I hate to call out the Smithsonian for dumbassery, but, well, I'm going to call out the Smithsonian for dumbassery.  Remember last month when Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. donated the handcuffs that were used to arrest him to the Smithsonian's new Black History museum?  Well, apparently, the Smithsonian thinks that was of greater historical significance than O.J. Simpson's murder trial:

What O.J. Simpson wore when he was acquitted in 1995 of murdering his ex-wife and her friend was the suit seen around the world during one of the most watched televised moments in history.

 But the Smithsonian Institution, America’s repository of historical artifacts rejected it Tuesday as inappropriate for their collection.

 Announcement of the museum’s snub came the morning after a California judge approved the donation as the solution to a 13-year court battle over the carefully tailored tan suit, white shirt and yellow and tan tie. The ensemble has been held by Simpson’s former sports agent, Mike Gilbert.

Okay, look.  O.J. Simpson is a douchebag.  But the O.J. trial was of massive importance to this country.  Massive.  Everyone watched it, everyone still talks about it, and it was an historic event.  Period.

Henry Louis Gates, Jr., is a whiny self-important Harvard professor, who was arrested for refusing to comply with an officer of the law's requests for identification.  I know we had a heated discussion or two about whether it was okay for the guy to be arrested, but the fact is that the Beer Summit is nowhere near the same level of significance to American history that the O.J. murder trial is.

It's stupid to say, "Yeah, we'll take those handcuffs," and then, less than 30 days later, turn around and refuse to take the suit O.J. wore when he was acquitted.

I can't imagine that, in a museum collection of more than 142 million pieces, they don't have something else that is "inappropriate" to their collection, but I'm too lazy to go find something.

UPDATE:  Here's a list of some of the weird shit in the Smithsonian collection.  H/T to Patty Ann via this comment at The Hostages.

Posted by: Ember at 11:34 PM | Comments (11) | Add Comment
Post contains 361 words, total size 3 kb.