It was bound to happen.
If you are a white person and don’t loudly and endlessly proclaim that you are “anti-racist,” then you are a racist to the Woke.
If you are a white person and have actually done things to help Black people, then you are derisively slurred as a “white savior.”
By some of the Woke.
And that’s where mayoral candidate and ShopRite owner Jeff Brown finds himself.
He has opened some of his supermarkets in minority neighborhoods a.k.a. “Food deserts,” he has hired ex-cons a.k.a. “Returning citizens,” he has talked the talk and walked the walk, yet gets labeled “white savior” by self-appointed Black savior Asa Khalif, a so-called “racial justice activist” who has a potty mouth, a bullhorn and virtually no followers.
I first heard of him some years ago when he claimed to be the local leader of Black Lives Matter. Alas, the actual leaders of Black Lives Matter said, uh, no he’s not.
As a matter of fact, Black Lives Matter Philadelphia said, “Any attempts on his behalf to promote himself as the voice of Black Philadelphia activists is disingenuous and self serving.”
But some in the media, a few anyway, keep pretending he is more than a solitary actor reciting a soliloquy with a loud voice.
There are racial inequities in our society, but Khalif’s actions are designed more to draw attention to himself than to solve problems — such as by interfering with government process and by vilifying police in an attempt to provoke them into striking back.
I have seen him get in the face of white cops and call them MFers and racists, while using the N-word on Black cops. Provocative without purpose.
In 2017, Khalif and a henchman disrupted a planned City Hall news conference. Here’s how I described the scene:
“City Council President Darrell Clarke was at the lectern when Khalif and Gardner started screaming about justice, dropping the F-bomb and the MF-bomb, and actually questioning Clarke’s blackness. Clarke responded that he grew up in North Philly.
“To Clarke’s right, Mayor Kenney was twisting in a throne-like chair, his chin resting on his right palm, his face expressionless. Here’s a pet Kenney project announcement being torpedoed, and what does he do? Nothing.”
After being harangued for 10 minutes, Clarke and Kenney slithered out of the room, handing Khalif a victory.
“This is part of an ongoing campaign, with Khalif promising to ‘shut down’ any meeting he chooses. His rationale is that City Hall is the ‘people’s house’ and that he has a right to speak and protest peacefully.”
That is unquestioned, but City Hall is everyone’s house, and he has no right to stop business. That’s not free speech — it’s anarchy.
In 2019, Khalif ran for an at-large seat on City Council, and that proved to be a big mistake. He received 1.4% of the vote, which placed him lower than whale dung in the results. His astonishingly poor showing proved that when he speaks, he is speaking for himself and practically no one else.
In January of that year, Philadelphia magazine profiled Khalif, and the headline said “he might just have a shot” at being elected.
Robert Huber wrote the profile — he didn’t write the headline — and made the mistake of calling Khalif a leader of BLM, which we know he was not. But he did present an accurate bio of Khalif, complete with his vocabulary dominated by MFers.
So this is the guy, Khalif, who is throwing racial slurs at Jeff Brown, a guy who actually has improved Black lives through his stores’ policies.
As they say, critics are like a**holes. Everyone’s got one.
Why give Khalif any press at all? Have pity on him. Tell him as much. That will really get his goat. Keep up the good work Stu.
I don’t call him to comment on anything. Others do, desperate to cook up a story.
And amazingly, the Inquirer race baiters continue to give Larry Krasner, the real white savior, one pass after another.
👏👏👏
The path for race baiters was laid by the charlatan, Al Sharpton. He used the phony sexual assault on Tawana Brawley to stir up racial hatred. When the Brawley thing turned out to be false, instead of Sharpton being relegated to the ash pile of race baiters, he was made an icon of the Left. Let them reap what they have sown.
He’s just another race hustling, poverty pimp, just like those phony “Revs” Al Sharpton & Jesse Jackson” (& both are ” limousine liberals”).
The “he” being Asa Khalif, to eliminate any possible confusion.
As is my custom, I attended one of my Township’s Commissioner Board Meetings back in 2017. At the conclusion of that meeting I was convinced that racism, real or perceived, will be with us forever. Why? Because the “race card” is powerful and has no expiration date.
A that meeting there were five women, all in their mid-60’s who brought a complaint against one of their neighbors during Open Forum. Collectively, they complained their neighbor had a beautiful vegetable garden much like others in their neighborhood. However, this neighbor cultivated her vegetable garden in her front yard. The group of offended neighbors preferred her vegetable garden be located in her backyard like everyone else.
At this point the accused took the podium. She announced she was 27 years old and a Military Veteran (Thank You!). Then she proceeded to play the race card. She claimed she was being singled-out by this group of offended neighbors because she was black. It was at this point I realized racism is with us to stay. Why? Because all five of the 60-ish women bringing the complaint were also black.
This is a problem with no solution. Great reporting as usual. Thank you!
I remain optimistic the race card will abate over time as fewer people pay attention to it.
Somewhat sad, there ARE legitimate cases of racism that won’t believed because of all the cries of “wolf!”
Sadly, racism, like anti-Semitism and other hatreds, will be with us forever as there will ALWAYS be inexplicable haters.
Khalif’s name in Arabic means friend, respectfully, a successor to your family traditions and values. I wonder how proud his parents would be of his continuing their tradition. The media create these demagogues to stir those in power to give them credibility or call them out for what they are. Kenny is a pusillanimous mayor who should have ended that occasion by showing strength and masculinity by removing an illegal intrusion. Maybe as a sympathetic gesture, Jeff Brown could offer him a job in the produce section where he can relate to a being like a durian fruit.
😄
Shouldn’t it be “food deserts”, rather than “Food deserts,”
Yes, but sometimes spellcheck makes fixes difficult