Poor Alexander Britton "Brit" Hume. He was born a white man who went to a high-end prep school and is 77 years old. He used to be a journalist but then went to work for Fox News, and now he is very upset about how the world is changing.
Listen to his conversation with Ben Domenech aka Mr. Meghan McCain. Ben says we are asking people who just want to be good neighbors to be courageous and "answer for everything their ethnicity involves." After all, they're not celebrities! How are normal people supposed to handle all these demands for justice?
Brit Hume explains that the nation used to be really racist, but since the civil rights movement, everything's fixed! What's the big deal? You protester kids, get off my lawn!
"We're seeing the erosion of our institutions, the erosion of our traditions, we're seeing, as Joe Biden again tonight, our entire justice system called into question by the suggestion that justice for people like George Floyd and other victims is rare. It is not rare. It is common! Injustice is what's uncommon," he insists.
"So we need as a nation, and as a people, to respond to this. I can't believe, Ben, as a matter of politics, there won't be a huge backlash against this cry that we're a racist nation and a racist people. Hearing that over and over again, all the time from all quarters, or from too many quarters, that there won't be a backlash against that in elections to come.
"We'll see. But I suspect it's coming."
Of course you see it coming, Brit. You work for Fox News! White resentment is your company's business model!
Look, I understand that white people do feel kind of beleaguered with all this talk of systemic racism. The rhetoric can be overblown, and many of them wonder, "What did I ever do?" But it's healthy that there's now a national conversation! I mean, it's good that white people are starting to realize that white privilege doesn't mean you got something extra. It means that you don't have the extra obstacles Black people have!
Ultimately, here's what it boils down to. When I get stopped by a cop, or when my kids get stopped by cops, they're not in existential fear for their lives. If you're Black, you are. This is a systemic problem. That's what systemic racism is, Brit.
My entire neighborhood (which was burned and looted twice last year) was completely boarded up in anticipation of of a "not guilty" verdict. Helicopters were hovering here, waiting for the verdict to be announced.
So my question to you, Brit, is that if injustice is so damned uncommon, why on earth, in light of the copious evidence even by his fellow officers that Derek Chauvin murdered George Floyd, did everyone assume he'd get off? Why did store owners spend all that money to board up their stores?
Because they knew the odds.