So, Paula Deen is back in the news because of an “I Love Lucy” homage from a past show. In the still — which has been extensively tweeted and retweeted — her son, presumably dressed as the Desi Arnaz character (or perhaps little Ricky), is in brownface. Despite the fact that Desi Arnaz was a white Cuban-American (and so was little Ricky), the brownface is clearly the signifier for “Latino.”

Deen, who in 2013 made news when she admitted to using the N-word and indulging in “casual” racism, quickly fired the social media manager who tweeted the newly revealed 2011 photo. 

It may be offensive to us, but her defenders are quick to tell us to develop a sense of humor, and excuse it because “it’s only a Halloween costume.”

Meanwhile, when Donald Trump said: “When Mexico, meaning the Mexican government, sends its people … They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems to us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists,” his defenders contorted themselves six ways from Sunday to remember the statement as being specific to undocumented immigrants rather than wholesale anti-Mexican (later expanded to anti-Latin American) sentiment.

Even more recently, Trump has reached back into the anti-immigrant bag of tricks to stoke fear of disease (“Tremendous infectious disease is pouring across the border. The United States has become a dumping ground for Mexico...,” says the Donald). Those who excuse his every utterance do so even when presented with World Bank statistics which show that  Mexico has a 99 percent vaccination rate compared to the U.S.’s 93 percent. (Ironically, anti-vaxxers in the United States tend to be exactly those white, ultra-conservative Americans who are so fearful of immigrants.)

And then there is Bill Cosby, who has been accused by remarkable number of women — we’re talking double digits — of having drugged them to have non-consensual sex. Just this week the AP managed to get part of the transcript of a previous suit against him released and unsealed. In it, Cosby admitted to purchasing quaaludes with the intent to give them to women with which he wanted to have sex. 

But no matter, Cosby defenders have long defended him by saying the women accusing him were gold-diggers and fame-seekers and not to be believed.

Why do we give celebrities, would-be politicians and cultural moralists a pass on their stupid, racist or criminal behavior? Why do we leap to their defense even to the point of ridiculing offense and dismissing fact?

In the case of both Deen and  Trump, those who defend them dismiss as exaggeration or misdirection the words and sentiments of precisely those at whose heart the brownface and ethnic/racist lies strike. Cosby’s case is more complicated, but his defenders, too, turn victim to victimizer.

The danger of this mindset is that it doesn’t stay in the stratosphere of celebrity and national figures, but leaks into our every day experience. Police brutality, school-to-prison pipeline, even cuts to entitlement programs all rely on our being willing to come up with  excuses for what is inexcusable — a deaf ear, a hard heart and an unwillingness to make amends.