Sean Hannity — in case you didn’t remember — is someone they let appear on a national cable news channel. This is a cold hard fact (and one that, despite the Fox News Channel being a lowly place, still surprises at times), despite the other cold, hard fact that last night, he said that if we’re banning the Confederate flag, we should also ban Jay Z, Beyoncé and Prince essentially equating a symbol fraught with America’s history of hate with some of the most important black musicians and icons.
A Bit of context: after the shooting in Charleston, some stores like Walmart have — after outcries from people who didn’t want to be terrorized by a racist symbol (imagine that!) — decided to remove Confederate related merchandise from their stores. And Hannity just doesn’t understand why they’d do that!
For, you see, these stores still sell albums by the likes of notorious bigots like Jay Z — who, as we all know, simply can’t stop hating on black people with his incessant usage of the N word. Yes, this bit of preposterousness is exactly what Hannity was insinuating — seemingly ignoring or being purely oblivious to the age-old conversation about the reappropriation of slurs for empowerment in oppressed communities. Hannity said:
Now I have a question: Can you still buy a Jay Z CD at Walmart? Does the music department at Sears have any Ludacris albums? Can I download 50 Cent on Amazon? Can I do that? Can I get some Snoop Dogg albums on eBay? Because a lot of the music by those artists is chock-full of the ‘N word,’ by the way and the ‘B-word,’ and the ‘H-word,’ and racist, misogynist, sexist anti-woman slurs none of those retail executives would be caught dead using.
He also took issue with Obama’s relationship with Jay Z, Beyoncé, and Prince, vituperatively suggesting:
It’s OK for Obamas teenage daughters and people going into these stores and buy music chock full of the ‘N-word’ and ‘B-word,’ maybe we should consider banning that too. Since we’re in the process of banning everything.
It turns out that he also just isn’t a big Prince fan (a proclamation that’s sure to crush Prince’s spirit, as we all know a musical icon’s validity really boils down to whether or not Sean Hannity “gets it”):
I don’t know if he uses any of that language. I have no idea. I’m not a big Prince fan. I don’t get it, frankly. I listen to his music and I’m like, ‘That’s it?’
Here’s a recording, in all its repugnant glory:
Via Consequence of Sound.