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If you’re involved in any type of social media, there’s a good chance that you’ve stumbled across the McClure twins. Alexis and Ava, two beautiful girls with big personalities share, with the help of their mom, hair tips, their thoughts on the day and interactions with their parents and younger brother.
If you’ve seen their parents, you know that their mother, Ami Dunn McClure, is Nigerian and their father, Justin McClure is White. Before his daughters became the famous ones in the family, McClure had a career—or was attempting to have a career– as a comedian. In fact, his professional Twitter page was converted to his daughters’ page once they started growing in popularity.
But no scandal lies dormant for long. And recently someone discovered some old tweets from Justin McClure that point to stereotypical and racist ideologies.
He tried to delete the posts from 2010/2011 but folks captured screenshots.
In them, he wrote things like:
“Black people can’t say ‘ask’ but they have no trouble saying Cadillac Escalade. #IfIWasBlack #blackpeoplecantsayask.”
“Dominican women I know: Ilia, Awilda, Janitsy, Zora. Black women I know: Chandelier, Lasagna, Constellation, Walgreens #whenblackpeoplegetpaid.”
“Mark my word…one day a black woman will name a child Allergies, “My Allergies been acting up lately…daaaaamn.”
[We should note that this one was composed after his daughters were born, to their Black mother.]
“Lately I’ve been under the impression…Impression is this black girl I went out with. She loves being on top. #blackgirls #ghetto.”
As if the tweets, weren’t enough, Justin McClure also authored a blog post where he discussed the hurdles for White men attempting to date Black women.
He writes:
“White guys are typically more cautious, laid back, and considerate of women. White guys might see a hot black girl at a bar or something, but talk themselves out of approaching because Anderson Cooper comes on in 30 minutes. They have to get home. Black and Spanish men lifting weights on the corner don’t even know who Anderson Cooper is, but they hope he buys their new mix tape. In New York City I’ve seen black and Spanish men sing to women on the street, saw a black man with bags of groceries chase a woman down many blocks (he had ice cream too), and one time I saw a Spanish guy jump the subway tracks to get to the other side in effort to talk to a girl. When he got there the girl wasn’t interested. He came back across the tracks and waited for his train like it never happened. Kid you not.
Black women have never been opposed to dating white men (for the most part) so when they get an email from a cute chalky boy they are like “He’s cute. I’ll definitely go out with him”, but on the street that would have never happen because the white guy would be too busy thinking about TED talks or buying books off Amazon.com to notice the sister. White guys don’t make the moves in person. So Caucasian guys if you want to date a black girl or curvy Spanish chick, get online. Send some emails. Talk about how you love piñatas and Fubu, whatever it takes.”
Gross.
Interestingly enough, when our sister site Bossip reported this story, people in the comment section failed to find the racism in Justin’s actions. But to me, it’s glaring.
And in case there’s any confusion about where the racism exists, allow me to spell it out for you.
- He insults Black folks’ intelligence by claiming we can’t pronounce the word “ask.”
- He makes fun of Black names— creating his own outlandish ones like Walgreens. Really, this is an issue of ignorance. As a people who have had our language, culture and customs taken from us, we’ve created our own names. And while there are some people who may regard them as ghetto or classless, they are ours.
- He evokes a Black woman’s sexuality only to describe it as #ghetto. Word to the wise, a White person using the word ghetto to describe Black people is always coded. It’s a demarcation of lack of class, lack of resources, lack of intelligence, still, as a White man he doesn’t mind engaging this type of Black woman for sexual purposes.
- In his blog post on interracial dating, he relies heavily on stereotypes of Black men being unrefined, unintelligent, unconcerned and brutish. While the White man is educated, “considerate” and informed about current events.
The part about the piñatas and FUBU are not racist as much as they are making light of cultural staples or reducing entire communities down to objects and brands. It’s reductionist and ignorant—the type of culture outsiders, read White people can readily see but won’t take the time to learn more about.
For the life of me, I can’t imagine what his wife has to say about all of this. These thoughts were shared on her husband’s public pages, so God only knows what he said in the privacy of their home—whether he was joking or not. More than that, I would love to know how she rationalized this type of “comedy” to herself. Did she believe because he didn’t say African, he was talking about Black Americans? Did she take all of this as just humor? Did she believe he would grow out of this lazy and racist brand of comedy? I wonder if she considered what her daughters would make of their father’s rhetoric? We may never know. But in the meantime, Justin has offered some thoughts on his old comments.
https://twitter.com/McClureTwins/status/1016168211396681728
https://twitter.com/McClureTwins/status/1016178311502946306
The good ole “Blame it on the alcohol” excuse. Jamie Foxx would be proud. As you’ll notice, there is no apology here to the Black women who make up the audience that watch and support his daughters, the Black women who represent the community to which his daughters belong. Instead, there are rationalizations and instructions that we move on. This type of entitlement, telling the target of his words to “move on,” instead of apologizing seems to suggest that McClure still doesn’t fully recognize the severity of his words. To him, they really were just jokes and nothing more. And with a Black wife and two Black children, that’s a damn shame.
Interracial relationships, by in large, are similar to many intraracial romantic relationships. But there is a key piece of the puzzle I’ve seen Black men and women alike fail to investigate during the dating/courting phase. Does this [wo]man have any racist tendencies, beliefs or communication that might prove problematic and hurtful for me and any future children we may share?
Racism is so pervasive. It’s so much a part of what it means to be White, that it’s a question you must ask before your White husband and his “jokes” embarrass the entire family on the internet.
