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submitted 6 months ago by tonytins@pawb.social to c/politics@lemmy.world

U.S. Rep. Al Green was booted from President Donald Trump's State of the Union address Tuesday night after waving a sign reading, "Black People Aren't Apes!" as the president made his entrance down the aisle.

The Houston Democrat stood near the front of the chamber holding the sign above his head as Trump greeted lawmakers and shook hands. Gasps and boos quickly spread across the room as members on both sides reacted to the sudden disruption.

Fellow Texan Troy Nehls appeared to exchange heated words with Green before throwing his hands up and returning to his seat. Within moments, the sergeant-at-arms moved in.

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[-] Asafum@lemmy.world 148 points 6 months ago

Gasps and boos quickly spread across the room as members on both sides reacted to the sudden disruption.

... holding a sign is a "sudden disruption?" Ffs...

Remind me, were MTG or Bobert booted from the SOTU when they literally yelled at Biden?

[-] AbidanYre@lemmy.world 77 points 6 months ago

Or the asshat who yelled "you lie" at Obama.

[-] Zombiepirate@lemmy.world 56 points 6 months ago

That dipshit, Joe Wilson, is still in the House of Representatives. He was pissed because Obama said illegal immigrants wouldn't benefit from the ACA.

His yelling at Obama was making political hay; scaremongering that "undeserving" people might get healthcare in the richest country in the history of the world.

[-] Asafum@lemmy.world 6 points 6 months ago

That asshat is a SCOTUS "justice" and it was in response to Obama essentially saying "Citizens United was an awful ruling that will (do everything we've now seen it do, handing even more political influence to corporations)"

So, no, Mr.Asshat "Justice," he did not in fact lie.

[-] anon_8675309@lemmy.world 17 points 6 months ago

Dems are held to decorum, the right isn’t.

[-] negativenull@piefed.world 122 points 6 months ago

Look at this picture:

Caption:

Nicole Malliotakis laughing and pointing towards the exit and she jeers a somber Al Green

It's like those civil rights pictures of people yelling at black people sitting in a cafe.

[-] deacon@lemmy.world 31 points 6 months ago

I hadn't heard of her before, but she certainly is a wretched little cretin.

[-] Maeve@kbin.earth 15 points 6 months ago

I guess he's no longer "one of the good ones."

[-] ameancow@lemmy.world 11 points 6 months ago

And it will go in history studies the same was as the civil rights pictures. We are seeing history happening and tend to forget it because so much of it is SO dumb.

[-] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 5 points 6 months ago

He looks like a badass

[-] Bonesince1997@lemmy.world 47 points 6 months ago

Gasps that our president is a racist, right?

[-] CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world 62 points 6 months ago

To the conservatives, having someone accuse you of racism is more offensive than actual racism.

[-] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 3 points 6 months ago

Republicans are more scandalized that someone called the president out for doing something incredibly racist than they are that the president did something incredibly racist.

Also, they have no room to talk about decorum...

[-] Nobodyjustnobody@sh.itjust.works 22 points 6 months ago
[-] moody@lemmings.world 20 points 6 months ago

He's wrong though. We're all apes, regardless of race.

[-] Soup@lemmy.world 12 points 6 months ago

We’re all boney, ray-finned fish.

[-] DokPsy@lemmy.world 10 points 6 months ago

I for one identify as a hagfish

[-] ALoafOfBread@lemmy.ml 9 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Came here to say this. I get what he's trying to say, but we are all definitely apes. And that's pretty cool - apes are awesome.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hominidae:

The Hominidae (/hɒˈmɪnɪdiː/; hominids /ˈhɒmɪnɪdz/), whose members are known as the great apes,[note 1] are a taxonomic family of primates that includes eight extant species in four genera: Pongo (the Bornean, Sumatran and Tapanuli orangutan); Gorilla (the eastern and western gorilla); Pan (the chimpanzee and the bonobo); and Homo, of which only modern humans (Homo sapiens) remain.[1]

[-] I_Jedi@lemmy.today 4 points 6 months ago

Ah, just like the vicious gaggle of dinosaurs who laid some dookie by the pond while intimidating any ape that approaches.

[-] DokPsy@lemmy.world 3 points 6 months ago

The least trustworthy dinosaurs are those found around water. Tasty though

[-] LibertyLizard@slrpnk.net 2 points 6 months ago

Most apes are awesome. I can think of a few I wouldn't miss.

[-] tonytins@pawb.social 8 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Yes. Unfortunately, racists deny that little technicality and think they're the superior other. So their usage of "apes" is offensive in this context.

[-] pomegranatefern@sh.itjust.works 6 points 6 months ago

This feels like a "read the room" kind of comment.

All humans are biologically considered animals, and there are many times when I feel that viewing human behavior through that lens genuinely encourages compassion and understanding, and yet: there is a long history of people being called "animals" as a dehumanizing measure in order to justify doing the same horrible things to them that humans routinely do to non-human animals. This is particularly true for historically marginalized groups.

Likewise, there is a long, racist history of white people calling Black people "apes" or "monkeys" to justify racist systems and treat Black people the way they view monkeys and non-human apes, as resembling humans but not fully human.

This representative is specifically responding to a video shared by Trump, who has a long history of racist behavior, in which the Obamas were depicted as distinctly non-human apes (I cannot recall the specific ape and cannot readily look it up. Gorillas, I think?), echoing that racist trope.

When someone responds to Trump trafficking in racist tropes with "Black people aren't apes," they are not getting into the nitty gritty of taxonomical clades, they're countering that trope. "Well, actually"-ing about humans technically being apes is undercutting the focus on countering Trump's racism. Time and place.

[-] moody@lemmings.world 2 points 6 months ago

It wasn't meant as a serious statement, more so like another commenter put it, we're not not apes.

I know what he meant, and it's why I specifically mentioned that it's not a question of race.

[-] Redditmodstouchgrass@lemmy.zip 1 points 6 months ago

Yeah, but it feels weird for the pro science party to be doing this...

[-] ameancow@lemmy.world 4 points 6 months ago
[-] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 1 points 6 months ago

So let's govern like they govern on the discovery channel

[-] Smaile@lemmy.ca 1 points 6 months ago
[-] DontRedditMyLemmy@lemmy.world 13 points 6 months ago

Every single Democrat should have done something to get kicked out

[-] CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world 6 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

I had to laugh at watching little Mikey Johnson pretending to be wringing his hands over Democrats boycotting the SOTU (oh, the CIVILITY!), and he just cannot fucking help himself because he knows who he is doing this little performance for, and it's not normal Americans:

He says:

We've never done that. It doesn't matter if there's a Democrat (sic) president, you go and respect the office, you respect the decorum, the institution, the tradition of having had this speech made.

These little weasels simply refuse to get the name of the party right. They do it all the time, and the Murc's Law media never calls them on it. They quote little Mikey and don't even put the sic in there as they should.

So the guy is pretending to be claiming that the SOTU is all about coming together, let's have some civility here, etc., and even in the process of doing that, he does the little Republicunt insult that all of them do, constantly.

Civility. He can kiss my red rosy.

[-] Innerworld@lemmy.world 3 points 6 months ago

We all share DNA with monkeys…

[-] Trilogy3452@lemmy.world 4 points 6 months ago

And bananas

[-] ameancow@lemmy.world 2 points 6 months ago

Every neurodivergent in Lemmy wants to chime in with correct biological facts despite it completely undermining the context of the message.

this post was submitted on 25 Feb 2026
293 points (99.0% liked)

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