Colion Noir, a host for the National Rifle Association’s NRATV, attacked Boston Globe columnist Renée Graham for writing a column that argued that African Americans, Latinos, and Muslims considering gun ownership “must also carry the sobering knowledge that constitutional guarantees tend to fall short when the hand holding a gun is black or brown.”
In a December 8 video clip released by NRATV, Noir reacted to Graham’s piece, stating that it was an example of “exploitation of racial tension” and terming Graham’s argument a “negro pity party.”
Graham wrote about minority gun ownership and police violence in a December 4 column addressing news reports that minorities are buying more guns in the wake of Donald Trump’s victory. Graham cautioned, “Here's what's also unfortunate: More people of color with guns will likely result in more people of color dead or in prison,” and continued:
Minnesota's open carry law did not save Philando Castile. He informed the officer who stopped his car that he was carrying a licensed gun, but was still shot to death in front of his girlfriend and her young daughter in July. In 2014, Ohio's open-carry law did not spare the life of 12-year-old Tamir Rice , shot dead by a cop while playing with a toy gun. This past week, officials declined to charge a police officer in the shooting death of Keith Scott who may have had a gun in his possession but was not holding it when he was killed in Charlotte earlier this year. North Carolina is also an open-carry state.
After Castile, who had a permit to carry a concealed gun, was shot and killed, the NRA was conspicuously silent, generating outrage from those who saw a double standard for how the NRA reacts to high-profile victims of gun violence. Following intense criticism, the NRA eventually released a perfunctory statement that did not even include Castile’s name. The NRA also had nothing to say about board member Ted Nugent, who promoted a fake news story that falsely identified Castile as a suspect in a robbery and wrote on social media that Castile did not have “enuf brainmatter (sic)” to avoid being shot. The police officer who shot Castile has since been charged with manslaughter.
Noir’s full comments:
COLION NOIR: The Boston Globe printed a piece this week called “More Guns, More Risk for People of Color.” Here’s a quote. “More people of color with guns will likely result in more people of color dead or in prison.” They actually printed this. And you see, the exploitation of racial tension is a big business in this country now-a-days. When you only give a platform to the far extremes, i.e. the covert, overt racists and those who believe everything is racist you only get deeper racial division. Telling me I’m a victim every chance you get doesn’t empower me, it facilitates feelings of inferiority, self-pity, hopelessness, an unhealthy dependency on a group of people who only see me as a human stepping stool to facilitate their need to bask in their own self-righteousness. This negro pity party is getting old. And if you really want to help black gun owners, how about you start changing the narrative and glorify the countless positive images of black gun owners and the non-black gun owners who embrace them and stop force feeding us inferiority. I’m not a stray dog, I don’t need you to save me so you can put a collar around my neck and then say you own me. Either power my self-sufficiency or leave me be, because I will not let you continue to make a victim out of me.