Justin Bieber, We Don't Accept Your Apology

I remember being 15-years-old and hearing certain friends - invariably white friends who'd only come alive when they were surrounded by other white people - making gross racist jokes for cheap laughs. I still know the exact smirk with which I was asked "why black people have white palms?" or "what's the difference between Santa Claus and a Jew?" and the mirthful way the punchlines were delivered. You can draw a direct line between a two-year-old discovering the vocabulary they can use to describe their own faeces and a 15-year-old making racist jokes because they know they shouldn't. It's the same morbid delight with breaking a taboo.

The joke Justin Bieber made isn't the passive racism of xenophobia, or the outdated, politically incorrect racism of Jeremy Clarkson. It's the gleeful racism of the National Front - a infantile punchline with threatening undertones, not really a joke at all - it's intimidation that demands affirmation through laughter. Justin Bieber understands the power imbalance that creates prejudice, and although he probably disagrees with it, he knows he's on the dominant side of that imbalance. Telling racist jokes for fun is basically bathing in white privilege like a pig in shit.

What's particularly noticeable is that, at 15, Justin Bieber had surrounded himself with black musicians and producers. He'd been working intensively with Usher, songwriter Ezekiel Lewis, and Ludacris. He was not a sheltered Scottish islander who didn't know any better, he was a global R&B star. Indeed, like many white musicians he was benefiting from the inherent racism of the pop market by taking black styles of music and re-packaging them for a young white audience.

As the Los Angeles Times wrote at the time: "Though a product of a middle-class suburban upbringing in Stratford, Ontario, Bieber's manner of dress and speech ('Wassup man, how you doin'?' or 'It's like, you know, whateva') suggest he's mimicking his favorite rappers."

Once again this feels like classic power-trip skinhead racism, admiring and imitating a culture you also seek to denigrate. What's especially remarkable, is that neither the girl sitting next to Bieber, nor the person heard off camera, seems to flinch when Bieber makes the jokes. Instead, the voice makes the half-hearted suggestion that the gag would also work with a motorbike. Not only does their lack of response suggest this may not be the first time they've heard the singer make these kind of comments, it's a pretty damning bit of evidence for why child stars, especially Bieber, end up so messy. If the people around Bieber won't even call him out on his racist shit, knowing he's being filmed for a documentary, then you know they won't be calling him out on anything else: violent mistreatment of fans, coming out against abortion even in the case of rape, or using a torch to select women he wants to sleep with.

Today, Bieber apologised for the comments with a picture he posted on Twitter. This also has to be called into question. One year ago, Bieber wrote an open letter to fans attempting to clear up some allegations that had been made about him in the press. It was misspelt and poorly punctuated, including lines like "if Anyone believes i need rehab thats their own stupidity lol I’m 19 with 5 number one albums" (sic) and "I know my talent level and i know i got my head on straight. i know who i am and i know who i’m not My messege is to to believe" (sic).

By contrast, this apology is written in pretty perfect English, and uses a lot of the known PR tricks politicians are advised to use when apologising for a fuck-up, demanding credit for being honest and using language to distance your current incarnation from an "other" version of yourself you no longer recognise. Perhaps Justin Bieber's grasp of English has come on a lot since 2013. Perhaps he didn't have much to do with this apology at all.

I'm not saying Justin Bieber harbours racist views or that teenagers don't make mistakes. I'm saying it's foolish to look at racism and remorse without context, and in the context of Justin Bieber, it seems this was not an ill-informed mistake but a demonstration of his impeachability. The fact that Bieber has apologised today, five years after this video was recorded, after, The Sun claims, numerous attempts by Bieber's team to keep the footage out of the public eye, spending money to silence those who knew of its existence, means it's not really an apology at all. Apologies are voluntary, this is just what you do when you get caught

Follow Sam on Twitter: @SamWolfson

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