It all started with House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy addressing the Dr. Seuss controversy by reading from Green Eggs & Ham:
I still like Dr. Seuss, so I decided to read Green Eggs and Ham.
RT if you still like him too! pic.twitter.com/2pbRbSiJD6
— Kevin McCarthy (@GOPLeader) March 6, 2021
At that point, CNN’s Jake Tapper got involved in a way that seemed familiar:
This thread / Dr. Seuss controversy exposes an Orwellian theme in Leftist politics. How much of the past do we want to hide or change?
It's a more polite version of the Taliban destroying ancient statues of Buddha, an image they found offensive. https://t.co/hxXlurOLSr
— Fusilli Spock (@awstar11) March 6, 2021
Here’s Tapper’s thread in full that sparked the dragging in question:
One of the weirdest parts of this culture war is that the self-styled “warriors” aren’t willing to stand by the empirically racist images they’re supposedly defending. Green Eggs and Ham is not one of the books the @DrSeuss Foundation has decided to stop publishing. https://t.co/OMXqHz11Vf
— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) March 6, 2021
2/ The NRCC will send contributors copies of The Cat In the Hat — also not one of the books that will no longer be published. pic.twitter.com/sduNc53cqp
— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) March 6, 2021
3/ The actual books no longer being published are:
– And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street
– If I Ran the Zoo
– McElligot’s Pool
– On Beyond Zebra!
– Scrambled Eggs Super!
– The Cat’s Quizzer— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) March 6, 2021
4/ The @DrSeuss Foundation explained its decision — and please note it was the Seuss estate that made this decision — this way: https://t.co/8lryfF016K
— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) March 6, 2021
Recommended
5/ Here are two of the empirically racist images from two of those books.
Ask yourself why the self-styled culture warriors “standing up” for Dr. Seuss don’t show these offensive images or read from the actual books in question when they’re on this crusade. pic.twitter.com/qK9HVphMMd
— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) March 6, 2021
6/ I would submit that they can’t defend the images because they’re indefensible. I would suggest that they don’t show them to you on the floor of the House or in their little videos because they don’t want to be associated with those racist images either.
— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) March 6, 2021
7/ Again: if you’re going to defend the books and the images, defend the books and the images.
It would be like trying to defend Disney’s Song of the South by showing Frozen and Toy Story.
— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) March 6, 2021
I have not seen the offending images in every book because the @DrSeuss foundation has been vague and opaque about the specifics. So: no, I’m not “on board” with the argument you’re ascribing to me. I’ve seen similar suggestions of overreach with McElligot’s Pool. https://t.co/ubQHWx6VaN
— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) March 6, 2021
The conversation took another turn here, so in the spirit of dialogue and nuance: https://t.co/tqS16mYEjX
— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) March 6, 2021
Guess what happened next:
Jake Tapper is getting dragged on twitter. #GoodDays
— Kris Kinder (@kris_kinder) March 6, 2021
So the CNN anchor gave his side, and here’s some of the other:
This is so dishonest. Or perhaps he doesn't understand the liberal notion of a neutral principle? There is nothing "weird" about calling out book bans without defending the content. https://t.co/2ca4V1BkDu
— David Harsanyi (@davidharsanyi) March 6, 2021
Banning books is wrong https://t.co/qUqsxBsyVI
— Anthony Abides (@AnthonyAbides) March 6, 2021
Banning books is wrong. This isn’t hard. https://t.co/COgcPhbygK
— Not-Reverend_Ducati (@DucatiNot) March 6, 2021
He is asking people to defend specific books instead of addressing the issue of book banning in general, it is disingenuous.
— Strawman! (@Bert_Huggins) March 6, 2021
He focuses on the examples but not the broader point. This is how dishonest people argue.
— Fusilli Spock (@awstar11) March 6, 2021
You don’t have to “stand by the ‘empirically racist’ images” to acknowledge that censoring/banning books is a bad thing.
It is possible to say, “This is how things were, and it wasn’t right” wi/o destroying history.
NEVER in history were the good guys the censors and banners. https://t.co/tPddFQ3c19
— Amy Curtis (@RantyAmyCurtis) March 6, 2021
You should stand down on this one Alfred E. Tapper. In fact, you should stand down on all of them! https://t.co/XbjxrQDDsg
— Gravis Mushnik ???????????????? (@SardinePundit) March 6, 2021
https://twitter.com/PartymanRandy/status/1368247034143268866
If this is problematic and you want them banned I wonder what you'd think of Mein Kampf and The Doctrine of Fascism being readily available on Amazon. Not to mention any books by Julius Evola and Yukio Mishima. Should those books also be banned? https://t.co/gLMYsuzaMe
— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) March 6, 2021
“We shouldn’t ban ‘Mein Kampf.’”
“Nazi!” https://t.co/qzLj86V1h0
— Varad Mehta (@varadmehta) March 6, 2021
Jake, the reality these people are pushing for is one where you'd get fired for this tweet because the context in which you shared such images is irrelevant. That's not hyperbole. That is literally the intent. https://t.co/00CfwQEpAV
— Noam Blum (@neontaster) March 6, 2021
A reporter from the NYT was just pushed out for using a racist word during a discussion of why the racist word is wrong. If his intent didn't matter, why does it matter what Jake Tapper's intent is in publishing this racist image? https://t.co/stCcmaO8qS
— I got your #Unity right here (@jtLOL) March 6, 2021
Other point about this shallow thread — you can't pretend this is just about six books. Their is a concerted attack on Seuss' entire legacy. They're divorcing his name from a nationwide event meant to honor him. Libraries have refused donations of the nonoffensive books. https://t.co/WREUiegvOS
— Mark Hemingway (@Heminator) March 6, 2021
Journalist writes thread justifying book banning. https://t.co/h8CEQu1hqO
— Aldous Huxley's Ghost™ (@AF632) March 6, 2021
Conservatives who argue with Jake Tapper on Twitter give him way too much credit as some sort of common sense centrist who just lost his way. He is a leftist through and through. Before CNN he worked for a gun control group and wrote for Salon.
— Mike LaChance (@MikeLaChance33) March 6, 2021
Banning books is wrong. https://t.co/9EYTWYUf4N
— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) March 6, 2021
Tapper was seen as once having a slightly different view on related topics:
No I'm sorry. Racist images that need to stop being published. https://t.co/pRqSOu4skk
— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) March 6, 2021
That time he defended supposed problematic and insensitive cartoons. Weird. pic.twitter.com/xpSYQC0S4T
— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) March 6, 2021
6 years ago @jaketapper was defending murdered cartoonists who drew supposed racist charictures of Muhammad. Now he just plays the role Jeff Zucker wants him to play on Twitter for a paycheck . pic.twitter.com/NJwj9pEICh
— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) March 6, 2021
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