Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee is slammed for his 'racist' and 'anti-Asian' tweet claiming he will 'identify as Chinese' to win favor with Coca-Cola, Delta and Nike who all criticized Georgia's new voting law but work with Beijing dictators
Former Arkansas Gov Mike Huckabee has been slammed on Twitter for his 'racist' and 'anti-Asian' tweet claiming he will 'identify as Chinese' so that Coca-Cola, Delta and Nike will like him.
'I’ve decided to “identify” as Chinese. Coke will like me, Delta will agree with my “values” and I’ll probably get shoes from Nike & tickets to @MLB games. Ain’t America great?' Huckabee tweeted Saturday morning.
Huckabee appeared to be referring to Georgia's sweeping new voting law, which many have blasted as voter suppression, while also mocking those who oppose hate and violence against Asian Americans.
His remarks come just a week after a 65-year-old woman was viciously attacked while walking to church near New York City's Times Square. The attack heightened already palpable levels of outrage over anti-Asian attacks that escalated with the pandemic.
The New York assault came just two weeks after a white gunman opened fire inside three Asian-owned massage businesses in metro Atlanta. Eight people, including six women of Asian descent, died.
Meanwhile, three groups already have filed a lawsuit over the Georgia measure, which adds greater legislative control over how elections are run and includes strict identification requirements for voting absentee by mail. It also limits the use of ballot drop boxes and makes it a crime to hand out food or water to voters waiting in line, among other provisions.
Huckabee's remarks prompted several people to take to social media to blast the former governor for claiming to be 'Christian' but spewing Asian 'hate' speech.
'WHOA. Racist, much, Mike? The Evangelical Christians are OUT OF CONTROL with hate. You lead the way,' one person tweeted.
Another wrote: 'Wow is this appalling. Six Asian American women were massacred on March 16. Last weekend, an Asian woman your age was beaten and kicked in NYC and is still in hospital with broken bones and a concussion. Every day Asian/AAPI people are victimized by hate crimes. Delete this.'
California Congressman Ted Lieu tweeted: 'Hey Mike Huckabee, I asked around and Coke likes me, Delta agrees with my values, I wear Nikes and my hometown Dodgers won the World Series. But it’s not because of my ethnicity. It’s because I’m not a sh*thead like you who is adding fuel to anti-Asian hate.'
'Pretty racist and scummy. Hope Twitter bans you for fomenting anti-Asian hate,' another wrote.
Activist Fred Guttenberg, whose daughter was killed in the Parkland shooting in February 2018, shared: 'I have decided to identify you as a hater of America, Democracy, and Decency and to simply identify you as an a-- hole.'
Huckabee's tweet also hit out at the MLB, which yanked its All-Star game from Georgia after Gov Brian Kemp signed a new voting law that critics say will disproportionately affect communities of color.
The Republican governor said at a news conference that MLB 'caved to fear and lies from liberal activists' when it yanked the July 13 game from Atlanta's Truist Park. He added the decision will hurt working people in the state and have long-term consequences on the economy.
'I want to be clear: I will not be backing down from this fight. We will not be intimidated, and we will also not be silenced,' Kemp said.
'Major League Baseball, Coca-Cola and Delta may be scared of Stacey Abrams, Joe Biden and the left, but I am not,' he said, referring to companies that have also criticized the new law.
Georgia Republicans say the changes were needed to maintain voter confidence in the election system, and the governor insists opponents have mischaracterized what the law does. Yet GOP lawmakers made the revisions largely in response to false claims of fraud in the 2020 elections made by former President Donald Trump and his supporters.
Abrams, who has championed voting rights since narrowly losing to Kemp in the 2018 election, is among those who have spoken out against the law. The Democrat is being closely watched to see if she seeks a 2022 rematch.
MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred previously said he made the call to move the All-Star events and the amateur draft from Atlanta after discussions with individual players and the Players Alliance, an organization of black players formed after the death of George Floyd last year.
A new ballpark for the events wasn't immediately revealed.
Kemp also criticized the league for not trying to improve voter access in its home state of New York, where he said voters need an excuse to vote by mail and have fewer days of early voting than in Georgia.
He said its decision means 'cancel culture' is coming for American businesses and jobs.
Former president Donald Trump also blasted the league's move, while former president Barack Obama congratulated MLB for its decision, saying there was no better way for baseball to honor [Hank] Aaron, 'who always led by example'.
Meanwhile, US Attorney General Merrick Garland has ordered a review of how the Justice Department can best deploy its resources to combat hate crimes during a surge in incidents targeting Asian Americans.
Garland issued a department-wide memo announcing the 30-day review, citing the 'recent rise in hate crimes and hate incidents, particularly the disturbing trend in reports of violence against members of the Asian American and Pacific Islander community since the start of the pandemic'.
Asian American activists say Trump is partly to blame because of his rhetoric around COVID-19, which he frequently referred to as the 'Chinese virus'.
They say he gave license for people to show racism that was already rooted in decades of anti-Asian sentiment in the US.
According to a report from Stop AAPI Hate, more than 3,800 anti-Asian incidents were reported to the organization between March 2020 through February.
The group, which tracks incidents of discrimination, hate and xenophobia against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in the U.S., said that number is "only a fraction of the number of hate incidents that actually occur."
According to the Center for the Study of Hate & Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino, hate crimes targeting Asians ballooned by 150 per cent last year, while hate crimes overall during the pandemic went down 7 per cent.
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Charles Barkley Drives a Dagger Through the Heart of the Left's Identity Politics Narrative
Charles Barkley dropped a lecture that’s bound to infuriate the woke mob because what he said was sensible. Barkley, an 11-time all-star and Hall of Famer, is often entertaining without the politics as he hosts Inside the NBA on TNT with Ernie Johnson, Shaquille O’Neal, and Kenny Smith. You’ve all seen Barkley take comedic swipes at San Antonio women and Jussie Smollett, things that would have led to him getting a pink slip if he had worked for a network like ESPN. On both of those occasions, Shaq was left on the floor laughing which only added to the comedic effect.
No, this time Sir Charles decided to really drive a knife into the heart of the identity politics antics that are engulfing the country. Barkley is not a conservative, but he’s not beholden to the rules of the woke Left either. Recently, he offered a lecture about racial divisions in this country and noted that we’re all be played for fools by the political class. These people want us to hate each other, especially on black-white lines, since that’s the best way to maintain their fiefdoms. He mentioned this during the network’s current coverage of the NCAA tournament (via Daily Caller):
Charles Barkley shared some refreshing and blunt thoughts about the divisions in America, and everyone needs to hear his words.
[…]
Man, I think most white people and black people are great people. I really believe that in my heart, but I think our system is set up where our politicians, whether they’re Republicans or Democrats, are designed to make us not like each other so they can keep their grasp of money and power. They divide and conquer. I truly believe in my heart most white people and black people are awesome people, but we’re so stupid following our politicians, whether they’re Republicans or Democrats, and their only job is, ‘Hey, let’s make these people not like each other. We don’t live in their neighborhoods, we all got money, let’s make the whites and blacks not like each other, let’s make rich people and poor people not like each other, let’s scramble the middle class. I truly believe that in my heart.
This isn’t the first time Barkley has decided to more or less shred through the liberal media narrative. He offered a nuanced take regarding the Breonna Taylor shooting. In keeping with his remarks above, he was not pleased with the former Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver DeSean Jackson posting an anti-Semitic post attributed to Louis Farrakhan. Barkley saw no reason for hating other racial or ethnic groups due to racial prejudice towards blacks. He aptly noted past discrimination is not a get-out-of-jail card for the black community to be bigots as well:
"We can't allow black people to be prejudiced also. Especially if we're asking for white folks to respect us, give us economic opportunity, and things like that," Barkley said. "I'm so disappointed in these men, but I don't understand how you beat hatred with more hatred."
Barkley says he doesn't understand the hatred in people's hearts and will never accept it.
"We gotta do better," Barkley concluded. "I want allies. I don't want to alienate anybody. And to take shots at the Jewish race, the white race, I just don't like it because it's not right."
The good news for Barkley is that you cannot cancel one of the greatest basketball players of all time. So, he has some level of protection from the legions of unhinged progressives.
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'No Gestapo Here!': Polish Pastor Tosses Canadian Police Out of Good Friday Church Service
Calgary police were met with resistance when they attempted to shut down a Good Friday church service for violating COVID restrictions. Artur Pawlowski, the pastor at The Cave of Adullam, told police to leave and not return until they have a search warrant in hand.
"You come back with a warrant," Pawlowski said. "Out! Out! Out!"
Police were hesitant to leave but the pastor wasn't backing down. "Out of this property, you Nazis!" Pawlowski shouted. "Gestapo is not allowed here!"
As police left the property, Pawlowski told them "not to come back, you Nazi psychopaths."
"Unbelievable sick, evil people. Intimidating people in a church during the Passover! You Gestapo, Nazi, communist fascists! Don’t you dare come back here!” he shouted as they walked away.
The pastor turned the camera to face him.
“Can you imagine those psychopaths? Passover, the holiest Christian festival in a year and they’re coming to intimidate Christians during the holiest festival? Unbelievable," Pawlowski said. "What is wrong with those sick psychopaths? It’s beyond me. Wow. Wow. How dare they?"
“Unbelievable. We’re living in a total takeover of the government with their thugs, goons, the brown shirts, the Gestapo wannabe dictators,” an incredulous Pawlowski said. “Coming to the church armed with guns and tasers and handcuffs to intimidate during Passover celebration? Well, I guess that’s what it is, they want to enslave us all like the Egyptians did. They want to be the Pharaohs of today, that’s what they’re doing. Unbelievable. People, if you don’t stand up, wake up, wow. I don’t know what will happen tomorrow.”
The pastor warned about Germany, where "wannabe Hitlers are already ruling" and fascism is reigning once again. He took particular issue with the country's lockdown.
He referenced the COVID passports that are being talked about and potentially implemented.
"If you will not be vaccinated like a dog or a cat, you will not be able to buy or sell. You will not be able to go to school or work. Is that the future you want?" Pawlowski asked. "Is that what you want for your children and your grandchildren?"
According to the pastor, the time to stand up and push back against the out-of-control government is now.
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Motte-and-Bailey: The Academic Threat from ‘Lived Experience’
A few years ago, my friend Sheila recounted an incident of alleged racism she experienced at a café in California. While waiting in line to order a coffee, a barista took the order of an older white woman first. The barista didn’t refuse service to Sheila and was polite when she finally took her order. To my surprise, the only potential slight was that in a moment of uncertainty, the barista took a white woman’s order before my friend, who is African American.
It is possible that the barista was a racist, but it is equally plausible that the barista wasn’t sure who was first in line, and so deferred to the older woman. As I listened, it became obvious to me that this incident had multiple interpretations, but Sheila’s “lived experience” only allowed for one: racism. And who was I to disagree?
What this anecdote shows is how a reasonable interpretation can become unreasonable when interpreted through a framework that rejects alternative explanations and assumes epistemic authority based on one’s identity. Academic frameworks like critical race theory and intersectionality take anecdotes like the above and use them to stifle good-faith debate.
One way that happens is by using the motte-and-bailey fallacy. One modest and easy-to-defend position (the motte) is replaced by a much more controversial position (the bailey). A person will argue the bailey, but then replace it with the motte when questioned.
For example, a key concept of critical race theory and the broader social justice movement is the notion of lived experience, which means that marginalized people have better access to knowledge about their own experiences of oppression than privileged people do. On the surface, that seems quite reasonable. A white person can never know how it feels to be called the n-word, and a man might be oblivious to how it feels to be a woman in a male-dominated profession. Sexism and racism do exist, so it seems reasonable to assume that members of the majority are less likely to recognize such prejudices.
However, the proponents of critical race theory and intersectionality do not stop there. Smuggled into their notion of lived experience is an adherence to the more controversial “standpoint epistemology,” a postmodern theory of knowledge that rejects reaching for objectivity and argues that marginalized people have authoritative knowledge about complex systems of oppression and society itself.
For example, a colleague of mine at a Swedish university cited his lived experience when he argued that critics of Sweden’s immigration policies are all racists and should be banned from speaking at universities.
When I told him that his lived experience was just anecdotal—that there is no way he could generalize about millions of people based on a few bad encounters—he doubled down and replied, “that’s a very white male thing to say.” Initially, I worried that I wasn’t sympathetic enough to his experiences as an immigrant, despite being one myself. However, I now realize that I was being emotionally manipulated and shamed into silence through a very clever bait-and-switch. These tactics are not part of a good-faith debate, but rather a rhetorical strategy to claim epistemic authority and gain power.
Retreating to the motte of lived experience is a manipulative tactic that the disciples of the social justice movement use to exploit compassionate peoples’ desire not to offend others. The motte-and-bailey allows pseudo-academics and activists to shut down important discussions without making an argument or citing any credible scholarship or data. It also allows them to drown out well-reasoned arguments with selective anecdotes, emotional appeals, shaming tactics, and religious zealotry.
The idea that suffering brings enlightenment—that a class of “woke” individuals will lead us to the promised land with their “revealed knowledge”—has much more in common with religious mysticism than academic inquiry. In an age when we are dealing with increasingly urgent and complex issues such as climate change and a global pandemic, well-reasoned arguments have even greater importance. Personal experience doesn’t need to be ignored, but a personal anecdote cannot be a substitute for data and honest debate.
Marginalization does not mean those who suffer will know the best policy to fix a social problem.
Much like how a cancer survivor can express how it feels to have cancer better than their doctor could, minorities may have a greater understanding of how it feels to be marginalized—but this does not automatically grant them a better understanding of complex social systems and other external causal factors. Nor does it make their own intuitions infallible or grant them insight into other people’s intentions. Most importantly, marginalization does not mean those who suffer will know the best policy to fix a social problem.
Experience can be the starting point of an investigation. An anecdote can be a powerful illustration of a known phenomenon. But the adherents of standpoint epistemology skip the investigation part and treat selective anecdotes as unquestionable facts. No attempts to falsify their explanations are made, and, like my friend Sheila, no counter-arguments or alternative theories are considered. To even propose another explanation is to engage in white supremacy, or systemic racism, or epistemic violence, according to this critical approach. In fact, at a recent MLK commemorative address, antiracist guru Ibram X. Kendi claimed that the very denial of racism is a strong indicator of its existence.
Yet, in their rejection of other explanations, Kendi and others disprove their own theory.
The lived experience of other minorities who, for example, do not believe that they are still living in a white supremacist hetero-patriachy, are not acknowledged. Nor do they consider the experiences of many women who were born with female bodies and who believe this may play a role in how they experience their gender.
Like any dogmatic belief system, critical race theory has a built-in confirmation bias. It perpetuates racial essentialism by teaching whites that all minorities think the same. But despite being antithetical to science and reason, it has gained traction in academic and political circles. For example, when recently asked by Trevor Noah what she would bring to a Biden White House, Kamala Harris cited her identity as a “Black woman” and replied: “Joe understands that he and I have very different lived experiences.”
To stop the critical takeover, it is important for educators to tread carefully when unpacking any claim rooted in these grievance narratives. That means critiquing the bailey of standpoint epistemology while respecting the lived experiences of both students and academics. Acknowledge that racism or sexism might have occurred, but gently encourage students to consider other explanations as well. Focus instead on the methodology being used rather than the conclusions that are reached.
Most importantly, try to draw a clear distinction between personal testimonies, selective anecdotes, and scientific data. Invalidating the experiences of others will only lead them to become defensive or feel marginalized. Introducing them to other ways of thinking about their experience, though, opens up a possibility for learning more about the world, as well as imparting wisdom for their future.
https://www.jamesgmartin.center/2021/04/motte-and-bailey-the-academic-threat-from-lived-experience/
***************************************My other blogs. Main ones below:
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com TONGUE-TIED)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://john-ray.blogspot.com (FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
https://heofen.blogspot.com/ (MY OTHER BLOGS)
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Kristina Pimenova, once said to be the most beautiful girl in the world. Note blue eyes and blonde hair
Bliss: What every woman wants: to feel safe and secure in the arms of her man. Robert Irwin and Rorie Buckey. See
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