On Monday Chelsea Handler posted an old clip of Louis Farrakhan on The Phil Donahue Show answering questions from a mostly white audience about white supremacy. “I learned a lot from watching this video,” Handler wrote, and apparently she wasn’t the only one. Actress Jessica Chastain also re-posted the video clip to her Instagram story, and according to several circulating screencaps of Jameela Jamil’s Instagram, she too may have posted it before deleting. “Powerful,” Lisa Rinna wrote in the comments to Handler’s video. “This should be played on a loop. Everywhere. Always,” wrote Sean Hayes.
Farrakhan, for the celebs who may be unfamiliar, is a minister and leader of the Nation of Islam, which has been classified as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. While he has denied being anti-semitic, Farrakhan has previously called Judaism a “gutter religion,” has referred to Adolf Hitler as a “great man,” and has spoken about “powerful” and “Satanic” Jews as being his enemy, among many other statements condemning Jewish people. But Handler seems to be familiar with his background, writing to a commenter who called her out for posting the video, “Hitler was responsible for killing millions of lives. Farrakhan is just responsible for his own promotion of anti-Semitic beliefs. They are very different.”
I know many celebrities right now are desperately trying to prove they have an activist streak, but hopefully they can do a little research before they post things to social media. It must be so hard not having a manager around to help you Google things!