'Full Frontal' Makes A Compelling Case For *Sigh* Not Punching Nazis In The Face

By Emily Cutler | Late Night TV | September 14, 2017 |

By Emily Cutler | Late Night TV | September 14, 2017 |

She’s back! Again! I think for good this time maybe? I’ll still need to check the listing for the next couple of weeks, but also I feel like I should shut up and take whatever Ms. Bee gives us. This week, it was a catch up on DACA, the hurricanes, Trump deal making with the Dems, and, of course, Ted Cruz yanking in on Twitter. Good times.

Also she made a compelling point about how maybe, possibly, just a little bit, it might be in our best interest to treat white supremacists likes human.

I know, I didn’t like it either. But I’ve come to some level of acceptance provided we issue a big, fat caveat: I can treat a white supremacist like a person. I will continue to treat the ideas espoused by white supremacists as dangerous garbage produced by garbage sections of damaged brains from now until eternity.

Because as it turns out, people, even people who explicitly buy into as destructively terrible ideas as white supremacy, are complicated. They can hold violent, hate-filled sewage ideas, and have real and valid hurt and problems. Those pains do not deserve more attention than other pain, but they do deserve the same attention. And, because we’re all fully functioning adults with the ability to discern, we can also weigh the validity of one’s pain. The world told you you were going to be president, but you’re not? Well fuck off, Tyler Durden. What that scene didn’t show was the millions of women and people of color behind you saying, “Hold up, they told you you can be president?”

But someone was abused and neglected as a kid? I can empathize with that. Someone felt unloved, unwelcome, and alone? I can treat that with humanity. That loneliness means now you actively abuse women, the LGBT community, and, most aggressively, people of color? Well now we’ve got a fucking problem.

Honestly, I haven’t gotten it all figured out quite yet. What I know is that my feelings on how I want to treat white supremacists doesn’t line up with how I want to treat convicted criminals, people with substance abuse issues or gang members. If hate were enough to get rid of them, they’d have been gone a long time ago. It might be time to start trying something else.