Ranting On...Karamo Brown & Sean Spicer

Karamo Brown

I have never actually watched a full episode of Dancing with the Stars.  I have seen snippets of it before (I specifically remember the "Paparazzi" dance with Kate Gosselin and Rob Kardashian's "booty-shaking samba" for some reason, though I know I've seen other dances), but it's not really my thing.  As a general rule I stay away from reality television unless it involves cooking or Marie Kondo.  But it's always intriguing to see who is cast each season on the show, trying to figure out how the phrase "star" will be stretched this year.  Among the contenders on this season are supermodel Christie Brinkley, actress Kate Flannery, and NBA star Lamar Odom (fulfilling an apparent mandate that at least one person connected with the Kardashians appear in each season).  But the two names that are making the most headlines this week from the show seemingly are from divergent parts of the political & entertainment world: Queer Eye star Karamo Brown and former Trump White House press secretary Sean Spicer.

Spicer's appearance on this show seems, well, disgusting.  We've discussed Spicer's attempts in the past to make the most out of his time in the Trump administration when he had a guest spot at the Emmys (still haven't forgiven Stephen Colbert or James Corden for that yet), and it seems even more damning three years into the Trump administration that he would be given this kind of opportunity.  The man repeatedly demonized the truth, lied to the American people, attacked members of the press like April Ryan and Jim Acosta, and seemingly defended Hitler during Passover.  About the only thing nice I can say about him is that he's better than Sarah Huckabee Sanders, but literally that bar is so low it's looking up at the Marianas Trench.  ABC putting him on their program, calling the lies and harm he has done to the American people cheeky, celebrity entertainment is an insult, and unforgivable.  Shame on all of them, and about the only person who comes out of this looking good at all might be the program's host Tom Bergeron, clearly disgruntled and putting out about as heated of a press release as one could expect from a man who makes Lawrence Welk look like Che Guevera.

Karamo Brown could have chosen to say nothing.  No one begrudges him the money and extra celebrity that comes with this gig.  As the initial Queer Eye guys could tell you, this isn't a career track with a long shadow, so it's best to cash in as much as you can before the 15 minutes are up, and the Queer Eye guys seem to be like genuinely good people who have randomly won the lottery.  But Brown was either unprepared to step into such a quagmire after being in the feel-good glow of Queer Eye's press or has lost perspective with what Spicer and his administration are doing to the LGBT community and communities of color, because he was dismissive of the Spicer controversy, saying he viewed this as a way for them to "meet in the middle" and that he's a "good guy, a really sweet guy."  Brown has since been raked across Twitter, to the point where it appears he has deactivated his account on the social media platform (as of at least this writing-it's not been announced publicly but his page says his account no longer exists).

White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer (R-VA)

There's three things I want to get to here, but the first is the "good guy, a really sweet guy" thing.  Here's the deal-I've met politicians of both parties.  I've met Democrats that were jackasses and I've met Republicans that were quite charming.  Mary Kiffmeyer, a state senator who once made a comment about biracial people not living as long because of "genetics" was very gracious to me in real life (in hindsight, probably because I'm white and looked like Opie Taylor at the time).  Samantha Bee, perhaps the TV personality who has been most critical of the Trump administration, has mentioned multiple times that Kellyanne Conway is "lovely & pleasant" in person.  Conway, in fact, gets these sorts of comments from pretty much any reporter willing to discuss what she's like off-stage, describing her as someone with a solid sense-of-humor and easy to talk to.  But this doesn't make her (or Kiffmeyer) a good person-being kind to someone to their face isn't the same as being a good person, it just means that you have good manners.  A "good guy, a really sweet guy" is not someone whose sole fame comes from lying to the American people, violating the public trust, and who has spent the past 2.5 years trying to make life hell for people who look like (and love like) Karamo Brown.  Brown dismissing all of the concerns that others have about Spicer because he was charmed by him face-to-face is naive (at best).

Because the reality is that Sean Spicer is a celebrity because of his actions in office, and nothing more.  That's why he's on the show, so if you think that those things are bad, there's no reason to reward him with a salary that most Americans don't make in a year, if not several years.  It's not a case where, even if you didn't like Kate Flannery's politics you could still like her acting or where you appreciate Lamar Odom's athletic prowess even if you find him a louse in his romantic relationships.  ABC gave this spot to Spicer because they thought it would goose ratings, but were willing to do so without any consideration for what they were condoning, what they were willing to reward with a platform and airtime and money and a wider audience.  And Brown condoning that makes it okay for someone else to copy Spicer's plans of being "sweet & kind" to the faces of unsuspecting celebrities, all-the-while tearing apart the communities of which those celebrities are the public face.

Before I go, I want to address one last comment that Brown made, and that's the "meeting in the middle."  While the "nice guy, a really sweet guy" thing is heinous and unforgivable, I want to get to this other part of his comments because they seem to have better intentions.  After all, there is some truth to the idea that meeting people of color or LGBT people changes people's perceptions of these communities for the better.  I know in my world I have relatives and friends that were far more homophobic before they knew they had a gay guy in their midst than after, and while that's not necessarily the way it should work, it's frequently the way it does work, and I'm sure Brown has seen that in his real-life.

But Sean Spicer is not someone who hasn't encountered gay people or communities of color in his life.  He's not some random person on the street, but instead someone who has dedicated his life to politicians who have made it harder for communities of color and LGBT people to live their lives with full and equal rights.  Trump wasn't his first foray into politics-he's worked for everyone from George W. Bush to Clay Shaw to Mark Foley, and has made a career of denying our community rights.  He's not someone that needs a lesson in what he's done-he's more than well-aware of it, and any public concessions that he wants to change seem opportunistic in hopes of cashing in with a lucrative reality TV gig rather than actually being conciliatory about his time in the Trump administration.  Brown trying to meet in the middle will give Spicer cover, but it won't actually change his heart-if his heart was going to change, it would have done it by now.  Instead, it just provides cover for him to get away with what he's done.  The correct actions here would have been to publicly denounce Spicer, knowing that Brown himself is the more valuable asset to ABC (as he's the bigger star on the show).  His unwillingness to risk that makes any political capital that Brown might expend on pet issues like HIV stigma & gun control meaningless, because when he was put in an actual position of power to do something and fight against people who would continue to hurt disenfranchised communities, he chose to simply say that the person who stood in the way of everything he believed in was a "nice guy."