EGOT winner Whoopi Goldberg has apologized for sparking outrage by saying that the Holocaust wasn’t about race during a segment on the The View, CNN reports.
Goldberg’s comments came during a Monday segment centering on a school district in Tennessee that decided to ban Maus, "a graphic novel that depicts the horrors of the Holocaust." Back in January, CNN reported that the McMinn County, Tennessee, Board of Education removed the book from the required eighth-grade English curriculum, arguing it was "rough, objectionable language" and it featured an inappropriate drawing of a nude woman.
During the discussion, co-host Joy Behar said that the nudity concerns were "a canard to throw you off from the fact that they don't like history that makes white people look bad."
In response, Goldberg stated she was surprised that the nudity in Maus and not the Holocaust itself was offensive to the school board.
"Well, this is white people doing it to white people, so y'all gonna fight amongst yourselves," Goldberg said.
As the conversation progressed, the panel spoke about America’s racist history and how that history should be taught in schools.
"If you're going to do this, then let's be truthful about it because the Holocaust isn't about race,” Goldberg said. She also added that the Holocaust, was about "man's inhumanity to man" and that it involved "two white groups of people."
Behar said that the Nazis considered Jews to be a different race altogether. Ana Navarro explained that the Holocaust was about white supremacy with the Nazis killing both Jewish and Roma people. Sara Haines added that the Nazis never viewed the Jews as white.
Throughout the discussion, Goldberg repeatedly insisted that the Holocaust wasn’t about race.
After her comments became a trending topic on social media, Goldberg took to Twitter to apologize for her comments on the show on Monday evening.
"On today's show, I said the Holocaust "is not about race but about man's inhumanity to man." I should have said it is about both," she wrote on Twitter.
"As Jonathan Greenblatt of the Anti-Defamation League shared, 'The Holocaust was about the Nazi's systematic annihilation of the Jewish people — who they deemed to be an inferior race.' I stand corrected."
"The Jewish people around the world have always had my support and that will never waiver. I'm sorry for the hurt I have caused,” she added.
