White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest defended comedian Larry Wilmore on Monday after the black comedian called Obama “my nigga” at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner.
Earnest called the performance a tough job and said that the President himself “appreciated” Wilmore’s sentiments.
“I think the first thing that I would observe is that any comedian who signed up to follow President Obama at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner is assuming one of the most difficult tasks in comedy,” Earnest said at his daily media briefing. “Just by the nature of the engagement—that’s a tough job following the President of the United States.”
Wilmore said at the end of his speech on Saturday night that he had a “humble appreciation” for the significance of Obama’s presidency, noting what it once meant to be black in the United States.
“A black man was thought by his mere color not good enough to lead a football team—and now, to live in your time, Mr. President, when a black man can lead the entire free world, words alone do me no justice,” Wilmore said. “So, Mr. President, if I’m going to keep it 100: Yo, Barry, you did it, my nigga. You did it.”
When a reporter asked Earnest if he thought Wilmore crossed the line by calling Obama “the n-word,” Earnest said that it wasn’t the first time a comedian’s performance at the correspondents’ dinner had made headlines.
“(Obama) said that he appreciated the spirit of the sentiments that Mr. Wilmore expressed,” Earnest said. “I’m confident that Mr. Wilmore used the word by design. He was seeking to be provocative. But I think any reading of his comments makes clear he was not using the President as the butt of a joke.”
Wilmore has received criticism from political leaders and commentators, including from Rev. Al Sharpton, who said Wilmore’s remark was made in “poor taste.”
People should just lighten up. I am sure Obama wasn’t offended and understood all the while knowing the Press (whom Obama disdains with reason) would make a big f’ng deal out of it. I am glad Josh addressed it. Let’s move one from all this faux outrage from folks in the media and especially from racist republicans
“When a reporter asked Earnest if he thought Wilmore crossed the line by calling Obama “the n-word,” Earnest said that it wasn’t the first time a comedian’s performance at the correspondents’ dinner had made headlines.”
WHO? Stop protecting them. Was it Ed Henry? I bet it was Ed Henry. That smirking douche could piss me off just by breathing in my proximity, and this smells like the typical play for poutrage from the conservatives…“how come they get to say it and we don’t…hypocrisy hypocrisy…where’s the outrage at Wilmore for calling the POTUS the n-word?”, which roughly translates to “I’m a white racist fucknut who is pissed off that I don’t get to drop n-bombs anymore, particularly because having one of them in the WH really REALLY made me want to start using that word again all the time.”
A black man dropping the N-word is just so much worse than a Kentucky Confederate war memorial not being torn down because the latter celebrates everyday use of the word by white slaveowners and in normal white discourse that offends mere black people while the former is just plain offensive for white people to have to hear.
Do we not have better things to worry about?
(And why am I spending time reading this story and replying to it?)
As someone who has a first hand experience with a different form of racism, anti-semitism, I think that level of scrutiny should be different for jokes made by a member of the discriminated minority and even a well meaning member of the majority. Each potentially racially charged joke should be judged in context and a large part of the context is the person making the joke. A black (or jewish or choose your minority) comedian is allowed much more latitude with the black (jewish, choose your minority) jokes using racially charged terms. While it is not really up to me to judge, I do not think that was in poor taste (in fact it was very complimentary to both the president and the progress the country made on the equality front).
Interestingly in his own speech Obama made a very relevant comment regarding CPT (though in recent CPT controversy I had no problem with de Blasio’s joke given the context as well as his family situation; but once again while I believe there were not many objections from the black community – it is not up to me to judge).