Let’s get this out of the way: Racism isn’t funny. Now that we’ve added our disclaimer, let’s try to have some fun with an otherwise disturbing chart.
When President Obama won re-election, the angry losers of the 2012 race took to Twitter to sound off on their thoughts, feelings, and reactions. While many expressed disappointment, there were a noted few who expressed their uncensored disillusionment with bitter mudslinging and unapologetic racism.
This isn’t the kind of racism that’s just perceived – that gray area of an intense social issue where some Liberals like to relegate and brand their opponents when bereft of a substantive rebuttal. No, this is full-on, inexcusable, n-word-using racism.
So where’s it coming from?
Floating Sheep, a group of geography academics, combed Twitter for tweets that revealed racist terms coupled with mentions of “Obama,” “re-elected,” or “won.” They then took these tweets and graphed them by geographic location, which is where you get the image above. The chart speaks for itself, but there are a few things we have to clear up.
It’s all very math-y (you can check out a good “for dummies” explanation at Mashable) but before we over-react with “Oh, the South is full of racists? Big surprise…” you should know that he chart above represents 395 tweets total. Yes, 395 racists is indeed too many racists, but the density of the scary red dots on the chart can appear misleading.
It’s still hate. It’s still disturbing. It’s still racism. I just don’t want you to lose hope for the US of A over 395 tweets.
Jezebel posted a slideshow of the “choicest” racist tweets immediately following the 2012 election here. Otherwise, here’s the list of “most racist” states in light of Twitter reactions to the 2012 election:
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