This might be the most stunning one minute video I’ve seen.
The Republican Co-Majority Leader of the Oklahoma House of Representatives casually apologized yesterday for casually using an antisemitic slur during a debate on a bill to repeal an old law prohibiting retailers from selling their items at a loss.
[…]
“[Customers] might try to Jew me down on the price,” Johnson added. “That’s fine. You know what? That’s free market as well.”
After it was pointed out to him that the phrase “to Jew down” might be considered offensive by, say, Jewish people, Johnson half-heartedly apologized.
“I apologize to the Jews,” he said, to laughter from his colleagues in the House. “They’re good small business men as well.”
It’s worth noting that there isn’t a single Jewish member in either house of the Oklahoma Legislature.
Reached for comment by the Tulsa World, Joe Griffin, spokesperson for Speaker of the House T.W. Shannon (R-Lawton), said Johnson “is not the first person to make a comment they regret. The chamber accepted his apology and has moved on.”
You watch and tell me if he’s actually apologizing here, seconds after using a slur and learning from a slip of paper someone hands to him that it is, in fact, offensive to use such a slur.
Oh, I’ll just tell you: He isn’t apologizing. He doesn’t care in the least. It’s actually funny to him. His colleagues, you’ll note, are laughing too.
HT: Michael Tofias.
[Cross-posted at my blog]
Rep. Don Young (R-AK) on Thursday night stood by his use of a racial slur to describe Latinos, saying that he “meant no disrespect” when he told an Alaska radio interviewer, “We used to hire 50 to 60 wetbacks to pick tomatoes”:
“During a sit down interview with Ketchikan Public Radio this week, I used a term that was commonly used during my days growing up on a farm in Central California,” Young said in the statement. “I know that this term is not used in the same way nowadays and I meant no disrespect.”
This is a terrible apology in no small part because it’s not an apology at all. It’s also a terrible apology because it doesn’t make any sense.
Young isn’t sorry for using a racial slur and disrespecting people. He’s not even sorry that people felt disrespected by what he regards as a simply miscommunication. He simply insists that everyone used the word “wetbacks” without any ill intent back when he was younger and, though it has apparently now become a racial slur, he didn’t mean it that way.
It’s hard to imagine how Young “meant no disrespect” if he knows “that this term is not used in the same way nowadays.” What’s more, the fact that the term was commonly used when he was younger in no way suggests that it was less disrespecful back then. It was equally disrespecful and people are less inclined to casually toss it around today than they were then because, generally, people want at the very least to seem more respectful of others than Young apparently does.
Mitt Romney, apologizing for leading his prep school classmates in an assault on a student they thought was gay. Did we say “apologizing”? Maybe that’s not the right word.
From Mother Jones.
George Zimmerman unexpectedly apologized to Trayvon Martin’s family in court today.
Almost certainly, Zimmerman is being honest in what he said to the family of his victim. it would be difficult not to feel sorry for shooting and killing someone, and not solely because of the terrible consequences for Zimmerman himself. But that doesn’t mitigate how badly the apology was done. A good apology would be the first sentence. “I wanted to say I am very sorry for the loss of your son.” Full stop.
Moving forward, attempting to explain why he shot Martin, does no one any good. It doesn’t help the family and it doesn’t help Zimmerman. Nor does it actually explain the shooting. Leaving aside the jurisprudential issues (as Zimmerman’s defense likely hinges, at least in part, on whether or not he had reason to believe that Martin was armed), would Zimmerman feel less sorry if Martin had been older? Would the family’s loss be lessened if Martin had been closer in age to Zimmerman? Certainly not.
It is almost always the case that less is more when it comes to making an apology.
Click here for more excerpts from George Zimmerman’s apology to Trayvon Martin’s parents, prosecutor’s questions.
