![]() ![]() The good book tells us to take a speck out of own eye before trying to remove one from your brother’s eye. The thought of a black man with Chinese tattoos having a problem with a Taiwanese man in dreads is just comical. The voice of the black community continues to be disregarded and for this reason now isn’t the time for influential black personalities to make statements that will unfairly degrade our entire community.Ĭam Newton’s comments about women talking about “routes” as it pertains to pro football and Kenyon Martin’s commenting on Jeremy Lin’s dreadlocks, calling him “a damn boy” and adding “you want to be black” did nothing to help the cause or strengthen our voice as blacks in America and North America as a whole. Rebuttals like “Respect the flag!” and “Leave politics out of sports!” have filled social media comment sections for months, and continue to alter the original debate brought to the table by Kaep. That was over a year ago and up to this day many athletes, not just pro, all over America have been taking a knee, raising fists, wearing t-shirts and demonstrating protests in other peaceful ways.īut even with protests being peaceful, it would seem that many non-blacks aren’t in agreement with whatever protests are being made. Thanks for everything you did for the nets and hoops…had your poster up on my wall growing up.”īlack pro athletes have been under a microscope ever since Kaepernick decided to take a knee for the injustices experienced by blacks in America. And i think as minorities, the more we appreciate each other’s cultures, the more we influence mainstream society. At the end of the day i appreciate that i have dreads and you have Chinese tattoos bc I think it’s a sign of respect. “Actually i legit grateful you sharin it tbh. It’s all good you don’t have to like my hair and definitely entitled to your opinion,” Lin wrote. Surprisingly, Lin’s response was text book emotional intelligence: “Hey man. ![]() Former NBA player Kenyon Martin (left), Jeremy Lin’s controversial dreads (right) (credit: Keith Allison by CC) But the last name is Lin, all right?” Unlike Cam, I don’t think any additional comments are necessary to surmise what Martin meant. ![]() Somebody really need to tell him, like, ‘All right bro, we get it you want to be black.’ Like, we get it. “Like, there’s no way possible he would’ve made it on one of our teams with that bulls–t going on on his head. Let’s stop this man, with these people,” Martin said. Martin, after seeing a picture of Taiwanese American NBA player Jeremy Lin rocking dreads, was recorded on video saying, “Do I need to remind this damn boy that his last name is Lin? Like, come on man. In a response to a female reporter asking about football routes for a specific receiver, Cam responded, “It’s funny to hear a female talk about routes.” This of course was taken as “women don’t really know football so it’s funny to hear one of them ask that question.” Both were quoted making completely inappropriate comments and the timing couldn’t be worse. Such is the case this past week with notable pro athletes Cam Newton and Kenyon Martin. It’s one thing to have a beat writer twist words but it’s another thing when a black athlete is quoted for saying something completely out of line. More often than not, when commentary on hot button issues is needed from the African American community, the media seems to continually turn to black pro athletes to grab a sound bite they can spin into whatever their audience has bleeding ears for at the moment.Īlthough that’s probably one of my pet peeves with national media outlets, that’s not the aim of my rant today. In a time when differences in society’s conscience regarding race ideologies seems to be front page news daily, celebrities, athletes and other notable personalities with platforms have an opportunity to change conversations and ultimately use their influence to unify and not create a bigger divide than the one that already exists. ![]()
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