MORAN, NEW HAMPSHIRE — Dr. Ben Carson has drawn some controversial comparisons between slavery and other issues facing Americans today as he continues his bid for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination. Most recently the neurosurgeon turned politician compared abortion to slavery, saying that if he were elected he’d like to see the landmark Roe vs. Wade decision struck down and abortion made illegal with no exceptions for rape or incest, however he has also compared Obamacare to slavery in the past as well. While many of his critics say that these comments show how incredibly out of touch and unfit for the presidency he is, Carson was in New Hampshire over the weekend and at one campaign stop he drew yet another comparison to the slave trade.
“And so to me, it goes beyond he who smelt it dealt it,” Carson told the crowd assembled to hear him speak in Moran, New Hampshire at a bowling alley where Richard Nixon once threw a perfect game, “if you don’t claim your fart you are acting just like a slave holder would. It’s exactly like slavery to not own up to when you drop a pooter.” Carson said that he began thinking about the issue of fart ownership in an elevator last month at a campaign stop in Iowa.
Carson told his supporters and the press he was “on an elevator riding up quietly to the 15th floor” where he was going to be attending a fundraising dinner. “All of a sudden, there was a horrible, putrid smell in the elevator. I looked around,” Dr. Carson said, “and no one in the elevator was putting their thumbs on their forehead and extending their pinkies, which is of course the universal sign for, “I totally didn’t fart.” So, Carson says, he couldn’t do anything but “think about what happens when Americans don’t claim their flatulence.”
“If you don’t claim your farts, in my estimation you are no different than a slave owner,” Carson said. “Sure, you don’t own any black people as property. Sure, you find racism abhorrent, but just like with my other slavery comparisons, I’m not out to make any sense here. Just to use trigger words that make conservatives’ knees flail violently upward when they hear them.” Carson that “by leaving us all enslaved to our thoughts of who could have possibly broken wind, those who fart and don’t immediately fess up are putting us in literally the same chains that black people were sold into slavery in.”
When reporters asked Carson if there is anything else that reminds him even remotely of slavery, Carson replied, “It’s probably a shorter list if I give you the things that I don’t think are directly comparable to slavery.” He then took out a list he said he keeps in his pocket at all times and recited it from it. “M & M’s, electric guitars, lawn mowers, non-fiction books, fictional movies, time travel, space flight, alcohol, sex, Cheetos, mentholated cigarettes, bacon, Taco Bell, The Los Angeles Lakers, Jay Leno, AIDS, Chewbacca the Wookiee, half of the Beatles discography, and Fun Size candy bars all remind me of slavery in some way,” Carson said, adding, “and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Oh wait, icebergs totally remind me of slavery too,” and he jotted down something onto his list, folded it neatly, placed it in his pocket, and then ended the press conference.
