Piers Morgan Defends ‘Love My Whiteness’ Tweet As Not ‘Remotely Racist’


Piers Morgan is in hot water again for a remark that he says isn’t racist at all. The former CNN journalist is the latest to respond to the Black Lives Matter movement in a way that activists say completely misses the point and demonstrates exactly why the effort exists. Only hours later, Morgan is tweeting frantically to prove that his tweet was not racist, and that there was nothing wrong with it.

It began when Deray McKesson, an activist at the center of the Black Lives Matter movement who was active during the protests in Ferguson, Missouri, tweeted something that is an oft-repeated sentiment in the movement.

Piers Morgan had interacted with Deray in an earlier series of tweets, in which Deray called Piers “loud and wrong” and “arrogant and privileged,” and Morgan argued that McKesson was being pompous.

Morgan apparently saw, in McKesson’s tweet about blackness, a chance to get back into the conversation and jumped right in.

Piers Morgan: I love my whiteness.
Within seconds, many people had jumped in to explain to Morgan that this conversation isn’t about him, and that his tweet gives the appearance of shoehorning his way in, refusing to allow the Black Lives Matter movement to be about people other than himself.

“Piers Morgan” began to trend on Twitter, and the journalist was getting an inordinate amount of feedback, which was largely negative. He found himself fighting to defend the words and insisting there was nothing wrong with the statement.

While numerous people tweeted to Piers to explain that Deray’s tweet was specifically addressed at a minority group, and that the problem with the journalist’s response was that it’s inappropriate to push into minority spaces and essentially attempt to rob a minority group of its own space and identity, Piers responded by retweeting people who agreed with him and supported his assertion that there was nothing wrong with the tweet.

Piers Morgan is glad someone agrees #BlackTwitter is unfair.

It’s a point the movement has addressed many times, as they’ve discussed people changing the #BlackLivesMatter hashtag to #AllLivesMatter and asked allies to allow black voices to lead the movement. At protests, leaders have made it clear that white voices aren’t unwelcome but shouldn’t be taking over in a movement that is about black equality.

The statement on the sign in the image above has been shared millions of times in various forms and memes.

“Yes, all lives matter, but we’re focused on the black ones right now, because it is very apparent that our judicial system doesn’t know that.”

While Piers’ statement wasn’t exactly the same one — he didn’t change the viral hashtag — activists point out that the sentiment is the same: rewording a statement from a minority group in order to make sure that he, despite being outside said group, becomes a part of the statement.

The journalist’s name continues to trend on Twitter as activists respond to the series of tweets, and Piers Morgan continues to deny that it was in any way out of line.

[Photo by Jeff Schear/Getty Images; Screenshots via Piers Morgan Twitter]

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