Insert Foot vs. Scott Adams and “Dilbert.”

I was going to join the chorus last week and rip Scott Adams for showing how much of a racist he is, and explain why he’s wrong, but why? At this point, either you’re racist or you’re not. If there’s not enough evidence in front of you to make an informed decision, please exit the cave and join us.

Publications are dropping Adams’ “Dilbert” comic strip like a burning cow pie as it turns out America’s favorite workplace satirist probably thinks South Africa was really onto something with Apartheid.

Not that it matters now. He already took enough of our money to buy his own island and populate it with his fellow white “victims.” And it’s not surprising, considering the lack of people of color in “Dilbert” and the white man victimhood spreading like daycare sniffles the past few years. I just wish Adams would’ve shown us what an obvious racist dick he is 25 or 30 years ago, so we could’ve asked ourselves back then if we wanted to give a racist – albeit one who was funny – our money.

I guess I joined the chorus after all. But no one should have to explain what’s racist and why it’s wrong by now.

If you missed it, Adams shared his opinions on his YouTube show Feb. 22. Referring to a Rasmussen survey of 1,000 American adults, Adams decided nearly half of Black people don’t think it’s OK to be white.

The rhetorical question is about as loaded as an assault rifle on Lauren Boebert’s Christmas card. Which is why it’s become a rallying cry for the racist corn nuts of America. “Is it OK to be white” … what a whiney, snowflaky thing to say.

Adams took the bait. This is a master satirist of workplace culture we thought had not only the ability to contextualize hysteria but was intelligent enough not to take offense in the basest of human arguments: I’m white, you’re not; Who’s better?

Guess not.

The poll said 72 percent of the 1,000 American adults (assumedly of various races) said it’s OK to be white, including 53 percent of Black people. The poll also said 79 percent of respondents agreed with the statement, “Black people can be racist, too,” including 66 percent of Black respondents.

But guess what the rich white victim focused on?

So 26 percent of Black poll takers said it’s “not OK to be White” and another 21 percent said they weren’t sure. I’m not sure either, and I’m white. It depends on who asks the question and what they believe being “white” means.

But Adams interpreted it as 47 percent of Black people think it’s not OK to be white. He went on to recommend segregated neighborhoods.

“The best advice I would give to white people is to get the hell away from Black people,” Adams said, according to Huff Post. “Just get the fuck away.  Wherever you have to go, just get away.” That was not all: “There’s no fixing this … you just have to escape. So that’s what I did, I went to a neighborhood where I have a very low Black population.”

Good God. So we should solve our country’s racial problems by not trying to understand each other. We should just give up and live apart.

What an elitist coward.

It’s disappointing to hear that from a supposed smart, funny guy. It’s an absolutely gloomy take on America from a man – an American cultural touchstone – for whom America has worked incredibly well.

I’m not making that up. “Dilbert” made Adams a star in the ’90s. The strip was funny because it reflected things we knew. Unfortunately, it was so accurate, it didn’t include any people of color in Dilbert’s white-collar workplace full of white people trying to outsmart each other.

Adams didn’t have enough imagination to include People of Color because … duh. Either he didn’t think of it because they weren’t part of white-collar work culture, or Adams simple didn’t want them because he didn’t believe they belonged there.

I guess we missed that part of the jokes. We used to miss a lot of things staring us in the face, because doing so involved admitting we screwed up. And who likes to do that? Right. We hadn’t “woke” up yet.

We knew Adams – who made millions pulling himself up by the bootstraps and drawing cartoons – was a Trumper who echoed the tired crap about being a victimized white man. America is just unfair like that. He did finally introduce a Black character in “Dilbert” after more than three decades, but only to make fun of “woke” people.

I talked to Adams a couple times back in the ’90s. He was such a big deal that I did a story about his assistant whom he paid to shade his cartoons or something. The other time we spoke was for a story I did about a mail robot going berzerk at Pacific Bell in San Ramon, allegedly injuring a worker, who turned around and sued. That was kind of funny (says the guy not attacked by a robot).

Adams, who lives in the East Bay and based much of “Dilbert” on his experiences working at the company, was very nice when I called. He said they had nicknames for the robots, including Mail-in Manson.

So racists can be funny. OK. But it’s just incredible we’re still doing this in 2023.

Black Americans weren’t migrant workers. They were hauled here in chains, stacked like lumber, and kept as possessions for centuries. They haven’t been treated much better since, and it pisses many of them off. It pisses off many of the rest of us. You either understand there are reasons for people feeling how they feel, or you lie to yourself because you feel better.

But how does someone who was seemingly so funny and accurate when it came to human behavior end up getting so much wrong?

Follow music critic Tony Hicks at Twitter.com/TonyBaloney1967.