Brooke Hogan has taken to her father Hulk Hogan’s defense, but sadly, she’s going about it in the wrong way.
The 27-year-old star told Entertainment Tonight that she’s standing by her father following his racist comments revealed in a recently leaked tape. “He’s so nice to everybody,” Hogan said of her father, who reportedly used the n-word multiple times in a tape leaked by Gawker. “He doesn’t talk like that, which is what was so strange about it.”
The former reality star said her father was in “the lowest point in his life” when he said the racial slurs in the tape, which was shot in 2006 and posted six years later. But Hogan continued to defend her father’s language by noting that he’s friends with people of color. “My dad’s best friends with Mr. T, he’s best friends with Dennis Rodman,” she said, “he’s not racist.” Just because Hulk Hogan is buddies with Mr. T doesn’t mean he can go around saying the n-word in an inflammatory manner.
But even worse, Brooke Hogan trivialized the offensive nature of her father’s words even further by comparing them to her own experiences with prejudice. “This is something that we have to put a stop to everyday,” she told ET, “because I’ll be honest with you, I’ve had a black guy call me a honkey, and I’ve also been told that white people smell like bologna. I don’t take offense to it, I just laughed at it.”
Sorry, Brooke, but that’s definitely not the same thing. One person being able to brush off an offensive slur with a laugh doesn’t mean all other experiences of being targeted by racism are invalid.
If Brooke Hogan really wanted help “put a stop” to racism, she should admit that her father was initially in the wrong, just as he did when he apologized following the leak. In a statement last month, the wrestler said, “It was unacceptable for me to have used that offensive language; there is no excuse for it; and I apologize for having done it.”
Hogan’s comments to ET follow Kelly Osbourne’s racist comment on “The View” on Tuesday regarding Donald Trump. Osbourne later apologized for her failed insult, but perhaps both women should take a seat when it comes to racial issues.
For more, head to ET.
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