Daily Caller
February 20, 2019
Forty years after his death, John Wayne’s views on race and homosexuality have suddenly sparked a firestorm of tweets from users who believe his comments are somehow representative of America as a whole in the Trump era.
After a viral tweet began to circulate over the weekend, highlighting portions of a famous 1971 Playboy interview, the phrase “John Wayne” was trending on the platform by Tuesday evening as users found their feeds flooded with both outrage and confusion at the new-found relevancy of the interview.
The tweet highlighted particularly jarring portions of the interview, such as Wayne’s belief that films portraying homosexuality were “perverted,” and statements asserting that “blacks” were uneducated and therefore lacked adequate “responsibility” for leadership positions.
Pia Glenn, an actress who played Condoleezza Rice in Will Ferrell’s 2009 political comedy “You’re Welcome America,” asserted that there exist “direct lines” between Wayne’s language “and the country today.”
OK but to be fair, this was a very different time!
…now that I’ve gotten the attention of anyone who might agree with the above statement, let’s be clear that this is exactly who America’s “hero” was & let’s look at the direct lines between this language and the country today https://t.co/Uucec8NrA0
— @PiaGlenn (@PiaGlenn) February 19, 2019
I love the tweets explaining how John Wayne was born in the early 1900’s so we shouldn’t be horrified.
Ya gotta pick one. Are we trying to go back to those times or were those times terrible? Ya can’t make America great again while making excuses about how shitty it was.
— Elon James White (@elonjames) February 19, 2019
I am shocked that John Wayne, who was born in 1907 (!) made some un-progressive remarks in 1971. Just shocked. This is me being shocked.