When he complained, rightwingers sent him homophobic taunts online. Black gay
Republican podcaster Rob Smith has claimed that “white supremacist” members of
his political party called him “fa**ot” and the n-word during his Sunday night
attendance of Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest event in Phoenix, Arizona. Though
Smith posted a video of his brief interaction with the aggressors, commenters on
X (formerly Twitter) noted that the video didn’t feature the n-word and mocked
Smith his membership in an anti-gay political party. “Last night in Phoenix, I
was confronted and surrounded by some White Supremacists that don’t like gays or
blacks in the Republican Party,” Smith wrote in a December 18 post on X. “They
shouted ‘nr’ and ‘ft’ at me to make their point. However, I served in Iraq. I
never back down. Ever.”
People here calling him all sorts of slurs are missing the point - people are conservative because they value their own money (even the potential of it) more than other humans.
Being Black and/or gay (or a woman, or disabled, or trans, or whatever marginalised group someone might belong to) doesn’t make a person any less greedy or exploitative. You would wish it would make them more aware of the systems of oppression they face and who controls and benefits from them, but considering the quality of education and amount of propaganda and capitalism-serving socialisation we are all exposed to courtesy of said people who control and benefit from these systems, and the promises oppressors make to the tokens they recruit (the “good ones”), it isn’t really at all surprising or confusing, and berating the guy as being “unintelligent” not only completely misses the reality of the situation (and therefore any possibility of resolving it), but is also flat out ableist.
Thank you for having something intelligent to contribute to the discussion, this place is just turning into reddit with less and less comments like yours.
I appreciate your position on identifying how someone who would otherwise be assumed to be more empathetic could find their way into these ideologies.
I’d add that it’s because he as an individual has probably faced very little actual oppression. I make the assumption his parents had money and he lived in a relatively affluent area. He got to his mindset because he hasn’t actually experienced what is a reality for so many others.
I will say that it’s an attitude that can only develop with a combined lack of wisdom and empathy.
Intelligence isn’t one thing, but the stories of tokens being used and thrown away are difficult to miss in our culture and even if not it takes a lack of wisdom to fail to see that the bigots don’t like the good ones either. And it takes a lack of empathy to get there. It requires being unable or unwilling to see consequences that others see easily and then to behave reprehensibly to get those consequences.
Conservative means “control the rate of change”. In the context of the USA they are conserving the rate of change from a White Supremacist slaver society to society with the shocking idea of black people are people and black lives matter.
It is somewhat about money.
But this post is about the racism and homophobic character that lies at the feet of the Xian white US nationalists core values.
Second of all, you should really read up on the relationship between racism (and patriarchal heteronormativity) and capitalism (hint: they created ways to dehumanise others to justify the pillaging and hoarding of resources. Racism feeds capitalism).
The idea that they aren’t inextricably intertwined, and that money isn’t used to manipulate marginalised people in to acting against their own interests, is absurd and wilfully ignorant, at best.
The idea that money has nothing to do with force is beyond ridiculous.
You will never end racism unless you also abolish capitalism (and vice versa - fighting only capitalism but not racism is just white supremacy).
People here calling him all sorts of slurs are missing the point - people are conservative because they value their own money (even the potential of it) more than other humans.
Being Black and/or gay (or a woman, or disabled, or trans, or whatever marginalised group someone might belong to) doesn’t make a person any less greedy or exploitative. You would wish it would make them more aware of the systems of oppression they face and who controls and benefits from them, but considering the quality of education and amount of propaganda and capitalism-serving socialisation we are all exposed to courtesy of said people who control and benefit from these systems, and the promises oppressors make to the tokens they recruit (the “good ones”), it isn’t really at all surprising or confusing, and berating the guy as being “unintelligent” not only completely misses the reality of the situation (and therefore any possibility of resolving it), but is also flat out ableist.
Thank you for having something intelligent to contribute to the discussion, this place is just turning into reddit with less and less comments like yours.
I appreciate your position on identifying how someone who would otherwise be assumed to be more empathetic could find their way into these ideologies.
I’d add that it’s because he as an individual has probably faced very little actual oppression. I make the assumption his parents had money and he lived in a relatively affluent area. He got to his mindset because he hasn’t actually experienced what is a reality for so many others.
Again, just assumptions
I will say that it’s an attitude that can only develop with a combined lack of wisdom and empathy.
Intelligence isn’t one thing, but the stories of tokens being used and thrown away are difficult to miss in our culture and even if not it takes a lack of wisdom to fail to see that the bigots don’t like the good ones either. And it takes a lack of empathy to get there. It requires being unable or unwilling to see consequences that others see easily and then to behave reprehensibly to get those consequences.
The irony of luke warm takes like this amuses me to no end.
Nah man.
Conservative means “control the rate of change”. In the context of the USA they are conserving the rate of change from a White Supremacist slaver society to society with the shocking idea of black people are people and black lives matter.
It is somewhat about money.
But this post is about the racism and homophobic character that lies at the feet of the Xian white US nationalists core values.
And that ain’t money. That is about force.
First of all, I’m not a man.
Second of all, you should really read up on the relationship between racism (and patriarchal heteronormativity) and capitalism (hint: they created ways to dehumanise others to justify the pillaging and hoarding of resources. Racism feeds capitalism).
The idea that they aren’t inextricably intertwined, and that money isn’t used to manipulate marginalised people in to acting against their own interests, is absurd and wilfully ignorant, at best.
The idea that money has nothing to do with force is beyond ridiculous.
You will never end racism unless you also abolish capitalism (and vice versa - fighting only capitalism but not racism is just white supremacy).
You nailed it. The belief in “I got mine, f u” isn’t tied to any sexual orientation or race.
It just doesn’t work out for the minorities since most conservative-minded people are also xenophobes
I’d wager that these conservative minorities are probably xenophobes too
How does that make them any different from liberals?
Show me where I said it does?
Just checking.