Media top headlines February 3
In media news today, Jeff Zucker resigns from his role at CNN after failing to disclose a ‘consensual relationship,’ CNN insiders react to the president’s abrupt exit, and Al Franken says Whoopi Goldberg’s name is proof she is not antisemitic.
Whoopi Goldberg is being held accountable for her Holocaust remarks after being suspended from her post at "The View," but CNN’s Don Lemon argues she should be shown some mercy as an ally.
The "Don Lemon Tonight" anchor proposed that those on the left must continue an alliance with one another even if there’s been internal wrongdoing.
"In this environment, we have to be allies to each other," he said. "Sometimes your allies say stupid things. Sometimes they say dumb things. But guess what? They’re your allies. They’re at least on your side and they’re trying to learn."
WHOOPI GOLDBERG SUSPENDED FROM ‘THE VIEW’ FOLLOWING HOLOCAUST REMARKS
"We have to stop trying to cancel people and shouting down our allies," Lemon added.
Don Lemon attends the "Mary J Blige's My Life" New York premiere at Rose Theater, Jazz at Lincoln Center on June 23, 2021. (Theo Wargo/Getty Images)
Lemon used the 2015 election campaign trail as an example, when Black Lives Matter protesters were "shouting down" Democrats like Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders who rallied in support of the BLM movement. The host promoted having ally-to-ally conversations, now between Goldberg and the Jewish community.
"Whoopi is an ally to the Jewish community," he said. "She is. She said something that she shouldn’t have said. OK, fine. But… don’t put her in a corner and marginalize her. Use her to the best of your ability to get the conversation and your points across about what’s wrong about that kind of thinking because she’s not the only one who thinks it."
Lemon considered Goldberg a "huge platform" to stimulate this kind of conversation and defended her remarks by pointing out that her show is called "The View" and not "The Facts" for a reason.
Whoopi Goldberg co-hosts ABC's "The View" on May 28, 2019. (Walt Disney Television/Lou Rocco)
"The show is called ‘The View,’" he said. "Her view was wrong. OK, so, let’s work with that."
Since Goldberg does not have a history of antisemitism and delivered "sincere" apologies, Lemon argued, punishing Goldberg is "heavy-handed."
WHOOPI GOLDBERG CONFRONTS HOLOCAUST REMARKS WITH STEPHEN COLBERT: DON'T WANT TO ‘FAKE APOLOGIZE’
Meanwhile, Lemon was quick to box all Trump voters as Klansmen and Nazis on-air with former CNN colleague Chris Cuomo on Jan. 13, 2021. He then defended his own remarks the following day.
"If you voted for Trump, you voted for the person who the Klan supported. You voted for the person who Nazis support," he said. "You voted for the person who incited a crowd to go into the Capitol and potentially take the lives of lawmakers ... You voted on that side, and the people in Washington are continuing to vote on that side."
Other media pundits continue to make excuses for Goldberg as well, rejecting her cancellation and, instead, calling for her to be educated on the matter.
LA Times editorial writer Karin Klein wrote in an article Wednesday that even though Goldberg "blew it big time," her ignorance indicated the scale of Americans who are also ill-informed on the topic.
"One good thing about a celebrity mishap is that it prods people into new awareness of the topic in question," she said. "Goldberg learned something; the best we can do at this point is not punish her but follow her example."
ABC’s "The View" co-host Whoopi Goldberg declared the Holocaust was "not about race." Monday, Jan. 31, 2021. (Screenshot/The View/Twitter)
A Daily Beast op-ed penned by MSNBC columnist Michael A. Cohen on Tuesday also agreed that Goldberg’s comments were "unfathomably stupid," but still do not equate to her cancellation.
"Firing Goldberg would provide her critics with a momentary whiff of moral superiority, but it would do nothing to help American Jews or enlighten those whose views of Jews, like Goldberg’s, are shrouded in misinformation," he said. "The response to stupidity does not always need to be cancellation – sometimes it can and should be education."
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Fox News' Joseph A. Wulfsohn contributed to this report.
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