Enough with the Hoodies

The Trayvon Martin shooting was never about “hoodies.” I own a hoodie, for god’s sake, and I’m a chubby 46-year-old white dude. In the rush to create a false racist meme about the Trayvon shooting, though, leftist activists decided to designate hoodies as a metaphor for supposed “violence against young black men.” A Daily Beast headline promised to patiently explain to us at the end of March: How a garment rooted in weekend athleticism became the complicated symbol for our country’s moral outrage and racial unease.

There was a spate of hoodie avatars on Twitter. Congressman Bobbie Rush got reprimanded for wearing a hoodie on the House floor, and even a Million Hoodie March was held–an event that I estimate was approximately 998,990 hoodies short of its goal. Important side note here: many people think the hoodie meme started with Geraldo Rivera chiming in. However the date of the Million Hoodie March was March 21 and Geraldo didn’t speak on the subject until two days later.

To repeat, however: THIS SHOOTING HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH HOODIES. In all likelihood, it had a lot more to do with Trayvon Martin being on top of George Zimmerman and beating him up, as Zimmerman and several eye witnesses claim.

However, let’s talk about hoodies for a minute.

Here’s a video of a young, black male wearing a hoodie. Watch him pull a gun, try to steal a moped, and shoot someone. Apparently, hoodies are not a magic crime repellant.

Here’s video from last August. It’s a black, Democrat mayor talking to an all black audience. Mayor Michael Nutter says that black teens should take down their doggone hoodies and gets applauded. Keep watching to see the reaction to saying “get a belt.” Wild cheers and applause. The audience knows what time it is, to quote Flava Flav.

In an era of racial divisiveness, no wonder Mayor Nutter’s speech didn’t get the media attention it deserved. It’s an amazing piece of truth-telling and God bless him for it.  As he says, “Show some sense and you’ll be surprised what opportunities open up for you.” That is a profoundly American message and the exact opposite of the Sharpton/Obama message. Stick that in your doggone hoodie.