A state lawmaker from Indiana insists he’s absolutely positively not racist after he posted a blatantly racist meme to social media.
Republican Rep. Jim Lucas, who once proposed the state stop issuing marriage licenses altogether in an effort to combat same-sex marriage, shared the meme on his personal Facebook page earlier this week.
The meme depicted a group of Black children dancing along with the caption, “We gon’ get free money!”
A backlash quickly ensued, with many criticizing Lucas not just for the image, but for writing in ebonics.
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Lucas, who has been a member of the Indiana House of Representatives since 2012, responded to the criticism in another Facebook post, this time saying the world had “lost it’s mind” and he was simply “bored and made several memes.”
“I used this STOCK PHOTO of a little boy dancing and celebrating because the government is handing out free money, to everyone, regardless of their skin color,” he wrote.
Then he tried flipping the blame onto his critics.
“I phrased it in a celebratory way and have danced and mocked things in that exact same manner myself,” he wrote. “I’m white. But hey, it’s a picture of a black kid so I guess that makes it different, WHICH IF YOU THINK THAT WAY, IS THE VERY DEFINITION OF RACISM!!!!!!”
WOW, the world has officially lost it’s mind!I was bored last night and made several memes on imgflip.com, essentially…
Posted by Jim Lucas on Tuesday, May 12, 2020
He followed that up with a second post in which he copied and pasted the Merriam Webster Dictionary definition of the word “racism” then posted a lengthy argument as to why he doesn’t fit that definition.
“I recently used a picture of a happy, cute, cocky kid dancing and celebrating to make a humorous meme mocking the government’s destruction of our economy,” Lucas wrote.
He continued, “There was ZERO intent of racism, I simply found the little kid cute and knew it was a well known picture. It’s. That. Simple. To me, to NOT use a picture SPECIFICALLY because of someone’s skin color is the very definition of racism, based on my beliefs and the above definition of racism.”
rac·ism/?r??siz?m/noun1.prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against a person or people on the basis of…
Posted by Jim Lucas on Wednesday, May 13, 2020
As a general rule of thumb, if you ever find yourself having to explain why something you did or said wasn’t racist, it’s usually a pretty good indicator that it was.
Also, rather than consulting the dictionary for help in resolving the matter, a better strategy is to just say you’re sorry and then do better in the future.
This isn’t the first time Lucas has posted something racist on social media either. Last August, he posted a picture of nooses under a Facebook story about a black man pleading guilty to rape. He also said that wasn’t racist.
Related: Gay mayor insists he’s not racist despite making racist remarks, says his brother-in-law is Asian
Cam
This is why all of those right wing troll accounts that consistently come in here and try to drive a wedge between the LGBT community and racial minorities aren’t that successful.
Whatever our problems, we know that if someone is anti-LGBT they’re most likely a racist, and if they are a racist, they most likely hate us too.
I love how when racists get got doing something obviously racist, they become such cowards and scream “How can anyone think that this very racist thing I just did was racist?!?”
He knew what he was doing, his constituents, and the people who support him knew what he was doing. He just didn’t expect to get called out on it. The scum.
PLAYS WELL WITH OTHERS
“I recently used a picture of a happy, cute, coccky kid”
Anyone wanna lay odds he actually has pictures of happy, cute kids coccks??
curiobi
Is he being serious, he found that kid cute, sure Jan.
And so no other image on the entire internet showed joyful dancing, just an almost naked dark skinned child?
And the stereotypical slang? -Oh he uses it himself, and also dances nearly naked, in blackface I am assuming, using his clan hat as a makeshift thong.
Delrio
I’m from Indiana. Yes, this was racist. He’s a fool and an idiot to not be aware of that fact. I apologize for the trove of morons that seem to be emerging from the lower half of my wonderful state.
theafricanwiththemouth
While i don’t give a rats aš? how this “meme” is perceived regarding this homophobic individual, i must point out that this photo is very popular amongst African (Nigerian especially) memes and it’s captions are always meant to insinuate excess happiness or jubilation over whatever.
The kids in the photo are dancing and
ARE happy.
You can say whatever you want about this guy (i don’t care if he’s perceived as racist), but the photo on its own has always been for exaggerated joyous emphasis.
I’m stating this because, white people especially, in the act of swooping in to reprimand this guy will inadvertently say racist things specifically about a photo that they have no clue about and possibly view as “strange looking”. Watch your mouths, that’s all!!
theafricanwiththemouth
To clarify, it’s most likely racist because it’s a white guy who could have selected ANY PHOTO IN THE WORLD to use to pass his message across, but chose a photo of african kids dancing and playing with sand.
But for those wanting to swoop in and reprimand, watch your mouths (same goes for you weird queerty editors/writers!), simple.
Raymundo
I think the outrage is more about the choice of words and the idea of black people loving welfare or free money. Its much less an insult towards Africans more of an insult to poor black Americans.
Jim
A cracker
Tombear
So what black people call each other the N word all the time. So if a black person made the meme it’s OK?