‘Good Bones’: Tad Starsiak Levels With His Followers, Weighs in on Capitol Riots

Good Bones star Tad Starsiak invited fans along for a lengthy discussion of American politics on Thursday, following the U.S. Capitol Riot. The reality star has never been quite this explicit with his politics before, but now dedicated several minutes to discussing why the insurrectionists on Wednesday cannot be fairly compared to Black Lives Matter protesters. His post stirred up a lot of conversation.

Starsiak spoke from his car in an Instagram Live broadcast that went on about seven minutes. He said: “I wanted to share my thoughts on what happened yesterday with storming the Capitol, and how it compares to the Black Lives Matter movement, and what happened in the summer, and why that’s erroneous. First, I want to strongly condemn what happened yesterday — that was a domestic terrorist attack. Those are not patriots.”

Starsiak spoke in a calm and even tone, but left no doubt how he felt about the attack on the Capitol. He was particularly upset by those comparing Wednesday’s mob to Black Lives Matter protesters during the summer, describing the fundamental differences between the two crowds’ goals. He referred to the writings of the 18th-century philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who devised the idea of a “social contract.”

Starsiak argued that Black Lives Matter protesters were demanding the rights they are owed under our current “social contract,” while the Capitol rioters aimed only to destroy the contract altogether. He argued that any equivalency drawn between the two groups was false.

“Okay, ‘there was rioting, rioting in both places’ — well let’s break that down also!” Starsiak said, paraphrasing the kind of talk he had been seeing online. “So, if you look throughout history, unfortunately, violence has been a means to create change. When we were involved with Britain, we had the Boston Tea Party, where we said ‘F— your goods, we’re going to toss this s— over because you care about money.’ …When Emmett Till whistled at a white woman, it wasn’t until the Black community got violent that changes were made. It wasn’t Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. marching peacefully that created change — what it was was when he got shot in the head. And then the Black community — and hopefully a good amount of the white community — flipped out.”

To Starsiak, the conspiracy theories that drove the rioters on Wednesday could not be compared to the real incitement of the people he listed above. He said: “Yesterday, non-patriots — domestic terrorists — stormed our Capitol building. They prevented our elected officials from carrying out the duties of their constituents. Huge, huge issue.”

“Why is this different? Because they have also signed the social contract, they were born into the social contract,” he went on. “So, where Black Lives Matter is trying to get their rights, trying to uphold the social contract, you now have a group inspired by Trump to tear down the social contract… they’re trying to tear that s— out and say ‘You know what, we don’t care about the social contract. We want what we want,’ and they threw a tantrum.”