Usain Bolt, the world's fastest man, retained his title during the Rio Olympics, bringing home three more gold medals in the 100m dash, 200m dash, and 4x100 relay. In her usual comedic manner, Ellen took to Twitter to make a joke about Bolt's incredible speed.
Americans began to panic over the photoshopped picture, calling Ellen a racist who does not see her white privilege. However, Bolt himself retweeted the photo. He must have not viewed it as racist, but I am sure the photo's critics did not stop to ask him. If he said it is not racist, those people probably would have told him he still has a mindset of inferiority, which I have seen told to black people who do not search for a hint of racism in everything. Or maybe, and this is the more likely conclusion, he just thought the post was funny.
Ellen is a good person who would never set out to hurt someone. In an ironic twist, many of the people (liberals) criticizing her now are the same ones who have endlessly praised and admired her for being openly gay. She has met Usain Bolt and interviewed him on her show. The photo of him smiling towards the end of the 100m dash has been used in many fun memes, and Ellen's post was no different from those other ones. Her comedy has no intent but to be funny and entertaining, and that is all it was. Bolt even agreed (a retweet is pretty much an agreement), yet people are being offended FOR him.
This social media incident is indicative of a bigger problem within our society -- the rapidity at which our society cries racism. Even a small joke like Ellen's can spark national backlash. Even if the person who is supposedly being oppressed by it, in this case Usain Bolt, is not offended, society feels like they should be.
Our society is too offended as a whole. Pretty soon comedians like Ellen will not even have an outlet to express themselves because a joke may be offensive to someone. We do not need to look for any type of hate in everything we see. Especially in this case, anyone who has watched Ellen on TV knows she is not a hateful person.
Sometimes a funny joke is just that - a funny joke, and it's time American society accepted that not everything is something to be offended by.
