What a week.
Joy Reid's hatred of LGBTs makes the news but most rush to defend her.
And I happen to catch THE RACHEL DIVIDE on NETFLIX.
This is a documentary about a subject I really didn't tune into in real time. Maybe you did?
Rachel Dolezal was president of the NAACP's Spokane chapter and taught African studies. Her world came crashing down when a number of people out to get her (her brother whom their sister was suing for assault as well as a police chief who hated Dozlezal for calling out the force) exposed the fact that she was born White.
She lost her jobs. She was publicly ridiculed. There was a mass pile on.
Which is why you won't find her name at this website until now. (She has actually changed her legal name.) We don't take part in the pile ons.
Watching THE RACHEL DIVIDE, I felt tremendous sympathy for her.
This is her story as I see it -- this was not told as such in the documentary. She grew up in an abusive family. Her White parents idealized her White brother while treating her and the African-American children they adopted in an abusive manner.
To me, that's key to understanding what she did. She was rejecting abuse and rejecting any identification with her abusers. This led her to identify Black.
I do get it. I do understand it. I'm not saying it's 'normal' but I am saying it is understandable.
And I don't understand the hate.
No, she should not have tried to speak for African-American women.
But in terms of her identifying as Black?
I felt like she was kicked out of a family she only wanted to be part of. That makes me very sad. There are enough people who hate me because of my skin color. That someone who, for whatever reason, wanted to identify as Black was held up to ridicule for this really bothers me.
I'm also hated by some because I'm gay.
Which brings me to Joy Reid. She expressed hatred of gays and trans people. She expressed disgust with how we have sex. She wouldn't see BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN because of her disgust -- did she think BROKEBACK was a porno? It's got the same amount of sex you'd find between a man and a woman in any film for adults. But that was just too much for Joy Reid.
She 'apologized.'
Uh, no, she did not.
She first lied and said she was hacked. Then, on Saturday, she apologized for her anti-trans remarks about Ann Coulter (who is not transgendered). She did not apologize for her hateful remarks about gays. She said she's not sure she wrote them. That's not an apology.
She's disgusting and vile. A hate merchant. By contrast Rachel Dolezal did what she did out of love. I'd have no problem sitting down at a table with Dolezal but I will never break bread with someone like Reid.