Professor tweets federal shutdown is about racism

Heidi Hall | The Tennessean

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — A provocative religion commentator returned Wednesday to Twitter after some accused her of racism over her tweet that the government shutdown had racist underpinnings.

"Please note that the last govt shut down was with the fake black president Clinton. Now they are have a real black president to mess with," Anthea Butler, a University of Pennsylvania associate professor of religious studies and Vanderbilt University graduate, tweeted Monday. And later: "I'm going to bed. Sad thing is, when I wake up, these crazy republicans will still be frothing at the mouth while folks sign up 4Obamacare."

The comments prompted a round of retweets and responders calling Butler herself racist. Most notably, the conservative-leaning site CampusReform.org, which touts itself as a place that exposes abuse and bias on college campuses, compiled the tweets into an article posted Tuesday.

"I see the lovely folks at campus reform have decided to curate my tweets again. Folks, this is just old. We're all angry about shutdown," Butler tweeted in response.

Butler spent this morning responding to angry tweeters calling her racist, some even using the "n word."

"What is so damn funny about this racist stuff is I will see my white Goddaughter and her kids this weekend, haha. But yo, I hate white folks," she wrote.

Butler was a prestigious Cole lecturer at Vanderbilt last year, speaking on "Whitewashing the Past: The Religious Right and the Quest to Reframe American History."

She made headlines earlier this year after the George Zimmerman verdict in the Trayvon Martin case, writing a blog that said the not-guilty finding supported the idea that the American version of God is racist: "I know that this American god ain't my god. As a matter of fact, I think he's a white racist god with a problem."

She explained later that it was a reference to Zimmerman's comment that the shooting was God's will.

The federal government shut down Monday after Congress failed to come to an agreement on the debt ceiling, in part over a failed Republican plan to delay the Affordable Care Act for a year. Most popular religious thinkers seem to be avoiding the topic on Twitter, but not all.

Atheist Richard Dawkins tweeted Tuesday: "Obamacare: someone tweeted me it's 'forcing an entire country into slavery.' WHAT? Others complain it's a tax. Of course it is. Is that bad?"

Christian financial guru Dave Ramsey tweeted Monday: "Federal Employees are insulted twice today. First they are declared 'nonessential,' then they arent paid. #Ouch" And then: "Good News: your life was never dependent upon the Gov.....Now you will get to realize it."

And then there's the sometimes foul-mouthed @TheTweetofGod on Wednesday: "I work in mysterious ways, but Congress doesn't work in pretty obvious ones."