Whoopi Goldberg has spent the past 13 seasons on
The View giving her unabashed opinion without shame: the woman is a straight shooter and has no problem telling it like it is. So of course, as a guest on
Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen on June 14, she got straight to the heart of the matter when Cohen asked her what she thinks needs to be done to dismantle racism, referring to the past three weeks of BLM protests across the globe and the current civil rights moment.“Well racism is in the heart of the country; you can't get away from it,” Goldberg explained via video-chat from her home. “Children are taught it without realizing that that's what they're learning, so the first thing that has to happen is people have to first look at people and see them for who they are, not for who they fear they are, but who they actually are.”
Referring to the calls to end the militarization of the police, end police brutality and
defund police departments, the
Sister Act star added that law enforcement officers need to hold each other accountable. “Good cops have to call out bad behaviour here so we can get rid of the bad cops, and we reteach police departments around the country how to police again. Because now they're soldiers, and we're not in a war; we're not in wars in our towns and neighbourhoods.”The Queen of Frankly Speaking did not mince words when it came to her views on the POTUS either and how he’s willfully ignoring the problem of racism. “That is going to take the action of the federal government,” she said of police reform, “but we have a guy who doesn't believe that there is institutionalized racism. He says, ‘Well I don't believe it's there,’ but in fact it is.”[video_embed id='1976694']RELATED: Justice for Breonna Taylor: Celebs make a call to action [/video_embed]These comments dove-tail off of a video she posted
on Instagram on June 4
th, where she suggested that the killing of a civilian at the hands of police should have the same consequences at the killing of a cop at the hands of a civilian. “Every criminal knows if you injure a cop, if you shoot a cop, if you hurt a cop, there are huge consequences,” she said. “But I wonder if we could change that so that if a civilian dies in your custody it is the same as shooting a cop. If civilians are harmed in your custody, the same way police officers are hit, there should be consequences.” Her
Instagram as of late has been full of videos on her thoughts on the protests, looting and police brutality.Her views on systemic racism in America have clearly been affected by the killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and the current BLM protests taking to the streets across the globe, because as early as six years ago, Whoopi
got into a heated debate with Rosie O’Donnell live on
The View about that very topic, and famously said, “America is not just a racist country, because there are white people who get it. That is why I will not accept the blanket statement that America is racist.” Rosie O’Donnell later said that interaction, among others, was one of the reasons why working on
The View with Whoopi was the ‘"
worst experience" she’s ever had on live television.[video_embed id='1976458']RELATED: Dave Chappelle speaks on George Floyd’s killing in new special [/video_embed]
