Last night, a Kenosha cop did his damnedest to kill a man. We don't know all the details yet, but we do have a 23 second video clip showing the exact moment it happened. What we appear to see in the video is a man walking around his car in a non-threatening way. Police follow him around the vehicle, guns drawn. When the man gets into his car, the lead officer tries to grab his shirt, and then a split second later, shoots him seven times in the back. The video has been shown on numerous news outlets, almost all of whom freeze the video just before the moment of shooting. But here at the Wursthaus, we don't do that spineless shit. You can see the entire video, unedited, here.
Witnesses say the man who was shot had just gotten done breaking up a fight. We can't see that part because it's on the opposite side of the car. But what we can see is the man getting up, walking around his car, apparently ignoring the cops who had their guns drawn on him. Whatever the events were leading up to this, when the man got into the car, the cop who opened fire was clearly shooting to kill.
Okay, I get it. Maybe the man had a gun in his car. If so, that earns him a bullet in the leg - maybe. But seven in the back? Come on! That's inexcusable, right there!
If the circumstances leading up to this do not reveal some MAJOR mitigating circumstances, we have yet another clear-cut case of a cop trying to murder an innocent black man in cold, cold blood.
Oh, did you know, the man's KIDS were in the car? The video shows what looks like a girl of about 11 utterly traumatized as she throws a fit, seeing a man gunned down right in front of her. What will these kids grow up to think about cops?
What followed last night was some rather appropriate riots designed to tell the Kenosha police, "This is some unacceptable bullshit right here!" Racine police were brought in. Police from other counties as well, according to various news reports. Protesters were gassed, at least one videographer was shot with a rubber bullet, bottles were thrown, and when garbage trucks and dump trucks were put in place to prevent traffic from getting to the Kenosha police station, they were fire-bombed. Some of the protesters lit off fireworks to goad the police. All in all, I can't blame the black residents of Kenosha! They had every right to be pissed at a public execution attempt in their back yard!
And then, this morning, on Facebook, I find this:
Okay Prager. You asked for it. Now you're going to get it!
When I followed the link, I was taken to one of PragerU's "Fireside Chats" (#142). You can watch the whole thing yourself, here. And here Dennis has the unmitigated gall to say that America is the LEAST racist country out of all countries with mixed races. "It's easy to be a non-racist country when everyone in it is one race," he says. Well, maybe, but also completely misses the point. He then makes several arguments, based on "pure logic," he says, about why America is not a racist country.
"Argument #1" he says (and he actually dares to say that he's tempted to say PROOF #1), "If America is so racist, why are there so many race hoaxes?"
And just what does he mean by "race hoaxes?" Well, the most famous example of this, he says, is the case of Jusse Smollett, who claimed he was attacked by white racists who put a noose around his neck, but it turned out not to be true. He claims to have documented fifteen such examples, even noting date and time of the event, of such "race hoaxes," and the existence of these somehow constitutes proof that racism doesn't exist in America.
Wow. The man is literally arguing that the prevalence of racially charged stories proves that racism doesn't exist! In Dennis Prager's twisted mind, the existence of the fake thing means that the real thing isn't there!
"I'll give you a dramatic example," he says. "In 1930's in Germany, do you think any Jews made up an anti-Semetic incident? Of course not! Because Germany was filled with anti-Semitism! So no Jew made up an anti-Semetic hoax! They would have been lucky to have to make up an anti-Semetic hoax!" He concludes, "Why are there so many hoaxes? You wouldn't need them, would you?"
Yeah, he really is that stupid! And that's argument #1? That's what he's tempted to call "proof?"
Come on, Dennis! Do large breasts not exist because there are so many fake breast implants out there? Do real cigarettes not exist because you documented kids "smoking" bubble-gum cigarettes fifteen times? Maybe Jesus never existed because there were so many other fake Christs during his time?! How about that?!
Here's an alternative hypothesis: Maybe Smollett's fake story rang true because there really is a lot of racist shit still out there! This video was shot in July of 2020, only two years removed from Trump equating Charlottesville Nazis with their protesters, and this guy doesn't even realize that the very existence of neo-Nazis in Charlottesville is proof positive that racism is a very real story!
Argument #2, "Why are we talking so much about slavery?" he asks. "Slavery ended 155 years ago. If things are so bad today, why not talk about today?"
Um, shit, Dennis, have you looked out your front window, lately?
"This constant reference to things that happened... 140... 145... whatever I just said... and Jim Crow that ended in the 60's.... If you've gotta go that far back, maybe that's because that's the only time you can find all this racism."
I don't know what's more myopic - that this guy actually said this, or someone else was stupid enough to post it to Facebook thinking it would do anything to convince anybody. Again, Dennis, look out your front window now and then! Jim Crow wasn't ended in the 60's! It started to end in the 60's, but shadows of it still remain! Slavery may be gone, but it's legacy has STILL not been dealt with! If you can't see the continuous racist things which go on in America, it can only be because you live in such a well-insulated bubble.
Argument #3 is the lies. He claims that the killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, which touched off the riots in that city, was somehow a lie. "See Larry Elders' video on PragerU," he says. "He tells you exactly what happened in Ferguson, Missouri.
Okay, asshole! I'll take you up on that! There WILL be a separate blog post regarding that video! But how hollow your claims ring now that we've seen what happened LAST NIGHT in Kenosha, and after the murder of George Floyd. (And yes, he dares to question what we saw regarding George Floyd, too.) Lies, you say? WE HAVE IT ON VIDEO, FOOL!
"Is it Michael Brown?" he asks off camera. "Check on that." Fucker can't even remember his name!
He dares to bring up the shooting of Rayshard Brooks. "You don't know that was racism," he says.
Oh, really? Again, WE HAVE IT ON VIDEO! Yes, he struggled with the police officers. Yes, he wrestled a taser away from one of them. But then... he ran off! And the cop shot him IN THE BACK! Why? Shoot him in the goddamn leg! Better yet, let him go! It's just a drunk driving charge! You have his car. If he wants it back, he'll just have to come by the station! There was ZERO reason to shoot him!
And Dennis Prager can't tell whether that is racist?
"According to the Washington Post, the last year we have records for, 15 blacks were killed by police. 25 whites were killed."
Yeah, except we don't really have all the police reports, because most precincts don't provide that information at all. only about 5% of precincts report any numbers, and so claiming only 15 of anything based on so small a sample is utterly useless!
Argument #4, Microaggressions. "There is so little racism that we have to make up racist things when they're really not."
Yeah, he comes close to making a point, here. He cites the old chestnut, "The human race is the only race" is considered a racist phrase at the University of California. But I dealt with that in a previous blog post.
Argument #5, Immigration. Prager points out that the country most Africans want to immigrate to is the United States. "Whoa!" he says. "That's powerful stuff. Are they stupid?" Fine, except I dealt with that one in the same previous blog post as well. "Why would they move to a systemically racist country?" Because any opportunity in America is better than no opportunity in Nigeria, that's why. America is modern Rome, and everyone, not just Africans, wants to come here at some point. America is also easier to get into than any other country, Trumpism notwithstanding. Besides, style of speech really counts. If you don't think a cop is more likely to let a black man with an Ethiopian accent go than a black man with an inner city accent, you don't understand cops!
Prager argues against the idea that all whites are racist. I'm not going to even bother with this one. I'm white, and I'm anything but racist. But I will say this: every one of those Charlottesville Nazis would probably say they aren't racists, either. That's how racism manifests itself today. It disguises itself as something else, and makes many white people "buttheads." Meaning that they say, "I'm not a racist, BUT..." No, not all whites are racist, Praeger is actually right about that. But every white racist sure thinks he isn't!
Prager argues that "white privilege" doesn't exist. But he doesn't give any really good answer to that one. The fact that whites are not harassed the way blacks are in this country doesn't seem to cross the man's radar.
The video says some other things about gays and conservatives, Dennis talks about his dog for awhile (his dog is smarter than he is, in many ways), and talks about "if it bleeds it leads," but none of that is relevant to the main stuff I wanted to debunk. I choose to not waste my time on it.
In the meantime, if any of you down in Kenosha want to hurl a bottle Dennis Prager's way, I won't feel bad about it in the slightest.
Eric
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