Energy expert and philosopher Alex Epstein rebuked Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) during a wild moment at a congressional hearing in which she accused him of having “espoused White Supremacist views.” As Epstein’s presence at the hearing in 2023 was to provide his testimony about the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), he was caught off guard by Bush’s diversion into racism.
Bush initially accused congressional Republicans of entertaining the energy industry that negatively impacts minority communities. “But my Republican colleagues have an ironically invited for-profit think tank and oil titans whose expertise is in maximizing profits, especially at the expense of our black, our brown and our indigenous neighbors, health, safety and well being,” she said.
Continuing, Bush suggested that Epstein had spread White Supremacist views. “One of these so-called energy experts is a philosopher who has previously espoused white supremacist views,” she said. “For instance, in his 2000 college newspaper, he wrote quote ‘the African and American Studies Department has 23 classes. In many of these classes, African culture is presented not as inferior to Western culture, but as on equal footing with it in other departments, the same is done with Latin American Indian and American Indian culture. End quote.'”
She added, “When confronted about these views over two decades later, rather than disavow them, he doubled down on this narrative, saying, quote, ‘it has nothing to do with skin color. I was arguing that those cultures overall are inferior to Western culture.’ We are not inferior to any culture, speaking as a descendant of one of those cultures. This is the witness the Republicans invited to discuss issues of energy security.”
From there, Bush continued pushing the idea that fossil fuels have a disparate effect on minority communities, without substantiating how. “He came here to promote fossil fuels, which we know are disproportionately harming and killing black and brown people,” she said. However, Epstein decisively rebuked this tirade from Bush.
He denounced the egregious “attack” from Bush, stating, “Thanks for giving me a minute to address truly despicable and false attack on me, claiming that anything I’ve ever said is white supremacist, and then trying to imply that that somehow applies today. So I don’t know if you want to put those cards back up, but what I argued more, what I argued, and what I’ve argued for my entire adult life, is that Western culture is superior in the sense that it promotes individualism and freedom.”
Building on this point, he added, “And I have fought my entire life for freedom around the world, including in Africa, including in Asia, including in India. And I want everyone around the world to have the same opportunities that I do in the United States. There are different places around the world that are in many ways inferior.”
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Epstein explained that some cultural practices objectively are not conducive to human flourishing. “They have female genital mutilation, they have slavery. These are not as good as not mutilating females’ genitals and not enslaving people. And so I make no apology. And the idea that this is associated with skin color is despicable and racist. Skin color has nothing to do with ideas. Where you came from, geographically is irrelevant. What’s relevant is what’s true,” he said.
Continuing, the energy expert said, “And it it has proliferated to the great benefit of all. And it’s really, it’s really about, it’s not really about the location. It’s about individualism and freedom and reason. So it’s certain values that are universal human values, the idea that freedom and reason and individualism only apply to people of certain skin colors, that is the actual original racist idea, versus no, no, whatever your skin color is, these ideas are true and good for human flourishing.”
Watch Bush below:
Note: The featured image is a screenshot from the embedded video.