Still Speaking of Racism

This is unreal

During the September 19 edition of his nationally syndicated radio program, discussing his recent trip to have dinner with Rev. Al Sharpton at Sylvia’s, a famous restaurant in Harlem, Bill O’Reilly reported that he “had a great time, and all the people up there are tremendously respectful,” adding: “I couldn’t get over the fact that there was no difference between Sylvia’s restaurant and any other restaurant in New York City. I mean, it was exactly the same, even though it’s run by blacks, primarily black patronship.” Later, during a discussion with National Public Radio senior correspondent and Fox News contributor Juan Williams about the effect of rap on culture, O’Reilly asserted: “There wasn’t one person in Sylvia’s who was screaming, ‘M-Fer, I want more iced tea.’ You know, I mean, everybody was — it was like going into an Italian restaurant in an all-white suburb in the sense of people were sitting there, and they were ordering and having fun. And there wasn’t any kind of craziness at all.” O’Reilly also stated: “I think black Americans are starting to think more and more for themselves. They’re getting away from the Sharptons and the [Rev. Jesse] Jacksons and the people trying to lead them into a race-based culture. They’re just trying to figure it out. ‘Look, I can make it. If I work hard and get educated, I can make it.”

This would have been bad enough if O’Reilly were some teenage yahoo fresh from all-white Snipe Hunt, Kentucky. But O’Reilly is even older than I am, and grew up on Long Island, for pity’s sake. Did his parents keep him in a box?

Come to think of it, that would explain a lot.

Hilzoy says,

If it was wrong for Don Imus to refer to the Rutgers basketball team as ‘nappy-headed hos’, and it was, and if MSNBC rightly decided that they had to drop him, then why on earth does Bill O’Reilly still have a job?

11 thoughts on “Still Speaking of Racism

  1. Snipe Hunt, KY? Well, I had to look that up to be sure whether there is such a place. [there’s not] I have long known that there really is a Monkey’s Eyebrow, KY…….it’s not far from where you grew up, Maha. I have always considered Monkey’s Eyebrow to be the strangest place name ever….

  2. Isn’t Bill O’Rielly the guy that was into sexual harassment in the workplace? I think I remember hearing something about him. A guy that was always making vulgar remarks to women about his irresistibility and sexual prowess Maybe I’m confused and mistaking the name with the Bill O’Rielly racist cited above.

  3. Bill “Orally,”
    Today’s Boo Radley, whose name scares children.
    “If you don’t behave, Boo Orally will opine on your little ass, you M’Fing miscreant!”
    Bill went to my college, Marist, a few years before I did. If I could see the future, I would have tried Yale. On second thought, they would never have me. I wasn’t dumb, sycophantic, or morally challenged enough to meet their tough standards.
    Boo Orally! Everyday’s, “WORST PERSON IN THE WORLD!!!!”
    Next to GWB, that is… And everyone of his sycophant’s.

  4. Pingback: Outside The Beltway | OTB

  5. There’s nothing more refreshing than reading a post claiming someone is a racist that has a racist comment in it.

    All white Snipe Hunt, Kentucky

    You are so ignorant! Oh thats right, I forgot you can get away with insulting whitey.

  6. Chuck et al: Since I’ve been accused of bigotry by James Joyner, I am going to repeat my comment to Joyner and then close comments on this post. I’m not in the mood to deal with a swarm of racist yahoos.

    * * *

    Re the crack about “It’s apparently fine for educated middle aged people to buy in to negative stereotypes about the rural South,” — as my regular readers know I am a hillbilly girl from the Ozark Mountains — I brag about this frequently — and grew up in an all-white rural town, so I actually relate to being a “teenage yahoo fresh from all-white Snipe Hunt, Kentucky.” It’s been a couple of centuries since I’ve been a teenager, but never mind.

    FYI, there are college-educated people living in Kentucky.

    Re “But what he’s expressing here isn’t racism but 1970s style white liberal guilt.”

    O’Reilly expresses surprise that Harlem residents don’t conform to his racist stereotypes, and that’s not racism? Puh-LEEZE.

    I grew up (in a legally segregated town) believing all manner of outrageous things about Black People, because that’s what I was taught and had no experience associating with anyone who wasn’t white, or Christian, until I went away to college. I figured out after a while that what I’d been taught was racism. As I said, O’Reilly is even older than I am and grew up in the New York metropolitan area, so what’s HIS excuse?

    And, btw, what’s YOURS? You’ve been in a box, too?

    * * *

    Comments are now closed.

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