MSNBC Blogger Blames America For Whoopi’s Holocaust Hot Take

MSNBC blogger Ja’han Jones, who writes for host Joy Reid’s “The ReidOut” blog, claimed Wednesday that Whoopi Goldberg’s “false” statements about the Holocaust “said more about America” than they did about her.

.@thereidout Blog: Whoopi Goldberg's Holocaust ignorance said more about America than herhttps://t.co/Ew3dKwWZYX

— MSNBC (@MSNBC) February 3, 2022

“Goldberg said the Holocaust involved ‘two groups of white people’ and, thus, wasn’t about race but rather ‘man’s inhumanity to man.’ The remarks were false, but they also reveal the complexity of race in America and the trouble we can encounter in ascribing our nation’s rigid view of race to conflicts in other countries,” Jones wrote.

Jones went on to suggest that Adolf Hitler had “admired” the way racism had been infused into the legal system, he simply took things a step further in claiming that all other races were “inferior” to his proposed “master race” of Aryans — blonde, blue-eyed Germans.

“German Nazis certainly admired the way white Americans instituted racism into law. But they didn’t adopt America’s racial hierarchy at the time, a system in which an array of white people with varying eye and hair colors shared power over supposedly inferior ‘races’ of Black and brown people,” Jones continued.

Jones’ argument appeared to be that because many Americans today only see racism as varying shades of white vs. varying shades of brown and black, Goldberg should not be held responsible for misunderstanding the historical context of the comments she was making — ironically, in defense of teaching better, more accurate history to the next generation of students.

Goldberg, who has since been suspended by ABC for two weeks, said on Monday’s broadcast of “The View” that the Holocaust was “not about race.”

As The Daily Wire reported:

“If we’re going to do this, let’s be truthful about it because the Holocaust isn’t about race. No. It’s not about race,” Goldberg said.

“They considered Jews a different race,” Joy Behar pushed back.

“It’s not about race. It’s not about race,” Goldberg insisted.

“What is it about?” Behar asked.

“It’s about man’s inhumanity to man. That’s what it’s about,” Goldberg replied.

“But it’s about white supremacy,” Navarro objected. “It’s about going after Jews and gypsies —”

“But it’s not about —” Goldberg interrupted. “These are two white groups of people. How do we —”

“They came after black people too,” Behar pointed out, noting that the Nazis had not considered Jews to be “white” either.

“But you’re missing the point. You’re missing the point. The minute you turn it into race, it goes down this alley,” Goldberg was insistent. “Let’s talk about it for what it is. It’s how people treat each other. It’s a problem. It doesn’t matter if you are black or white because black, white, Jews, Italians, everybody eats each other.”

WATCH:

Sparks fly as The View panel confronts Whoopi after she says "the Holocaust isn't about race. No. It's not about race."
"Well, the considered Jews a different race," Joy Behar says.

"But it's about white supremacy. It's about going after Jews and Gypsies," Ana Navarro adds. pic.twitter.com/GZwZSi2qXi

— Nicholas Fondacaro (@NickFondacaro) January 31, 2022

Daily Wire editor emeritus Ben Shapiro called out Goldberg’s comments, saying that she was espousing a view of racism that was often used as a convenient cover for anti-Semitism.

“Whoopi Goldberg explaining that the Holocaust wasn’t about race because these were ‘two groups of white people’ isn’t just insipid, it’s insidious. It’s downplaying the minority status of Jews in order to uphold bulls*** intersectional arguments that justify anti-Semitism today,” Shapiro explained. “The intersectional argument is that Jews are white people, and that Jews are disproportionately successful thanks to ‘white supremacy.’ Because racism is ‘animus plus power,’ and Jews are powerful because they are white, anti-Semitism from non-white supremacists isn’t bigotry.”