NBC's Megyn Kelly doesn't understand why blackface is offensive
Kelly: “Back when I was a kid that was OK”
Written by Media Matters Staff
Published
From the October 23 edition of NBC's Megyn Kelly Today:
JACOB SOBOROFF (NBC NEWS): If you're going to dress like an idiot, act like an idiot, and actually dress and be racist, then somebody should say something to somebody, and -- but you should still be able to dress like a moron.
MEGYN KELLY (HOST): But what is racist, because truly, you do get in trouble if you are a white person who puts on blackface on Halloween --
ALL: Yes.
KELLY: -- or a black person who puts on whiteface for Halloween, like -- back when I was a kid that was OK as long as you were dressing up as, like, a character.
SOBOROFF: If somebody feels like something is offensive to them then you should say it, and that's fair game, and you should be able to take it if you're going to dress up like that.
KELLY: Yeah, you've got to be able to take it.
MELISSA RIVERS (AUTHOR AND TV HOST): One of the things I mentioned is people dressing up like Nazis and this. If you think it's offensive, it probably is --
SOBOROFF: Yup.
RIVERS: -- and one of my big complaints just about society right now is, whatever happened -- and I know how you were raised, I don't know how you were raised but --
SOBOROFF: It's questionable.
RIVERS: -- whatever happened to just, manners and polite society?
KELLY: But on Halloween? On Halloween you've got guys running around with fake axes coming out of their head. You're going to -- it's going to be jarring.
RIVERS: Right, but what I'm saying is in polite society, someone [inaudible] would not think that dressing as a Nazi is OK.
JENNA BUSH HAGER (NBC NEWS): Or painting somebody -- I think that there are limits to how far you want to go because you're making people feel bad --
RIVERS: But I'm saying normal people kind of know where that line is.
...
KELLY: There was a controversy on The Real Housewives of New York with Luann, and she dressed as Diana Ross, and she made her skin look darker than it really is and people said that that was racist. And I don't know, I felt like who doesn't love Diana Ross? She wants to look like Diana Ross for one day. I don't know how, like, that got racist on Halloween, it's not like she's walking around [inaudible].
SOBOROFF: I haven't seen it, I have not seen it, but it sounds a little racist to me.
Related:
NY Daily News: Luann de Lesseps denies she wore blackface on ‘Real Housewives of New York’
Previously:
Megyn Kelly wants kids at home to know that Jesus and Santa were white