It’s too late to blacklist John Wayne, and it’s too illegal to ban his films, so critics are going after the only emblem they can: John Wayne Airport.
After Twitter exploded with vitriol toward the actor over a rediscovered 1971 interview with Playboy, people began calling for a boycott of Wayne’s films. Because that’s not enforceable, and righteous rage loves company, Pulitzer Prize-winner Michael Hiltzik argued that “It’s time to take John Wayne’s name off the Orange County airport.”
In his opinion piece published Thursday, Hiltzik writes that no one remembers why the California airport adopted Wayne’s name in 1979, but it might have been because Orange County, like John Wayne, was predominantly conservative.
Now, Orange County is only slightly conservative, and we all suddenly remember that Wayne had problematic views, it’s time to scrub away his name:
Wayne’s comments included that gay love stories were perverted, he believed in “white supremacy” until black people were more educated, and Native Americans were “selfishly” trying to keep their land.
The actor’s opinions have been in print for almost 50 years and, contrary to what some may think, they were problematic back then, too. Removing his name from Orange County’s airport now only validates what many Americans are coming to believe: You can’t say anything anymore, darn it, without being discovered and punished by the mob.
If you want to rename the airport, fine. Find out where to get the hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars it will take to rebrand and call it “Orange County Airport” or “Leo Fender.” But for goodness sake, not yet.
Don’t, like Wayne, become a reactionary.
