278

U.S. Rep. Al Green was booted from President Donald Trump's State of the Union address Tuesday night after waving a sign reading, "Black People Aren't Apes!" as the president made his entrance down the aisle.

The Houston Democrat stood near the front of the chamber holding the sign above his head as Trump greeted lawmakers and shook hands. Gasps and boos quickly spread across the room as members on both sides reacted to the sudden disruption.

Fellow Texan Troy Nehls appeared to exchange heated words with Green before throwing his hands up and returning to his seat. Within moments, the sergeant-at-arms moved in.

top 38 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[-] Asafum@lemmy.world 145 points 6 days ago

Gasps and boos quickly spread across the room as members on both sides reacted to the sudden disruption.

... holding a sign is a "sudden disruption?" Ffs...

Remind me, were MTG or Bobert booted from the SOTU when they literally yelled at Biden?

[-] AbidanYre@lemmy.world 75 points 6 days ago

Or the asshat who yelled "you lie" at Obama.

[-] Zombiepirate@lemmy.world 54 points 6 days ago

That dipshit, Joe Wilson, is still in the House of Representatives. He was pissed because Obama said illegal immigrants wouldn't benefit from the ACA.

His yelling at Obama was making political hay; scaremongering that "undeserving" people might get healthcare in the richest country in the history of the world.

[-] Asafum@lemmy.world 12 points 6 days ago

That asshat is a SCOTUS "justice" and it was in response to Obama essentially saying "Citizens United was an awful ruling that will (do everything we've now seen it do, handing even more political influence to corporations)"

So, no, Mr.Asshat "Justice," he did not in fact lie.

[-] anon_8675309@lemmy.world 17 points 6 days ago

Dems are held to decorum, the right isn’t.

[-] negativenull@piefed.world 117 points 6 days ago

Look at this picture:

Caption:

Nicole Malliotakis laughing and pointing towards the exit and she jeers a somber Al Green

It's like those civil rights pictures of people yelling at black people sitting in a cafe.

[-] deacon@lemmy.world 30 points 6 days ago

I hadn't heard of her before, but she certainly is a wretched little cretin.

[-] Maeve@kbin.earth 15 points 6 days ago

I guess he's no longer "one of the good ones."

[-] ameancow@lemmy.world 10 points 5 days ago

And it will go in history studies the same was as the civil rights pictures. We are seeing history happening and tend to forget it because so much of it is SO dumb.

[-] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 4 points 5 days ago

He looks like a badass

[-] Bonesince1997@lemmy.world 44 points 6 days ago

Gasps that our president is a racist, right?

[-] CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world 59 points 6 days ago

To the conservatives, having someone accuse you of racism is more offensive than actual racism.

[-] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 3 points 5 days ago

Republicans are more scandalized that someone called the president out for doing something incredibly racist than they are that the president did something incredibly racist.

Also, they have no room to talk about decorum...

[-] moody@lemmings.world 28 points 6 days ago

He's wrong though. We're all apes, regardless of race.

[-] Soup@lemmy.world 12 points 6 days ago

We’re all boney, ray-finned fish.

[-] DokPsy@lemmy.world 10 points 6 days ago

I for one identify as a hagfish

[-] pomegranatefern@sh.itjust.works 7 points 5 days ago

This feels like a "read the room" kind of comment.

All humans are biologically considered animals, and there are many times when I feel that viewing human behavior through that lens genuinely encourages compassion and understanding, and yet: there is a long history of people being called "animals" as a dehumanizing measure in order to justify doing the same horrible things to them that humans routinely do to non-human animals. This is particularly true for historically marginalized groups.

Likewise, there is a long, racist history of white people calling Black people "apes" or "monkeys" to justify racist systems and treat Black people the way they view monkeys and non-human apes, as resembling humans but not fully human.

This representative is specifically responding to a video shared by Trump, who has a long history of racist behavior, in which the Obamas were depicted as distinctly non-human apes (I cannot recall the specific ape and cannot readily look it up. Gorillas, I think?), echoing that racist trope.

When someone responds to Trump trafficking in racist tropes with "Black people aren't apes," they are not getting into the nitty gritty of taxonomical clades, they're countering that trope. "Well, actually"-ing about humans technically being apes is undercutting the focus on countering Trump's racism. Time and place.

[-] moody@lemmings.world 2 points 5 days ago

It wasn't meant as a serious statement, more so like another commenter put it, we're not not apes.

I know what he meant, and it's why I specifically mentioned that it's not a question of race.

[-] Redditmodstouchgrass@lemmy.zip 1 points 5 days ago

Yeah, but it feels weird for the pro science party to be doing this...

[-] MutantTailThing@lemmy.world 10 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

Ackschually, that’s a common misconception. Humans and apes merely share a common ancestor

Edit: sure is reddit in here

[-] Catoblepas@piefed.blahaj.zone 15 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

Humans are apes, specifically members of the great ape family, Hominidae: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hominidae

Like, going actually we’re all apes! In response to this is missing the point. But we’re not not apes.

[-] DokPsy@lemmy.world 7 points 6 days ago

Can't evolve out of a clade and all that jazz

[-] Catoblepas@piefed.blahaj.zone 4 points 6 days ago

Exactly, you can’t evolve out of a clade, and Trump is also a giant racist for calling black people apes. It doesn’t have to be just one!

[-] DokPsy@lemmy.world 1 points 6 days ago

Oh absolutely. It's definitely both

[-] moody@lemmings.world 1 points 5 days ago

The point of my statement was to miss the point, because I know what he meant.

Obviously when we talk about apes, we're not thinking of humans, we're thinking of chimps and gorillas. But like you said, we're not not apes.

It was a tongue-in-cheek pedantic statement.

[-] ALoafOfBread@lemmy.ml 10 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

Came here to say this. I get what he's trying to say, but we are all definitely apes. And that's pretty cool - apes are awesome.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hominidae:

The Hominidae (/hɒˈmɪnɪdiː/; hominids /ˈhɒmɪnɪdz/), whose members are known as the great apes,[note 1] are a taxonomic family of primates that includes eight extant species in four genera: Pongo (the Bornean, Sumatran and Tapanuli orangutan); Gorilla (the eastern and western gorilla); Pan (the chimpanzee and the bonobo); and Homo, of which only modern humans (Homo sapiens) remain.[1]

[-] I_Jedi@lemmy.today 4 points 6 days ago

Ah, just like the vicious gaggle of dinosaurs who laid some dookie by the pond while intimidating any ape that approaches.

[-] DokPsy@lemmy.world 3 points 6 days ago

The least trustworthy dinosaurs are those found around water. Tasty though

[-] LibertyLizard@slrpnk.net 2 points 6 days ago

Most apes are awesome. I can think of a few I wouldn't miss.

[-] tonytins@pawb.social 9 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

Yes. Unfortunately, racists deny that little technicality and think they're the superior other. So their usage of "apes" is offensive in this context.

[-] ameancow@lemmy.world 4 points 5 days ago
[-] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 1 points 5 days ago

So let's govern like they govern on the discovery channel

[-] Smaile@lemmy.ca 1 points 5 days ago
[-] Nobodyjustnobody@sh.itjust.works 21 points 6 days ago
[-] DontRedditMyLemmy@lemmy.world 12 points 5 days ago

Every single Democrat should have done something to get kicked out

[-] CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world 6 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

I had to laugh at watching little Mikey Johnson pretending to be wringing his hands over Democrats boycotting the SOTU (oh, the CIVILITY!), and he just cannot fucking help himself because he knows who he is doing this little performance for, and it's not normal Americans:

He says:

We've never done that. It doesn't matter if there's a Democrat (sic) president, you go and respect the office, you respect the decorum, the institution, the tradition of having had this speech made.

These little weasels simply refuse to get the name of the party right. They do it all the time, and the Murc's Law media never calls them on it. They quote little Mikey and don't even put the sic in there as they should.

So the guy is pretending to be claiming that the SOTU is all about coming together, let's have some civility here, etc., and even in the process of doing that, he does the little Republicunt insult that all of them do, constantly.

Civility. He can kiss my red rosy.

this post was submitted on 25 Feb 2026
278 points (100.0% liked)

politics

28687 readers
2040 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

  1. Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.

Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.

Example:

  1. Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
  2. Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
  3. No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
  4. Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
  5. No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

That's all the rules!

Civic Links

Register To Vote

Citizenship Resource Center

Congressional Awards Program

Federal Government Agencies

Library of Congress Legislative Resources

The White House

U.S. House of Representatives

U.S. Senate

Partnered Communities:

News

World News

Business News

Political Discussion

Ask Politics

Military News

Global Politics

Moderate Politics

Progressive Politics

UK Politics

Canadian Politics

Australian Politics

New Zealand Politics

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS