Virginia Governor Ralph Northam has been lying low for this past week, “using tunnels to shuttle between the mansion and the nearby building where he has an office,” according to the Washington Post. He also granted the Washington Post his first interview since photos from his 1984 medical school yearbook seemed to show Northam in blackface. At first he admitted to photo was him. Then he moonwalked that back in a press conference in which he said the photo wasn’t him, but he did don blackface as part of a Michael Jackson costume to moonwalk during a San Antonio dance contest in 1984. Is that supposed to be better? Were people our parents’ age just doing blackface on the regular? SNL seems to think so.
On Saturday, Northam told the Washington Post he “overreacted” when he put out his initial statement taking blame for the yearbook photo. And that’s when his interview goes ass over teakettle into whoopsidoodle territory:
“The things that I did back in medical school and — and — in San Antonio were insensitive and I have learned since that they were very offensive,” Northam said. “We learn from our mistakes and I’m a stronger person.”
Asked later what Northam meant by referring to things he did “back in medical school,” spokeswoman Ofirah Yheskel said he misspoke and just meant San Antonio, where he did his residency.
Amazing. He just needed to keep denying the medical school photo was him, and he can’t even seem to do that.
Northam also said he will serve out the remaining three years of his term, and that he is “setting up a ‘reconciliation tour’ that will take him around the state to engage in conversations about race and healing, but that he had no details yet.”
We’re sure that’ll be constructive and not at all hamfistedly absurd. Meanwhile, on Twitter, people have been making jokes, and the jokes keep coming:
when we said more black faces in government, we should have been specific.
— shalewa sharpe (@silkyjumbo) February 6, 2019
the amount of time it takes to paint on blackface seems like plenty of time to realize it’s a bad idea.
— JD Dillard (@JGDillard) February 7, 2019
Some gave a shout out to Virginia:
congratulations to virginia on its new job as florida
— Peter Banks (@PLFino) February 6, 2019
https://twitter.com/jasonshevrin/status/1093194016286535682
https://twitter.com/pattymo/status/1093526148166893569
And this seems like an Adam Sandler movie in the making:
https://twitter.com/jelani9/status/1093222440451403777
Meanwhile, people are wondering why this racist nonsense keeps happening:
Old white politicians treat blackface like cocaine. “Yes I tried it once at a party. Wasn’t for me.”
— Biniam Bizuneh (@biniambiz) February 6, 2019
dang it seems a lotta white men in politics think sexual assault and blackface are required classes
— Aparna Nancherla 🇵🇸 (@aparnapkin) February 6, 2019
Blackface is racist. Always has been. Yet people who do it say they’re not racist. Why don’t you do it in public, maybe in a crowd of black people and not behind closed doors with your klan?
Asking for a friend.
— Eric Jerome Dickey (@EricJDickey) February 7, 2019
https://twitter.com/solomongeorgio/status/1093287783781740544
https://twitter.com/solomongeorgio/status/1094009535746826240
https://twitter.com/JeanGreasy/status/1093498033403318272
Others shared their dash cunning strategy for avoiding all yearbook controversy:
https://twitter.com/InternetHippo/status/1093575001914122245
This is a trap but I don’t mind it:
https://twitter.com/FeministaJones/status/1093208971295506432
And people even tied their jokes to other current events, like Liam Neeson’s bonkers interview, MAGA hats, and that astoundingly tone deaf Gucci sweater.
what if a politician did blackface and ended up getting murdered by a revenge-seeking Liam Neeson
— Hey hey, daloy politsey! (@blunted215) February 6, 2019
can't wait for 30 years from now when people will be asked to resign because an old photo surfaces of them in a red hat
— maura quint (@behindyourback) February 2, 2019
https://twitter.com/kashanacauley/status/1093525622754762755
All in all, this Black History Month has already been one for the history books.
wow February has been….a lot
— chrissy teigen (@chrissyteigen) February 8, 2019
https://twitter.com/rgay/status/1093547433617956867
Let’s just cancel everything to be safe.
https://twitter.com/marianbull/status/1092915053874081793
(Via the Washington Post)