist...so...
If you called somebody who was an American Indian 'Pocahontas', that's racist. But saying that to taunt someone who pretends to be...especially when they do so in order to gain an e.g. affirmative action advantage...I don't see how that's racist...
Anyway, even it if is obscurely racist somehow, what Warren did is worse.
Man, imagine the left if it were revealed that Trump had done what Warren did... ZOMG... MSNBC and co. would literally burst into flames. There'd be a mushroom cloud over Salon.com.
Anyway.
Next week on THAT'S RACIST!: Are you racist? Trick question! Even asking it is, of course, racist!
posted by Winston Smith at
11:17 PM
2 Comments:
From Wikipedia (please, just...Wikipedia, I know...):
Scott Brown, her Republican opponent in the Senate race, speculated that she had fabricated Native American heritage to gain advantage in the job market.[72][73][74] Former colleagues and supervisors at universities where she had worked stated that Warren's ancestry played no role in her hiring.[70][71][74][75] Warren responded to the allegations, saying that she had self-identified as a minority in the directories in order to meet others with similar tribal roots.[76] Her brothers defended her, stating that they "grew up listening to our mother and grandmother and other relatives talk about our family's Cherokee and Delaware heritage".[77] In her 2014 autobiography, Warren described the allegations as untrue and hurtful.[78] The New England Historic Genealogical Society found a family newsletter that alluded to a marriage license application that listed Elizabeth Warren’s great-great-great grandmother as a Cherokee, but could not find the primary document and found no proof of her descent.[74][79][80] The Oklahoma Historical Society said that finding a definitive answer about Native American heritage can be difficult because of intermarriage and deliberate avoidance of registration.[81]
So if this is true it's Trump repeating an allegation that has never been proven true or false. She may indeed have Native American Ancestry, or it may simply be family lore passed through the generation(s).* How is that worse than deriding a person's possible heritage? When that heritage has not been proven false (and may well be true)?
*example, in my family many said 'we're descended of Daniel Boone', and all I did was shrug and say 'ok' - not big into hero worship. Family lore for generations. A tenacious family member has now traced Daniel Boone to being an acquaintance or friend of an ancestor. So were my family members dishonest in believing something as being true that was passed down the generations? My answer would be no...even though I've met them (couldn't help the snark).
Yeah, I don't think I disagree--or not much anyway. And, even though it's Wikipedia, that's consistent with stuff I've read about Warren.
I don't blame her for an honest mistake--hell, if I had any whiff of American Indian ancestry I'd totally be telling everybody just because it's cool, verification be damned.
I think that the most serious charge is not that she *did* benefit from it, but, rather that she *tried* to. The record seems consistent with that...though mere consistency isn't enough to regard her has guilty, obviously.
Also, when there's the possibility of affirmative action benefits in play, things get more serious, and I think you have an obligation to have evidence, not just...well..what like half the country has, which is family rumors of Cherokee ancestry.
Even if she *didn't* benefit, doesn't it seem that she should have taken care not to take the risk of getting preferential treatment on the basis of a family rumor?
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