Megyn Kelly Doesn’t Get Why Wearing Blackface For Halloween Is Wrong

Former Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly is once again under fire for her views. Kelly, who once went on a rant about why Santa Claus shouldn’t be portrayed as a Black man, is apparently perfectly okay with folks rocking Blackface on Halloween. “You do get in trouble if you’re a white person who puts on Blackface on Halloween or a Black person who puts on white face for Halloween,” she said during a conversation about dressing up for the holiday on her NBC show, Megyn Kelly Today. “Back when I was a kid, that was OK as long as you were dressing up as a character.” While it’s been explained time and time again why wearing Blackface — or any other culturally insensitive costume like Native American headdresses — is absolutely NOT cool, Kelly just couldn’t understand why someone would find the practice offensive.

Megyn Kelly wonders what the big deal is about blackface pic.twitter.com/07yvYDuAYe

— Tommy Christopher (@tommyxtopher) October 23, 2018

“But on Halloween?” Kelly asked, after panelist Melissa Rivers said people should steer clear of offensive costumes. “On Halloween you’ve got guys running around with fake axes coming out of their head,” Kelly said somehow equating dressing up as a horror movie character to donning Blackface. “It’s gonna be jarring.” To prove her — absolutely wrong — point, Kelly brought up an incident from The Real Housewives of New York in which Luann de Lesseps came dressed as Diana Ross, complete with super tanned skin. Though it’s EXTREMELY easy to portray a Black person or character without painting your face black, Kelly thought the RHONY controversy was overblown. “People said that that was racist,” Kelly said of the incident. While Lesseps later apologized, Kelly didn’t see anything wrong with it. “And I don’t know, I thought like, ‘Who doesn’t love Diana Ross?’ She wants to look like Diana Ross for one day, and I don’t know how, like, that got racist on Halloween.” After outrage erupted on social media over her comments, Kelly sent an internal memo to her colleagues apologizing for her views, according to THR. “One of the wonderful things about my job is that I get the chance to express and hear a lot of opinions. Today is one of those days where listening carefully to other points of view, including from friends and colleagues, is leading me to rethink my own views,” she wrote. Kelly went on to state that she “suggested that this seemed okay if done as part of this holiday where people have the chance to make themselves look like others,” she continued. “I realize now that such behavior is indeed wrong, and I am sorry. The history of blackface in our culture is abhorrent; the wounds too deep.” Here’s the thing: wearing Blackface, or any other culturally stereotypical costume, IS racist. The fact that Kelly can’t seem to understand it only reaffirms that she hasn’t ditched her Fox News roots and is still firmly committed to spreading her ignorant, and often times problematic, views about race to America.