NOT INVITED ON BEHALF OF THE UYGHURS pic.twitter.com/uWbjgeIbbI

— Matt Schlapp (@mschlapp) January 19, 2022

At least Schlappy is disinviting an actual real life person as opposed to fictional characters this time around. We didn’t get to reporting this story at all this week here at National Zero, but Golden State Warriors co-owner Chamath Palihapitiya stirred up a shitstorm for himself when he said he said in a podcast interview “Nobody cares about what’s happening to the Uighurs, OK? You bring it up because you really care. And I think that’s nice that you care. The rest of us don’t care,” in response to one of the hosts praising Biden Administration policies toward China over the ongoing genocide in the region. Palihapitiya tried to walk it back and apologize, but he quickly became a target of right wingers who already think the NBA is too cozy with the ChiComs (and they’re not wrong, it is), with all sorts of wild-eyed, impotent outrage coming from the fanboys.

Palihapitiya said he didn’t care because he was far more worried about climate change, supply chain issues, and the economic disruption a Chinese invasion of Taiwan would cause. That still doesn’t make his callousness toward the Uighurs okay, but in context at least him snapping like that makes more sense. Having such concerns over climate change also makes it seem pretty unlikely Palihapitiya was planning on going to CPAC, but Schlapp wasn’t going to let that stop him.

We’re also left wondering why if condemning China’s real abuses toward an impoverished Muslim minority are a noble and righteous cause on the right then why aren’t Israel’s? There’s no equating the situations as China is far more destructive toward the Uighurs than Israel is to the Palestinians, but what’s different in scale and severity is largely the same in the toplines: A modern, organized state is depriving a Muslim population of basic human rights. And American Conservatives are rooting for one but not the other. Yeah, big shock that right wingers are fucking hypocrites, but this one particular flavor hasn’t really been highlighted much yet.