Right-wing activists pushing a campaign to get “The View” host Whoopi Goldberg removed from the television show were reminded of the award-winning actress’ accolades as many accused her of being protected because she is Black.
Goldberg has faced backlash over the past several months for her comments about the Holocaust.
During an episode of the talk show last February, Goldberg said the genocide of European Jews during World War II was not about race. The actress and moderator then issued an apology explaining that her comments were misconstrued. However, the controversy resurfaced after her December interview with a British publication, The Times, prompting a second apology.
However, conservatives believe Goldberg’s position on the show is still secure because of “Black privilege.”
“Retweet if you would like Whoopi Goldberg fired from the View,” wrote self-proclaimed “Ultra MAGA” Josh Dunlap on Twitter with a photo of Goldberg with a “Canceled” stamp across it on Jan. 6.
However, it quickly backfired when fans pointed out the hypocrisy of the tweet.
The photo was lifted from Act for America, a conservative grassroots organization “dedicated to preserving America’s culture, security, and freedom.”
Founder and chairman Brigitte Gabriel has created a petition demanding Goldberg be fired because her “denial that the ‘Jewish Race’ was targeted by Hitler and NAZI Germany is a desecration to the memory of those who were mass murdered or managed to survive the Holocaust genocide.”
During the Feb. 2 episode, springing off a discussion about a Tennessee school district vote to remove a book about the Holocaust from shelves, Goldberg said that Nazis and Jews are “two white groups of people.”
“The minute you turn it into race, it goes down this alley. Let’s talk about it for what it is. It’s how people treat each other,” Goldberg said. “It doesn’t matter if you’re Black or white, Jews. It’s each other.”
Some Jewish organizations and the Anti-Defamation League criticized the remarks, causing Goldberg to issue an apology that same night on “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.”
“It upset a lot of people, which was never ever, ever my intention,” she said. “I feel, being Black when we talk about race, it’s a very different thing to me. So I said I thought the Holocaust wasn’t about race.”
“When you talk about being a racist, you can’t call this racism. This was evil. This wasn’t based on skin,” she told Colbert “You couldn’t tell who was Jewish. You had to delve deeply and figure it out.”
ABC executives suspended the show’s moderator for two weeks.
During the live interview with The Times 10 months later, the interviewer pointed out that Nazis believed Jews were a different and inferior race to their “Aryan” race. However, Goldberg argued that it was initially based on mental capacity.
“Remember who they were killing first,” she told The Times. “They were not killing racial; they were killing physical. They were killing people they considered to be mentally defective. And then they made this decision.”
The interview spurred even more backlash from ADL, other organizations and critics who called for Goldberg to be suspended again or removed from the show. Some accused the host of doubling down on her original comments, which she later rejected before issuing the second apology.
Dunlap’s tweet calling for Goldberg’s firing was reshared over 800 times with several conservatives calling for the entire talk show to be canceled. While others agreed Goldberg should be fired, several other Twitter users questioned why Dunlap watched the show if he disliked the moderator.
“Don’t watch The View, and they will all disappear,” one user replied.
However, some Twitter users argued that Goldberg won’t be fired because she is a “liberal elite” and a Black woman. While other users called out Dunlap for going against conservative values by calling for the actress to be canceled.
“I thought yall abhorred ‘cancel culture,'” user Bella LaRue wrote.
Three days later, Act for America’s Gabriel renewed the effort.
“Can someone please explain to me why Whoopi Goldberg still has a job!” she said in a Jan. 10 tweet.
The tweet drew echoes from her follower base who also marveled at how good of a question it was, and many others accused the network again of meeting its “status quo” and pointed out Goldberg’s “Black privilege.”
Goldberg’s fans also joined the conversation. One replied with a screenshot of the lists of the actress’ many awards. Others reminded Gabriel that the host was famous years before the daytime gig. Goldberg is one of 17 actors who have won all four of the major American entertainment awards.
“Because she’s talented and not you. You are nobody,” replied Jaime Jimenez.
“Sure! Unlike you, she’s widely admired, intelligent, and very talented, She is one of 17 entertainers to win the EGOT (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony awards). What have you won lately…?” replied Mark Ira Kaufman.
