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Leave Michelle Obama Alone

Why the former First Lady skipping the inauguration is a valuable lesson

Rod T. Faulkner
3 min readJan 20, 2025
Graphic image of a young African American woman in business attire, arms folded, looking defiantly into the camera
A defiant young African American woman looking directly at you. | Image created by author using an AI tool.

Former First Lady Michelle Obama will not be attending the inauguration of Donald Trump.

The best part?

She gave no explanation.

Right on cue, reactions from the media and the right have been biased and racist. “She seems a little angry” performer Kid Rock told right-wing propaganda machine FOX News. His labeling of Mrs. Obama as “angry” is a direct through line to a stereotype of Black women straight from racists’ hymnals.

New York Magazine published an op-ed with the headline: Michelle Obama Isn’t Sick — She Just Hates Trump. The Washington Post (owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, a Trump supporter) released an article entitled Michelle Obama To Skip The Inauguration, Breaking With Tradition.

On social media, the right has been calling Mrs. Obama “immature,” “rude,” “graceless,” “tacky,” purposely mis-gendering her as male, and using other insulting, racist descriptors.

Those reactions are nothing new. Throughout Barack Obama’s two terms as president, Mrs. Obama endured a constant barrage of racist, misogynist attacks, including claiming she was actually a man and describing her as primates, such as an ape in heels and a…

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Rod T. Faulkner
Rod T. Faulkner

Written by Rod T. Faulkner

Proud Blerd. I write about sci-fi, fantasy, and other areas of interest. Founder of EYE ON SCI-FI Podcast. https://bio.site/eyeonscifi Chocolate lover.

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