Michael Richards' apology

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Transcript of entire apology:

http://evilbeet.blogspot.com/2006/11/br ... chael.html

My issue is with this statement:

"There’s a great deal of disturbance in this country and how black feel about what happened in Katrina, and, you know, many of the comics, many of performers are in Las Vegas and New Orleans trying to raise money for what happened there, and for this to happen, for me to be in a comedy club and flip out and say this crap, you know, I’m deeply, deeply sorry. And I’ll get to the force field of this hostility, why it’s there, why the rage is in any of us, why the trash takes place, whether or not it’s between me and a couple of hecklers in the audience or between this country and another nation..."

I'm kind of offended that he would speak have the nerve to speak for any of us like this. I don't have a problem with black people. I have a problem with how Bush and his crony at FEMA handled the situation. I don't think it's the blacks' fault. Moreover, I see this as a poor vs. not-poor problem in the country.... Not black and white.... What do you all think?

He isn't saying that.

The way I see it, he is blaming American society (of which I am a part) for his conduct. I know he doesn't live in a vaccuum and that his racist comments may be acceptable within his family or clique - something that I don't condone. If he were at my dinner table saying the n-word, he would very quickly find himself outside waiting for a cab. That's how things works in my neighborhood of society.

Blaming social problems for his tirade in his "apology" seems to indicate that he does not want to take personal responsibility for his racism. I think that at the very least he has opened the door for people interpreting his apology the same way I did. I don't know if this was intentional on his part - I doubt it was. The only thing that was unambiguous in his "apology" was that he was sorry for what this will do to his career.

He's not blaming American society, he's trying to show empathy by acknowledging the plight of black people

Yeah.

I can see that.

When I heard it, I thought that he was surprised that someone called him a racist for using the n-word despite all the hard work he and other comedians have done to raise money for the victims of Katrina. That seemed really insincere - but I know it's just my interpretation of it. Maybe I am trying to read to much into it.

One more thing about this - I read the apology right after watching the youtube of his tirade at the laugh factory. Here is the link to the video (I tried to embed it, but it didn't work out - maybe Alex can use his powers to embed it ):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UomfLKQr57U

Two things about this video. 0:04 into it, he says to the black person, "Shut up! 50 years ago we'd have you upside down with a f-ing fork up your [behind]." I interpret this as a lynching reference.

After spewing the n-word for several seconds, he proceeds to say the following at 0:27 into the video: "Alright, you see? This shocks you, it shocks you to see what is buried beneath you stupid motherf**ers." Originally, I interpreted this as him talking about what is buried beneath white people. In light of him using the word "we" to refer to who would have been lynching, I didn't think it was all that unreasonable to think that he was making another "us" vs "them" reference with blacks and whites.

I guess he could have been talking about what is buried beneath in himself. I don't know. But the fact that he started out this tirade with saying "we" would have been doing the presumed lynching made me interpret his whole tirade as him claiming to be speaking on behalf of "all" white people. This would include me, and I can say with no uncertainty that I do not share this view. Since I read his apology right after watching the tirade, I continued to project the assumption that he was trying to speak on the behalf of whites in his apology. Putting the two together, I don't think my interpretation is terribly unfair to him. I could see why you think I am way off about it, though, so I wanted to explain it a little better.

I felt that what he said was very hurtful and I think he did the right thing to apoligze. The thing is, when we are angry, we tend to say things that we really don't it. I do think he should be forgiven and that he has learned something out of that.