Spike Lee Goes Off On Chris Hayes About Black-On-Black Crime

There were some minor fireworks on Tuesday night’s All In when host Chris Hayes challenged director Spike Lee over his new film, Chi-Raq. Specifically, Hayes asked Lee to respond to the criticism that his film’s focus on “black-on-black crime” is a red herring that is frequently used as a rejoinder to the #BlackLivesMatter movement. Lee was essentially not trying to hear that, noting that his film deals with “both sides.” Things got a little heated, and Lee even pulled out a “sir” on Hayes:

Chris Hayes: One of the things we hear all the time is black on black crime. you guys are protesting because you know, a cop shot this young black man but young black men kill young black men all the time. There’s a sense in which people feel like that is a disingenuous misdirection, on the part of some people, not everyone, obviously.

Spike Lee: First of all, people that look at my body of my work. I’m the director that made Do the Right Thing, Malcolm X, I could go on for another three hours. Look at the body of work. I did not get off just a turnip truck.

Hayes: No, I’m not accusing you of that…

Lee: Let me finish.

Hayes: Right, right, right.

Lee: Sir, it doesn’t matter to me what color or complexion that pulls the trigger. As an artist, I’m going to look at it, and look at both sides. There’s a specific scene where Samuel L. Jackson talks about it. Where he’s in the middle, there’s a gang banger on one side and Chicago cop on other. If you’re a parent — whether your child got killed by a gang banger or cop, you still feel the same.

Hayes: Right.

Lee: Your child is dead and your child is never coming back to you forever and for the rest of your life, you are going to have a hole in your soul. So it doesn’t matter. I’m not going to get about — it doesn’t matter to me.

Let me first say that…READ MORE

By: Tommy Christopher

Tommy Christopher is The Daily Banter's White House Correspondent and Political Analyst. He's been a political reporter and liberal commentator since 2007, and has covered the White House since the beginning of the Obama administration, first for PoliticsDaily, and then for Mediaite. Christopher is a frequent guest on a variety of television, radio, and online programs, and was the villain in the documentaries The Audacity of Democracy and Hating Breitbart. He's also That Guy Who Live-Tweeted His Own Heart Attack, and the only person to have ever received public apologies from both Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck.