New York Times and racism – a portrait of hypocrisy

“Hating people because of their color is wrong. And it doesn't matter which color does the hating. It's just plain wrong.” 

-          Muhammad Ali

It has become increasingly clear of late that the once august New York Times is a publication living off the glories of its past. The latest hiring of one Sarah Jeong to the NYT’s editorial board is another example of the regression of the old publication.

Ms Jeong has drew the ire of many for her Twitter posts such as:

“Oh man it’s kind of sick how much joy I get out of being cruel to old white men”

“#cancelwhitepeople”

“Dumbass fucking white people marking up the internet with their opinions like dogs pissing on fire hydrants.”

In defence of Jeong, the NYT released a statement which suggested that her seemingly spiteful tweets were simply a ‘parody of the hate she has received online as an Asian woman.’

If they are parody, needless to say she is unlikely to be a contender of the Modern Day Oscar Wilde Competition. However, even applying the principle of charity (quite thickly it must be spread, given the sheer volume and consistency of her almost pathological obsession with attacking ‘white people’) to say that each one of the many anti-white tweets was meant as parody, one cannot help but notice the glaring hypocrisy applied by NYT.

I would first like to say that NYT has the right to hire Jeong. I rather resent the firing of people for social outrage generated by old tweets i.e. James Gunn, director of Guardians of the Galaxy, fired for his unfunny jokes on rape and pederasty – one sad side-effect of social media is that a person is frequently judged by their lowest moment, often when they are in their teens or early 20’s, drunk or simply ignorant. Some of Jeong’s tweets under scrutiny were made several years ago and, for all we know, she may have changed her perspectives (not that there is any evidence of this). What is glaringly however is the inconsistency of principle applied by NYT and other media outlets as well as a tedious attempt by a certain type of leftists to redefine racism so that it is ok when people ‘on their side’ express it.

In May this year, Roseanne Barr, titular actor of the popular sitcom “Roseanne” had her ABC show cancelled after making a racist slur on Twitter against Valerie Jarrett, a black woman who was a former advisor for Obama. She called Jarrett the offspring of the “muslim brotherhood & planet of the apes.” Barr later defended herself by saying that 1) it was a joke (rather embarrassingly low-brow, especially for a comedian), 2) that she didn’t know Ms Jarrett was black, but rather “a Jew or a Persian” (showing that Ms Barr can be unintentionally funny), and 3) that when she made the tweet, she was drunk and on Ambien.

The NYT, like many other leftist media outlets, were unanimously agreed on the righteousness of ABC’s sacking of Barr (e.g. this piece). This is without considering that she might indeed be making a bad joke on a drunken night, or taking into account whether it is fair or proportionate that scores of people working on the show, including her co-stars, script writers, the stage hands and many more, lost their jobs through no fault of their own. And this for a racist slur against one person, not a whole chunk of society. There were no op-eds suggesting Barr was taken literally when she clearly meant it as a joke. Or that she herself is a Jew. One reason might be because Barr is an outspoken conservative operating in the realm when most of the media outlets, such as NYT, are not. The difference in the way that NYT has responded to Jeong versus Barr highlights the dangerous political partisanship that obfuscate principles – something especially dangerous to see in journalists. For this blatant moral relativism, which the left has been increasingly unable to hide, trust in the media has quite naturally corroded to its lowest point yet.

Christopher Hitchens brilliantly defined racism as, not discrimination, as most people seem to think, but an inability to discriminate. In other words, racists are those who cannot see past skin colour and categorise all people according to skin pigmentation rather than their individuality, thoughts and ideas. Mutatis mutandis, what’s sauce for the goose is also sauce for the gander. Imaging the outrage from the same outlets defending Jeong if she was a white man saying what she says about black people. 

Indeed, as if to prove the hypocrisy of the regressive left, and highlight its own confusion about the race issue, when Candice Owen, a young, black woman, tweeted out some of Jeong's tweets, substituting 'white' for 'black' or 'Jew', while making it clear she is making a point about Jeong's racism, Owen was suspended by Twitter for 12hrs. Meanwhile Jeong has never been suspended.

There is a segment of the extreme left however, who are trying to redefine racism as ‘prejudice plus power’ and hence to mitigate racism espoused from minorities on their side of political debate and defend the sort of vile language used by Jeong. They suggest that racism is not racism if the people propounding it are not from a ‘community’ with power because they cannot act upon their prejudice as the society is not infused with ‘systemic’ racism of their ilk. Putting aside for a moment that Asian Americans are the highest earners by quite some margin, the sheer stupidity of this argument can be dealt with thusly: would a person who is prejudiced against the Chinese, say, and who calls them ‘Chinks’ and so forth, not be a racist if they did it in China, where they are not the majority and where anti-Chinese sentiments are not systemic? 

One way this inability of the left in general to introspect and self-criticise is reflected in how few people on the left are willing to stand out and say that Jeong’s comments are, apparent to the meanest of intellects, pretty abhorrent and racist. Andrew Sullivan, with whom I have many disagreements, but who is I think genuine and consistent, wrote a good piece in the New York Magazine. Sullivan has been criticised by many leftist outlets including this typically weak one from Salon, whose editorial staff apparently cannot distinguish between intellectual arguments backed with data and nasty racist slurs.

Shockingly, when a NYT writer, Elizabeth Williams, tweeted out a mild reprimand against Jeong, she was forced to delete the tweet and apologise. Meanwhile, no apologies have been forthcoming from Jeong for continuously insulting a whole race of her fellow Americans using the most crass language. Instead, a formerly prestigious newspaper saw fit to give her a job on the editorial board.

It is rather sad that the NYT cannot apply the by now rather self-evident rule of judging people not by their hue but by their thoughts and actions. Rather, they have become entrenched in neo-Marxist identity politics, forsaking decency and common sense. They say the fish rots from the head – with additions like Ms Jeong to the editorial board, the NYT is looking to decay ever faster.

“To cheapen the lives of any group of men, cheapens the lives of all men, even our own. This is a law of human psychology, or human nature. And it will not be repealed by our wishes, nor will it be merciful to our blindness.” 

-          William Pickens