The problem with government officials and police officers who share their bigoted beliefs online is that they often do so without fear of retribution. From their armchair, the post isn’t racist, and it certainly won’t affect their employment.
But we never actually read about the officials who express their racist commentary with impunity, we read about the ones who are exposed. And it’s a glorious occasion when a troll faces the formerly inconceivable consequences of their click.
A Georgia magistrate judge from Gwinnett County is the newest member of the “forced to resign for being racist on Facebook” club. Judge Jim Hinkle, the previous mayor of Grayson, GA, was suspended on Saturday after posting a horrendous take on the events in Charlottesville, VA.
Hinkle probably could have gotten away with his the first post he shared around midday Saturday. “In Charlottesville everyone is upset over Robert E. Lee statue,” Hinkle wrote according to a screenshot of the since deleted post obtained by The Gwinett Daily Post. “It looks like all of the snowflakes have no concept of history. It is what it is. Get over it and more on.”
Describing proponents of removing Confederate monuments as “the nut cases tearing down monuments” who are comparable to ISIS was, however, enough to lead the Chief Magistrate Judge to suspend Hinkle. On Thursday, Less than a day after he was suspended, Hinkle resigned.
Hinkle said he didn’t “see anything controversial” about the post when asked by The Atlanta Journal-Constituion — an unsurprising admission from a man who labeled the $20 bill featuring Harriet Tubman’s face as “the ugliest” bill of “any money ever.”
“But you know, with the way things are going in the world today I guess everything’s controversial,” Hinkle told The Journal-Constituion. It’s only controversial if you’re racist, Jim.