John Oliver compares the Confederacy to sex offender Jimmy Savile: 'America’s tracksuit sex offender'

Stephen Colbert also appeared on the episode of Last Week Tonight

Jack Shepherd
Monday 09 October 2017 09:16 BST
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John Oliver: The Confederacy is America's Jimmy Savile

Over the last few weeks, the Confederacy has been widely debated, sparked primarily after white supremacists protested a Confederate statue being taken down in Charlottesville.

Due to the ongoing conversation, John Oliver decided to tackle the subject on Last Week Tonight, beginning with a comparison to Jimmy Savile.

The former English TV personality was celebrated while alive, being honoured with a knighthood. However, following Savile’s death, allegations of sexual abuse were finally reported, memorials to the offender being removed from around the UK.

“Once we found out he was a monster, we decided it was not right to publicly glorify him,” Oliver told the audience. “Which brings us to our main story, the Confederacy: America’s tracksuit sex offender.”

Oliver then spoke about the history of the Confederacy, explaining how Confederates were fighting for the right to keep slaves” “To put it simply, they wanted to own black people, and they didn’t much care how.”

However, only 38% of Americans actually know what the Confederates fought for. Oliver reasoned that history cannot be changed — “I’m English and I would like to go to an Indian restaurant at some point in my life” — but concluded some parts of history cannot be celebrated.

“Some of these statues commemorate people who fought a war to preserve slavery, were erected to assert white supremacy, and were dedicated by clan members,” Oliver said. “Yet there’s a blanket deference given by everyone, including this guy.”

The host then played a clip of Trump saying history should be preserved” “You really do have to ask, ‘where does it stop?’” Oliver quipped back that there is an answer to that question, because everything stops somewhere: “You let your kid have twizzlers but not inject black tar heroin.”

Oliver then offered some statues that could replace those celebrating Confederates, including Robert Smalls, a former slave who became the first black member of Congress.

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For a statue South Carolina could have, Oliver said: As for Charleston, South Carolina, Oliver argued, “Why have a divisive Confederate statue when that pedestal can be filled by your favourite son, the Actual Stephen Colbert, who will stand there all day and tell you fun facts about your wonderful, town?”

Underneath a sheet was, indeed, the real Stephen Colbert, who offered some fun facts about Charleston, including the city being home to America’s first free public library. Watch the clip below.

Last week, Oliver called out Donald Trump over his “racist” response to Puerto Rico, particularly the President’s comments on the people of Puerto Rico being lazy.

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