When he complained, rightwingers sent him homophobic taunts online. Black gay
Republican podcaster Rob Smith has claimed that “white supremacist” members of
his political party called him “fa**ot” and the n-word during his Sunday night
attendance of Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest event in Phoenix, Arizona. Though
Smith posted a video of his brief interaction with the aggressors, commenters on
X (formerly Twitter) noted that the video didn’t feature the n-word and mocked
Smith his membership in an anti-gay political party. “Last night in Phoenix, I
was confronted and surrounded by some White Supremacists that don’t like gays or
blacks in the Republican Party,” Smith wrote in a December 18 post on X. “They
shouted ‘nr’ and ‘ft’ at me to make their point. However, I served in Iraq. I
never back down. Ever.”
So gut instinct: he’s probably a misogynist first and black and gay come after that. It may not be correct but holy hell as a lesbian it describes a lot of the gay male conservatives I’ve met.
The more nuanced potential is that people don’t like being put into boxes or perfectly matching stereotypes. Additionally many people can’t read between lines even when it’s obvious. Trump went very hard against immigrants and Black Lives Matter protesters, and he has white supremacists supporting him and a history of anti black prejudices, but he’s never said that he hates black people. Similarly he’s ranted and raved about trans people, and he allies with people who hate gay people, but his words are not explicitly against cis gay people. So if he wanted to be willfully ignorant to declare himself as the special good one who won’t be boxed in by your preconceived notions of what he should be, all he has to do is not read the obvious messages between the lines and hope they go away.
So gut instinct: he’s probably a misogynist first and black and gay come after that. It may not be correct but holy hell as a lesbian it describes a lot of the gay male conservatives I’ve met.
The more nuanced potential is that people don’t like being put into boxes or perfectly matching stereotypes. Additionally many people can’t read between lines even when it’s obvious. Trump went very hard against immigrants and Black Lives Matter protesters, and he has white supremacists supporting him and a history of anti black prejudices, but he’s never said that he hates black people. Similarly he’s ranted and raved about trans people, and he allies with people who hate gay people, but his words are not explicitly against cis gay people. So if he wanted to be willfully ignorant to declare himself as the special good one who won’t be boxed in by your preconceived notions of what he should be, all he has to do is not read the obvious messages between the lines and hope they go away.