If you've ever read anything penned by Shaun King, then you're probably familiar with the taste of your own bile. It tends to creep up your esophagus as you read one of his NY Daily News rants blaming everything that's wrong with society on white males.
One of the pitfalls of having liberal friends on social media is that I'm exposed to toxic doses of King's flaming rubbish on a daily basis. Sure, I could simply unfriend these liberal acquaintances, but that wouldn't be very conservative of me. In fact, it would be downright liberal. I say this because studies have shown that liberals are far more likely to throw a hissy fit and unfriend somebody over political differences.
But the smoldering pile of racist manure which Shaun King serves up for publication on a regular basis is, in many ways, unintentionally apolitical. It's so offensive and divisive that folks from all political spectra can find something to cringe about. Earlier this evening I encountered one of Shaun King's Facebook posts and was ashamedly enticed by his clickbait statement, which read: "Hands down, the most effective way to reduce violence & mass shootings in America is actually to ban white men."
And the Buzzie goes to...
I will give credit to Mr. King for mastering the skill of offending people so much that they have no choice but to click on whatever link he's hawking. It's a good skill for a writer to possess, and if there was a Clickbait Hall of Fame, King would be inducted on the first ballot.
Perhaps BuzzFeed could present King with some sort of lifetime achievement award in clickbaiting. They could call it the Buzzie.
King's provocative Facebook post on Friday evening directed gullible rubes to one of his typical race-baiting NY Daily News editorials, in which the author attempts to make the case that "white people, white men to be particular -- are responsible for the overwhelming majority of America's mass shootings."
This, of course, is fake news at its finest, since it has been general knowledge for quite some time that government statistics concerning mass shootings are non-existent.
In fact, the government doesn't track mass shootings at all. According to the Investigative Assistance for Violent Crimes Act of 2012, the government only tracks "mass killings" and the FBI defines this term as an incident resulting in more than three deaths. It's a fact. Look it up.
Old news and fake news
But the funny thing about King's article is that it was written not in January of 2017, but in June of 2016.
In other words, King relishes his role as champion race-baiter so much that he posts a bigoted statement on social media on January 27 to drive traffic to a factually inaccurate piece that's as current as Bernie's chance of winning the Democratic nomination. As Donald Trump would say -- lame.
Shaun King may believe that the most effective way to reduce violence in America is to ban white men. I argue that the most effective way to end race-baiting is to ban Shaun King from writing.
