Black Tennessee State Rep. Confronts White GOP Rep. Over Gun Control Legislation

They almost came to blows and fisticuffs.

Image: WKYC Channel 3 via YouTube

It is not true that people become liars without knowing it. A liar always knows that he is lying, and that is why all liars travel in packs in order to be reassured that the judgment day will never come for them. They need each other for the well-being, the health, the perpetuation of their lie. They have a tacit agreement to guard each other’s secrets, for they have the same secret.

— James Baldwin, No Name in the Street, 1972

During a recent hearing on gun control in the Tennessee legislature, black State Representative Justin Pearson verbally and physically challenged a white Republican colleague, Andrew Farmer.

Rep. Pearson’s ire was ignited by Rep. Farmer’s thinly veiled and downright callous remarks about Pearson’s putatively poor “work ethic.” Indeed, Farmer came thisclose to calling Pearson a lazy nigger.

Rep. Pearson had been a champion and “activist” for gun reform long before his election to the legislature. Recall that back in 2023, not long after his first election, he, along with fellow black Rep. Justin Jones, was unceremoniously expelled from the House by these…