I’m sorry Mark, but it’s one or the other. ether you believe it isn’t your place to speak on hate crimes against minorities that you aren’t a part of, or you don’t, but the fact that you chose this topic to brake your silence on and in this way speaks volumes.
“death to all jews” isn’t a joke (and you wanna talk “respect”? how about respecting jews? do jews not count as people in need of respect? cause lemme tell ya, “death to all jews” or “death to” any oppressed minority is beyond disrespectful), and the fact that he even for a second thought to do that tells us everything we need to know about him as a person, and the fact that you think it’s ok to even refer to it as a joke says a lot about you as well (and don’t think I didn’t notice the way you changed your voice, made it deeper, and used the volume and tone to intimidate us into not speaking out. hate to break it to ya but that only works irl).
Mark wants to insist that no matter how bad a person someone is, we must treat them with respect, and basic human decency.
tell me Mark, do you think this man will treat us with the same respect that you’re demanding we treat him and those like him?
you say “we’re ether all people who deserve respect or we’re not” and let me make it clear if that image isn’t enough: he thinks we are not, and openly talks about genocide, as nonchalantly as we talk about removing mosquitoes from the planet.
you say “we must take the high road”, and claim it’s hard because it’s “lonely”.
I’m sorry Mark, but it isn’t “hard” because it’s “lonely”, it’s impossible because doing so will result in our deaths. (and btw? what you’re doing here isn’t “the high road” that’s taken a lot of courage to take. it is, in fact, incredibly cowardly)
it is extremely easy to blow us off when you aren’t the one being targeted, when you aren’t the one being dehumanized and treated like a pest in need of extermination.
you aren’t the one scared to go to your place of worship because today could be the day it’s bombed with you in it. you aren’t the one scared walking down the street because today could be the day a police officer decides you’re a threat. you aren’t the one scared to hold the hand of your significant other (let alone kiss) because today could not only be the day that you yourself and your partner are murdered, but that show of affection could be the thing that sets off someone to then go and massacre your community.
if we lived in a world without bigotry, particularly this kind of wildly unchecked racism, maybe. maybe this could be a statement to listen to, or at least think about.
but until men in power stop debating my humanity and wondering how to best rid me from existence, along with everyone else deemed less than human, this could not be more ignorant, silencing, and actively helpful for men like richard spencer.
I want to reiterate something I was having a hard time putting into words last night.
the biggest problem I have with this, is how victim blaming it is.
he targets the entire message at the victims speaking out. he completely glossed over the actions of pewdiepie and focused the entire video on the message that “no matter how bad the person is, they deserve respect”
yet at no point did he call out bigots and tell them “no matter what you think of any minority, they are still human and deserving of respect”
he never addressed anyone besides those calling out bigotry.
and that’s where the problem really lies.
had this been a “hey nazis, jews are people too and deserving of respect, and hey jews nazis are still people too and deserving of respect” I’d have a lot less issue with this message. there’d still be some fucked up things in need of addressing, but at least then truly the intent would have been..at least there would have been an attempt at something good.
but instead this entire video is “hey jews, nazis are people too and deserving of respect” period, end of statement, all while using curse words and volume and clearly barely restrained anger (and everyone knows how violent and dangerous an angry man is).
that is the biggest reason this message is such a mess, and really shows where Mark’s actual morals lie.
