Shot Down! 'Duck Dynasty' Star Phil Robertson Put On 'Indefinite Hiatus' From The Show After Controversial Remarks
Dec. 18 2013, Published 8:25 p.m. ET
Duck, duck -- cut him loose! Duck Dynasty star Phil Robertson has been placed on "indefinite hiatus" following anti-gay and controversial racist remarks he made in a recent interview with GQ.
"We are extremely disappointed to have read Phil Robertson's comments in GQ, which are based on his own personal beliefs and are not reflected in the series Duck Dynasty," A&E said in a statement. "His personal views in no way reflect those of A&E Networks, who have always been strong supporters and champions of the LGBT community. The network has placed Phil on hiatus from filming indefinitely."
As RadarOnline.com has reported, Robertson came under fire for the explosive comments about gay people and race released earlier today.
“It seems like, to me, a vagina -- as a man -- would be more desirable than a man’s anus," Robertson says in the January issue of the men's magazine. "That’s just me. I’m just thinking: There’s more there! She’s got more to offer. I mean, come on, dudes! You know what I’m saying? But hey, sin: It’s not logical, my man. It’s just not logical. Start with homosexual behavior and just morph out from there. Bestiality, sleeping around with this woman and that woman and that woman and those men."
GLAAD slammed those remarks as "some of the vilest and most extreme statements uttered against LGBT people in a mainstream publication," and said "his quote was littered with outdated stereotypes and blatant misinformation."
Unfortunately for Robertson, that wasn't the interview's only contentious point, as he also told GQ that he believed reports of black Americans' suffering in the pre-civil rights era South were exaggerated.
He said, “I never, with my eyes, saw the mistreatment of any black person in the pre-civil rights era South. Not once. Where we lived was all farmers. The blacks worked for the farmers. I hoed cotton with them. I’m with the blacks, because we’re white trash. We’re going across the field…. They’re singing and happy. I never heard one of them, one black person, say, ‘I tell you what: These doggone white people’—not a word!… Pre-entitlement, pre-welfare, you say: Were they happy? They were godly; they were happy; no one was singing the blues.”
The National Executive Director of Al Sharpton's National Action Network spoke out to RadarOnline.com to slam the comments as "narrow-minded" and "cretinous."
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“The comments made by Phil Robertson represent ignorance in its highest form,” Janaye Ingram told RadarOnline.com exclusively. “His narrow-minded delusions about the state of happiness felt by black people during the 50s and 60s civil rights era are some of the same arguments spewed by the proponents of Jim Crow laws at that time and obviously are contrary to the truth. He is not an authority on the Black experience, no matter how many Black people he has known, seen, or heard sing."
"The striving for equal rights would have never had to pass through him to be achieved, and most importantly, could have put those Blacks who did complain at risk if he or his family believed that blacks were inferior and in their rightful place in society,” she continued. “Because of that, I would never expect him to be an expert on what the Black experience was like at that time. Even with his statement, he addresses the inequality that existed by almost asserting that the only reason he was with or around Black people was because he and his family were ‘white trash.’ He may accept a lower than equitable status for himself and his family, but he cannot transfer his acceptance to black people.”
Robertson issued his own statement in response to the criticism. “I myself am a product of the '60s," he claimed. "I centered my life around sex, drugs and rock and roll until I hit rock bottom and accepted Jesus as my Savior. My mission today is to go forth and tell people about why I follow Christ and also what the Bible teaches, and part of that teaching is that women and men are meant to be together. However, I would never treat anyone with disrespect just because they are different from me. We are all created by the Almighty and like Him, I love all of humanity. We would all be better off if we loved God and loved each other.”
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