You are absolutely correct. What Juan Williams said was the classic example of bigotry. Could you please take some time and explain this to Jeffrey Goldberg?
And now I will get ten emails telling me how thoughtful Goldberg “normally” is…
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cleek
fuck Goldberg.
why does anyone pay any attention to him?
i know lots of people here feel the same way about Sullivan, but at least Sullivan can be counted on for interesting non-political stuff. Goldberg? who cares.
Persia
To hell with Goldberg, why does anyone pay attention to Juan WIlliams?
MikeJ
I wonder what Goldberg’s reaction would be if Williams had said, “but when I walk down the street, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in teabagger garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as teabaggers, I get worried. I get nervous.”
Fergus Wooster
Or Peretz – let’s not forget Sully’s mealy-mouthed apologia for the “Muslim life is cheap” episode.
Sully’s pathological blind-spots have been killing me lately.
My favorite was in one of his recent religion discussions, particularly of ressentiment being key to understanding Islam. He then went on to say breezily that this is a new concept to him, because ressentiment has never been a meaningful factor in Christianity.
Seriously.
Bullsmith
Hey if you can’t bash Muslims for no particular reason how are you supposed to run blanket cover for shoving them off their land?
david mizner
Yes, of course he was describing his own bigotry, and the problem was the context. He was citing his own bigotry to justify Bill O’s bigotry, and proudly so.
If he were merely owning up to it, and describing it with sadness, it would’ve been a different story. I’m thinking of Jesse Jackson famously saying:
It’s different not just because JJ’s black but because his sadness was clear.
NPR fired Williams, apparently. Has anti-Muslim bigotry finally become off-limits?
MikeJ
@Persia:
Because until today he was, “even the liberal Juan Williams.” Somebody who could be counted on to spew any sort of rightwing nonsense you wanted, but because he worked at NPR people assumed he was liberal.
Punchy
Let’s just rename this blog “The Atlantic II: Electric Sullivoo”
geg6
Who the fuck cares cares what that asshole Jeffrey Goldberg has to say? I have as much respect for and read him just as often as I do McMeghan. Which is, not at all.
OT, I found this hilarious link through my NASFAA newsletter today. I think the economy is the least of the reasons this idiot may have trouble finding a job:
http://www.bostonherald.com/news/regional/view.bg?articleid=1290088
Chuchundra
Oh goody. This blog hasn’t had a good dose of Goldberg haterade in a while. I guess the natives are restless.
Culture of Truth
What is muslim garb, anyway?
Hunter Gathers
@david mizner:
Everywhere except Fox News and the wingnut-o-sphere. And my grandmother’s house.
p.a.
It’s just natural, if I’m introduced to someone named Goldberg, it sounds Jewish to me and I make sure my wallet is secure. But I’m not an anti-Semite. Right Jeff?
Steve
Goldberg is right. Of course it would be okay for me to go on TV and say that I get nervous when I’m walking down the street and see a black person. That would be totally cool and not offensive or anything.
For a genuine wingnut take on this, I will quote my crazy Facebook friend (everybody should have one):
It’s always liberals making it about race, y’know? In a colorblind society, we’d all be free to talk about how people of a different color make us nervous.
eemom
not to defend Goldberg, but he did condemn that Pam whatzerface that y’all talk about not too long ago. And he did support the Burlington Coat mosque.
Also he wrote an interesting article about Fidel Castro that AFAIK wasn’t a veiled attempt to get the U.S. to bomb anybody.
Someone’s gotta keep things interesting around here. : )
Ash Can
@Chuchundra: Bigotry is rewarded with repeated kicks in the junk on this blog, regardless of who’s supplying the bigotry. It just so happens that Jeffrey Goldberg has it to spare.
david mizner
I have to admit, though, speaking of Goldberg.
When I get on the couch and turn on my TV, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in liberal hawk garb, garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as liberal hawks, I get worried. I get nervous.
Persia
@Steve: Because no Muslims pay taxes, ever.
Steve
@eemom: It would be too much work to say that Goldberg sometimes says really sharp things, which are worthy of praise, and sometimes says really dumb things, which are worthy of criticism. It’s much simpler to say he’s an idiot asshole who should be ignored altogether. Hopefully no one notices that the list of people who have never said a really dumb thing keeps getting shorter and shorter.
Culture of Truth
Openly carrying a gun to a Presidential event — now that’s what I call “distinctive garb”
Steve
@Persia: Of all the things to react to, you picked that line! Hehe.
Anton Sirius
@Culture of Truth:
Rachel Ray’s scarf, and a belt of dynamite.
Anton Sirius
@Ash Can:
I get nervous around commentators who obsess over the size of Jeffrey Goldberg’s junk.
norbizness
Is The Atlantic holding one of your pets hostage or something?
mds
OT, since (1) otherwise I would be tempted to go on at length about how thoughtful Goldberg “normally” is, and (2) it’s a Balloon Juice comment thread.
(Full NYT article observing that—Hold on to your hats, now—the Tea Party movement is full of proudly ignorant religious freaks.
Baron P. Hill is frequently a Blue Dog DINO poster child, so kudos to him on this. I confess I found some spare change under the couch cushions to send his way, though it probably won’t matter.
dmsilev
@p.a.:
Personally, if I’m introduced to someone named J. Goldberg, it sounds ideologically-hackish to me, and I make sure my brain is secure. Between Jeffrey and Jonah, I think I’m on safe ground for this particular prejudice…
dms
Ash Can
@Anton Sirius: LOL!
DougJ is the business and economics editor for Balloon Juice.
Goldberg and Sullivan have been at each other’s throats recently.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
At Time, Michael Crowley, who IIANM is an alum of both The Atlantic and TNR, is also Very Concerned.
Gin & Tonic
@Ash Can: OT, but how exactly did
this sort of thing enter the lexicon? I happen to be somewhat fond of my external genitalia, and wouldn’t refer to them as “junk.”
Crusty Dem
@Culture of Truth:
Actually an excellent question and one that I think will enlighten us regarding Williams’ issues. I don’t really know, I’m pretty sure Williams must piss himself when a Sikh steps on his plane.
But using what we learned on September 11th, “muslim garb” consists of a clean shaven, short-haired man wearing a suit and tie. And taken as such, I have to agree with Juan, those people scare the shit out of me..
Jim
That’s a pretty low standard for bigotry, in my view. Probably everyone has an experience where they crossed to the other side of the street or quickened their step when they saw certain types of folks out at dusk. Whether that is a logical reaction is wholly separate from whether it is a first instinct. Good on Williams to admit that this is what he feels–where he erred was in using it as a righteous justification, as if it was something to be proud of and use as a rationale for other acts of bigotry.
Williams is a Caddellian liberal, so anything that removes him further from the discourse is fine by me, but on the merits this is a pretty weak tea firing. The only story here is the hypocrisy of the right, which was predictable and is tiresome already–and it’s only 10:30 A.M.
Persia
@Steve: But it’s a symptom of the greater disease! They’re not really human or citizens or taxpayers, they’re just Horrible Bogeymen we must Fear.
Sentient Puddle
@Gin & Tonic: I’ve been hearing “junk” since at least as far back as high school. It’s been around a while.
Ross Hershberger
I have to wonder if the camel’s back at NPR wasn’t already pretty well loaded and this was the straw. They can’t have been happy about contributors with important positions whoring on Fox as well.
It will be interesting to see how they replace him.
Ross Hershberger
Oh, and predictably, Saletan’s comparing him to Shirley Sherrod. Wonderful.
Mutant Poodle
NPR (especially people who worked in their news division) has had issues with Williams’s relationship with Fox News for years.
Williams is an incredibly bland, unoriginal and not terribly insightful analyst, and while I can argue both sides on the Williams AND Sanchez firings, my guess is his dismissal had less to do with Williams’s recent idiotic comments than with a trail of idiocy over which NPR couldn’t reasonably sever their relationship with him.
Of course, Williams’s Fox News cred just soared, and he’ll be Bill O’s #1 “liberal” bff going forward.
Ross Hershberger
@Mutant Poodle:
I hope he likes sleeping in that bed, because he made it. Lie down with dogs…
Persia
@Ross Hershberger: Man, every time I think I couldn’t hate him more, he surprises me.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Mutant Poodle:
Bichon frisé fluffer? Is that the new “lapdog”?
vg
@MikeJ:
I wonder what Goldberg’s reaction would be if Williams had said, “but when I walk down the street, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in teabagger garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as teabaggers, I get worried. I get nervous.”
lol, kossacks. “If I don’t like what he has to say, it’s because he’s a right winger and a teabagger or neoconservative or whatever the alternate form of the word ‘conservative’ is this year.”
Goldberg is just an unconditional Israel advocate. I don’t like him either, but it’s not because he’s a right winger.
Gin & Tonic
@Sentient Puddle:
I haven’t, so I suspect I was in high school a lot longer ago than you. When I was in high school, a kick in the balls was known as a kick in the balls.
New Yorker
Leaving the bigotry aside for a moment, look at Williams’ statement again:
He’s got it exactly ass-backwards. See, when I’m on a plane or the subway and I see someone in traditional Muslim garb, I immediately think, “that person is obviously not up to something sinister because he or she is not trying to conceal their Muslim identity from idiots like Juan Williams.”
Was Mohammed Atta wearing traditional Muslim attire? No, he was trying to blend in to make it easier to carry out his mission.
aimai
@Ross Hershberger:
I’m so pissed that NPR couldn’t summon up the intelligence to fire Williams for simply appearing on Fox because it is a competitor and an abysmal anti news organization. They are really too stupid to pour piss out of a boot. They waited until Williams and Fox could make this into a free speech issue? And, of course, if you felt that you had to fire him over this specific issue why not come right out and say:
Now I know NPR is really liberal because they couldn’t help themselves, they had to shoot themselves in the foot or score an own goal instead of throwing a knock out punch–see if I care that I’m mixing my metaphors.
aimai
p.a.
@Crusty Dem:
Sikhs who have been beaten/threatened can probably give us a definition of what is thought to be muslim garb.
But I believe the sine qua non of a Muslim wardrobe is a dusky complexion.
Dennis SGMM
Why is is that the “distinctive garb”of Muslims gets mentioned often while the sartorial distinctions of the Teabaggers and outfits like the Hutaree Militia go unremarked?
kindness
At least with Sully you can e-mail him via a link on the page. I have and he’s answered me several times.
But Goldberg must know he pushes shit too often to take the risk of getting e-mail.
It’s sad, replace the word ‘Muslim’ with the word ‘Jew’ in Juan Williams ill advised statement and Jeffrey Goldberg would be leading the charge to stone him to death.
Larkspur
@DougJ is the business and economics editor for Balloon Juice.: At each other’s throats? Well, why can’t they be useful about it, put on some sumo garb, oil up, locate a mud field, and televise it. Jonah Goldberg can officiate, and in the end, they turn on him, et voila, a trio of mud pundits. Mudnits. If the the conflict is monetized, who could rationally object? But all they do is scribble and whine. It’s time for them to mud up. Put on their mud pants.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
@Mutant Poodle:
Which makes him no different that Cokie, well other than his gender, his race and the fact I doubt Cokie sexually harrassed a crapload of employees at one of her previous jobs.
Oh wait, she’s never had a real previous job.
Nevermind.
Ross Hershberger
Muslims from the Middle East are a large minority around here. 0.5 miles from my house is a row of shops with signs only in Arabic. And I’m in a ‘Jewish’ neighborhood.
Still, the appearance of someone in traditional Middle Eastern Muslim clothing is rare enough to draw attention. Mostly, they look like everyone else, but maybe a little more fashionable if they’re single. I worked at a high end department store, and could count on our customers of Middle eastern descent to know more than we did about fashion.
So what does a Muslim look like, Juan?
Catsy
@Steve:
Probably because it takes a lot of effort to persuasively make a counterfactual argument.
Culture of Truth
I’d like to see Iott try to board a plane dressed as an SS Officer.
Culture of Truth
I’d like to see Iott try to board a plane dressed as an SS Officer.
J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford
@New Yorker:
Good point.
SIA
Since the tag is “Assholes” this may not be too far OT. Devotees of AquaBuddha’s website.
And when can we get “Put on your man-pants” as a tag line?
Joseph Nobles
@New Yorker: Excellent point. Wearing “Muslim garb” on an airplane these days could be considered the equivalent of sitting at a white’s only lunch counter in the 1950’s.
El Tiburon
Facist and racist liberal NPR keeping the Black Man down while smearing him by taking his words out of context.
Thank God Fox News keeps the Liberty FIres a’burnin!
jurassicpork
Check out my first VR blog post, courtesy of Xtranormal.com.
geg6
@Steve:
Unfortunately for Jeffrey Goldberg, it’s the ratio that’s the problem. And his ratio on good things v. bad things is heavily weighted on the bad things side. Which makes him too idiotic for me to bother with, let alone defend.
wilfred
I actually read Goldberg’s comment; he wrote:
Priceless, really.
At least Juan will continue as the token Negro at Fox.
Nick
I don’t think that admitting one gets nervous among ethnically different people makes one a bigot. Quite the contrary, I think people who claim they are color blind, or who have no anxiety with people who are outside their own group are either unaware or lying.
A bigot takes this anxiety to another level. A bigot takes conscious and willful steps to prosecute his/her prejudices, into active discrimination.
Prejudice–preconceived notions and feelings about different groups of people–is not bigotry. It’s unfortunate, but it’s not bigotry.
Punchy
Teatard bozo clowning on fellow teatard clowns.
Did the apockylapse happen and nobody told me?
Nick
A bigot is a person obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices, especially one exhibiting intolerance, irrationality, and animosity toward those of differing beliefs. The predominant usage in modern American English refers to persons hostile to those of differing race, ethnicity, nationality, sexual orientation, various mental disorders, or religion.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bigotry
I think that association with Fox News or the Republican Party is fair evidence that one is a bigot, in that both promote intolerance. But merely saying seeing Muslims on a plane makes one anxious, by itself, does not make one a bigot.
Kryptik
One of the things about this is that…people are focusing on Williams’ ‘I get scared when Muslims are on a plane’ part, without recognizing his explicit agreement with O’Reilly and the other Faux News folks about how we should all be scared of all Muslims, since this is a literal War Against Islam. It’s not the ‘I’m scared when they’re close to me part’ as it is the blanket ‘Yes, we are all against Muslims, since all Muslims are against us’ bullshit he endorses, whether he means to or not.
maus
@Nick:
ornery curmudgeon
Oh, yeah. Sullivan said something.
Yeah. Thanks for the info. What a find.
sneezy
@Jim:
“Probably everyone has an experience where they crossed to the other side of the street or quickened their step when they saw certain types of folks out at dusk.”
I can tell you with certainty that you are wrong about that.
(Note: It’s always safe to speak for yourself, and never safe to presume to speak for others.)