Obama Says He Didn't Take Trump's Monkey Video "Personally"
Former President Obama Says He Didn't "Take It Personally" When Trump Posted Monkey Video
President Trump’s two terms have been riddled with scandals, both big and small, and many that some thought would be the last straw for his overwhelming support.
One of those missteps that Republicans tried to do gymnastics to defend was sharing the racist video that depicted former President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, as monkeys.
Obama was asked about the post—which Trump refused to apologize for—in an interview with The New Yorker, where he explained his initial reaction to it.
“I don’t take it personally,” Obama said. “I mean, I’m always offended when my wife and kids get dragged into things, because they didn’t choose this…That’s a line that even people whose politics I deeply reject, I would expect them to care about. I would never talk about somebody’s family in that way.”
But what’s more offensive to Obama is how Trump depicts wars. He’s backed video footage of actual attacks with music, and one even shows a Wii Sports homerun spliced in with a clip of a bomb America dropped on Iran. Other memes and social media posts downplay the seriousness of war, with nods to Grand Theft Auto and SpongeBob SquarePants.
Between Trump’s A.I.-generated videos, clips that treat war “like a video game,” and showing “excrement dumped on ordinary citizens,” is what Obama truly takes issue with, as compared to disparaging imagery of him.
He added, “I mean, I’m a fair target in the sense of, yeah, you can feel free to pick on me, because I’m your own size.”
Back in February, Obama’s comments on the monkey depiction were more pointed, calling it a “clown show” that exhibits “no shame” and a lack of “decorum,” but acknowledged the majority of the country does “still believe in decency, courtesy, kindness…”
The controversy began in early February when Trump posted a video focusing on false election fraud, but it ended with a video of the Obamas as monkeys as “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” by The Tokens played in the background.
When initially asked about the racist post, he refused to admit he was in the wrong, saying, “No, I didn’t make a mistake. “I looked at the beginning of it. It was fine.”
Backlash grew, and the post was removed, as the White House claimed a “staffer erroneously made the post.”
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Former President Obama Says He Didn't "Take It Personally" When Trump Posted Monkey Video was originally published on cassiuslife.com
