If you play some music for me and I say I didn’t like it, that’s not hating. I just didn’t like it.
If you’re a 300 pound woman trying to squeeze into some clothes that aren’t made for any woman over 140, and I don’t think you look the least bit cute, that’s not hating. That’s your inability to dress appropriate to your size.
If you do something stupid, and you and I both know how stupid it was, don’t call me a hater for pointing it out. You knew it was stupid when you did it.
Stupid people in 2008 have confused the meanings of the words “hating” and “disagreeing.” They’ve also confused “hating” and “constructive criticism,” “hating” and “I don’t like it,” and “hating” and any contrary opinion to anything. So in 2008, I’m a hater when I say “Even if I had it, I wouldn’t spend $1.3 million dollars on a 16-year-old’s birthday party.” My own girlfriend said this about me. She may or may not have been joking, but needless to say, we have vastly different views on parenting.
As I always understood it, “hating” is when one is irrationally obsessed with tearing down another person. They don’t have real reason for talking about the person, but they do it anyway. It’s like when women say things like “That bitch think she cute,” or when guys say things like “fuck nigga,” even though I have no idea what a “fuck nigga” is. To me, it just sounds like people are just randomly throwing together cusswords. Look for this trend to continue with “cunt damn” in 2009.
But hating has nothing to do with just being mean to people anymore. People have become so sensitive these days that any little thing you say is considered hating. I don’t like the “Mayfield Milk” logos all over your car, so I’m a hater? Have you even considered that your car just looks stupid? Why do you even care what I think? I’m not infringing on any freedoms of yours or anything like that, so why are you being so sensitive? Yes, you have the right to wear pink t-shirts or your jeans around your knees, but I also have the right to say that you look like a girl or that you shit on yourself. It’s a free country.
I don’t know when or where this phenomenon got started, but it’s probably just an offshoot of political correctness, which is defined by the Tony Majestic Imaginary Dictionary as “a societal mechanism instituted by guilty white liberals that requires that nothing negative is said about anyone, anywhere, ever.” When political correctness came on the scene, the world must have been high on something, because it seemed to have forgotten that no one who defines themselves as a “liberal” can kick anyone’s ass, anywhere, ever.
Whatever the reason, it took hold and suddenly, all forms of off-color comedy where shunned by everyone except angry white men, who seem to enjoy being bigots and racists. It’s why Andrew “Dice” Clay was living in a box on the side of the freeway and playing hole-in-the-wall clubs until VH1 gave him a reality show that asks the question, “Is there anything that washed-up actors won’t do for money?” Now, everything has to be family friendly and non-offensive and everyone has to pretend to be all-inclusive, even though they know they really want to say “Can’t they bathe all of the Indian people before they let them into the country?”
And so, even asking a valid question about the differences between us is considered politically incorrect, which sucks for you, because I’m still going to ask why the Mexicans can’t learn English before hopping the fence. Everyone’s so touchy about everything. Instead of just saying, “I don’t know” or “I don’t give a shit what you think, fuck nigga,” they say “you’re infringing on my civil liberties, and the courts should force you to make a public service announcement to make sure that no one ever says or does that again.” Well, excuse the hell out of me, because I thought my civil liberties included being able to stand next to people on the bus who didn’t smell so bad that it made me want to throw up.
The problem is that everyone is emotionally weak. People have taken things away from us, like the word “no,” or bullies or beating our kids, all of the things that teach us the proper way to react when someone says to us “I don’t like gay people.” You’re supposed to either agree or disagree, but in today’s world, you lobby to file legislation to insure that no one ever thinks about thinking those words again, issue pamphlets to educate people on the hurtfulness of those words, and force the offending mouth and brain to donate $10,000 to GLAAD. And let’s not forget the most insincere of public apologies, the kind that only prove that the speech writer owns a thesaurus and knows how to find the part that gives other ways to say “bad.”
None of these measures ever solves anything, because no one ever listens to groups like GLAAD. The only people who listen to GLAAD are other gay people, and they don’t need any convincing, because they’re already gay. Groups like these only serve to make everyone think that they’re special and deserve to be treated in a special manner, apart from everyone else. And I’d hate to be the one to break it to you, but there’s nothing special about you because you enjoy swallowing the next man’s dick. I know a ton of girls who enjoy doing the same thing. But by treating everyone this way, one, it takes away from people who are dealing with legitimate injustices and two, it allows people to never learn how to deal with real problems.
Now, I know that gay people do deal with some real things, but shouldering the burden of gay jokes shouldn’t be one of those things that federal dollars need to be spent on. The offensiveness of gay jokes isn’t quite the same thing as immigration reform. And really, if gay men (because lesbianism is pretty much accepted nowadays) want to do something to prevent gay jokes, they should stop making themselves targets of them. I can handle the fact that you want me to poke you in the shitter. I get that, and honestly, I don’t blame you. But that doesn’t mean you have to express this feeling to me while wearing permed hair and glitter makeup.
So when I reject you (and not because of the glitter, but because I’m not gay), how you handle that will let me know if you grew up in a world where GLAAD told you that I should be more accepting of your alternative lifestyle by letting you suck me off, at the very least. If you just say, “No problem,” and go look for someone else to pump you raw, then we’re cool. But if you sit in your room and obsess over the rejection for weeks before going into a building and shooting at everyone, I’ll know that you were brought up in a PC-world. I wonder how many dicks those Columbine kids sucked before putting those trenchcoats on?
And that’s the level of sensitivity that has infected the black community. As we know, black people don’t do things the same as everyone else. We put our own spin on it, before white people homogenize it and sell it to the rest of the world. That’s all that the word “hating” is: The black version of political correctness. We’re surrounded by overly sensitive black people whining and crying about being “hated on,” when someone should have told them that naming your kid “Moskinika” isn’t a good idea. Sad thing is, you can’t tell if that’s a real name or if I just made it up.
But when I tell you that your kid’s name sounds like they should be running from the cameras on “COPS,” that’s not hating. That’s my way of telling you that I think you made a poor choice of names. It’s your choice to name your kid whatever you want, but it’s my choice to tell you that your kid is likely to need therapy for all the pointing and laughing that the other kids are likely to inflict upon them. I hope little Moskinika deals with it better than you have, but since you’re so quick to call me a hater, I don’t really have a high expectation that she will.
Thursday, March 27, 2008
The Tony Majestic Financial Report
I am insulted by what President Bush thinks about me. He thinks I’m just some money-wasting, greedy American who is forever following the trends that TV is forcing upon me.
President Bush believes that giving certain Americans an extra $400 to $800 dollars will stimulate the economy and fend off the impending recession, more than enforcing sound business practices or providing jobs would. It’s his belief that giving us this money will make us go out and buy stuff, even in the face of foreclosure or three-dollar gas.
I am truly insulted, sir. What kind of person do you think I am? What, do you think I’m gonna see a free check from Uncle Sam and go, “Whoo, Lawd! I’mma go cash this at the liquor sto’ right now, so I can get the whole bottle of Cristal at the club tonight!”
Just the idea that he believes that enough people would blow through some free money quickly enough to slightly stimulate the economy is crazy. I mean, I ain’t no financial expert (hell, I’ve never even balanced a checkbook), but I know enough about not having money to know that if $600 fell from the sky tomorrow, the last thing I’m gonna be thinking about is using it to make a down payment on a flatscreen TV.
But that’s what they’re banking on, that we will waste this money on disposable goods, that we are all just a bunch of broke, greedy souls who can’t wait to be separated from our money by Corporate America. Sure, that usually holds true when it comes to things like cell phones (i.e., the song that plays when you call someone…they’re paying two bucks a month for a song that they’ll never hear), or auto accessories (chrome rims…that spin), but I expect most people that qualify for this small government handout will use it to pay bills or try to save some of it. You know, they’ll be trying to dig themselves out of a hole that the government helped get a lot of them into.
Thanks for the vote of confidence, Bush. Thanks for thinking so little of us. We don’t even have the self control to hold on to a few hundred dollars without leaving it at Best Buy. The financial analysts out there are acting like we’re about to hit the lottery. It’s four hundred dollars (eight hundred at the most)! How much can you really buy with four hundred dollars? Seriously, I am insulted by this.
I’ll be even more insulted if I don’t get a check. I’m going to the mailbox right now to wait for mine. There’s a PS3 at Wal-Mart with my name on it.
President Bush believes that giving certain Americans an extra $400 to $800 dollars will stimulate the economy and fend off the impending recession, more than enforcing sound business practices or providing jobs would. It’s his belief that giving us this money will make us go out and buy stuff, even in the face of foreclosure or three-dollar gas.
I am truly insulted, sir. What kind of person do you think I am? What, do you think I’m gonna see a free check from Uncle Sam and go, “Whoo, Lawd! I’mma go cash this at the liquor sto’ right now, so I can get the whole bottle of Cristal at the club tonight!”
Just the idea that he believes that enough people would blow through some free money quickly enough to slightly stimulate the economy is crazy. I mean, I ain’t no financial expert (hell, I’ve never even balanced a checkbook), but I know enough about not having money to know that if $600 fell from the sky tomorrow, the last thing I’m gonna be thinking about is using it to make a down payment on a flatscreen TV.
But that’s what they’re banking on, that we will waste this money on disposable goods, that we are all just a bunch of broke, greedy souls who can’t wait to be separated from our money by Corporate America. Sure, that usually holds true when it comes to things like cell phones (i.e., the song that plays when you call someone…they’re paying two bucks a month for a song that they’ll never hear), or auto accessories (chrome rims…that spin), but I expect most people that qualify for this small government handout will use it to pay bills or try to save some of it. You know, they’ll be trying to dig themselves out of a hole that the government helped get a lot of them into.
Thanks for the vote of confidence, Bush. Thanks for thinking so little of us. We don’t even have the self control to hold on to a few hundred dollars without leaving it at Best Buy. The financial analysts out there are acting like we’re about to hit the lottery. It’s four hundred dollars (eight hundred at the most)! How much can you really buy with four hundred dollars? Seriously, I am insulted by this.
I’ll be even more insulted if I don’t get a check. I’m going to the mailbox right now to wait for mine. There’s a PS3 at Wal-Mart with my name on it.
How I Hated Brett Favre
I was living in Biloxi, MS when Brett Favre rose to prominence in Green Bay.
God, I hated him.
This was 1994 or so. I don’t remember the exact year, but I do remember that his time at Southern Miss in Hattiesburg was still fondly remembered. I remember that back then, he still hadn’t gotten his teeth cleaned, so his smile still looked like he was eating chocolate. I remember that he was almost always on the front page of the sports section in the Sun Herald. Biloxi is about an hour and a half away from New Orleans (at least, when I drive), so normally, everyone in the area was a Saints fan. We were so close that our Fox affiliate was based in New Orleans. My football memories during this time were tainted with a chorus of “Saints on Fox 38!” being sung by a zydeco band. But also during this time, everyone was talking about the Packers like Lambeau Field had been right next to the Grand Casino for the last 50 years.
It bothered me, because I couldn’t (and still can’t) stand bandwagon fans. Yes, I understood that he was from Kiln, which is about 60 miles north of Biloxi. I understood that he was the last worthwhile thing to happen to Hattiesburg that someone outside of Hattiesburg would know about (at least until that episode of “My Super Sweet 16). But the Packers, a team that’s at least 1000 miles away, were getting more love than the team that was right down I-10. Yeah, the Saints were still being called the “Ain’ts” and had no hope of reaching the playoffs. But what about team loyalty, or at least being loyal to the team that’s closest to your town? Jim Mora was giving Biloxi a free show every Sunday night by blowing up in front of the cameras and somehow, that wasn’t enough to hold Biloxi’s attention.
On top of that, people just wouldn’t shut up about Favre. I couldn’t escape from him. I’m the kind of person that tends to avoid following trends and rebels against whatever is the hot thing at the time. If everyone else likes it, I ignore it until it goes away and discover it on my own. It’s why I still haven’t listened to Alicia Keys’ latest CD. But I wasn’t allowed to do that with Favre. He was forced down my throat as the greatest thing since someone decided to put air inside of pigskin and throw it at people.
And to top all of that off, my girlfriend around that time had a friend across the street that was related to Brett Favre. They were distant cousins, but cousins nonetheless. They were closely related enough to where they shared facial features and she knew he was related to her, but distant enough that their names were spelled differently (Farve). Surprisingly, she was like me. She was sick of this guy.
I didn’t want to hate on the hometown boy, but it just became ridiculous down there. For one, he wasn’t even a hometown boy, like Ronald Dupree or Chris Jackson. He was from Kiln, MS, which is all the way over in the next county and really, isn’t even on the Coast. He didn’t go to Mississippi Gulf Coast CC or even Perkinston. He went to Southern Miss. He had no real ties to the Coast, and yet was embraced as the biggest start to ever come out of there. It just didn’t make any sense to me.
So when the Packers would play, I’d almost always root against them. Besides, that’s back when the Cowboys and 49ers were still good, so I’d support those teams, mainly because they were the only ones I really knew. Eventually, Favre overpowered my personal vendetta and the Packers won the Super Bowl. It was a sad day in the Martin household, or at least, in my bedroom. I doubt my parents really cared about my player-hatred.
After that, I would move on to Jackson State University, about two hours north of Hattiesburg (provided you’re obeying the speed limits). Up there, they didn’t care about Brett Favre. They had their own colleges in Jackson, like perennial powerhouses JSU, Belhaven, and Millsaps, whom you might remember from a famed ESPN clip where a football team lost a game after the opposing team scored a touchdown after about 30 laterals were thrown to get the ball in the endzone. That was Millsaps. It’s the only way Jackson colleges ever get on TV. Millsaps Fever! Catch it!
Also, we were close enough to Ole Miss and MS State to where they got most of the attention.
Being away from all of those fake Packers fans gave me the opportunity to see what everyone else had figured out years before me: That Brett Favre was a great football player. It also gave me the chance to learn the hard way that one should never bet against Brett Favre. I lost way too much money doing that.
Ironically enough, when I started betting on him, the Packers were stinking up the joint. Karmic justice at its finest.
Along the way, I watched him teach the top, fall off, almost get run out of town, turn a hater like me into a fan, and almost reach the pinnacle again. Not a lot of players in the NFL get the chance to do that. John Elway might be the only other one in my short football memory.
But aside from all of the records he broke and amazing games he played, the lasting memory that I will have of Brett Favre is of him throwing snowballs at his teammates in the middle of a playoff game. And maybe his brown teeth, but mostly the snowballs. I mean, here was one of the greatest quarterbacks to ever throw a spiral and he was wasting his Hall of Fame arm beaning his teammates in the back with poorly packed snowballs. His Mississippi upbringing was showing through.
Two months later, he shocked the world by walking away from the game after his team was a win away from going to the Super Bowl. Surely, they’d be in contention again next year. Why didn’t he walk away during the three years that the Packers weren’t worth the chalk that marked the yards on their historic field? Why now, when he had turned the football world on its ear by making the Packers a legitimate team again at the age of 37?
He just didn’t want to play anymore. That’s all there is to it. But he went out on his own terms, and as an athlete, that’s really all you can ask for. No one made him go and his body didn’t betray him. And while I’m sad he’s gone, I’m still happy for him. I’m happy that he walked into his retirement press conference and I’m happy that he found such joy in doing something that it made him cry to stop doing it. What more can you ask for in life?
I guess maybe a chance to start an NFL game. At least, that’s what you’re asking for if you’re Aaron Rodgers. Be careful what you wish for, kid. You’re about to get it.
God, I hated him.
This was 1994 or so. I don’t remember the exact year, but I do remember that his time at Southern Miss in Hattiesburg was still fondly remembered. I remember that back then, he still hadn’t gotten his teeth cleaned, so his smile still looked like he was eating chocolate. I remember that he was almost always on the front page of the sports section in the Sun Herald. Biloxi is about an hour and a half away from New Orleans (at least, when I drive), so normally, everyone in the area was a Saints fan. We were so close that our Fox affiliate was based in New Orleans. My football memories during this time were tainted with a chorus of “Saints on Fox 38!” being sung by a zydeco band. But also during this time, everyone was talking about the Packers like Lambeau Field had been right next to the Grand Casino for the last 50 years.
It bothered me, because I couldn’t (and still can’t) stand bandwagon fans. Yes, I understood that he was from Kiln, which is about 60 miles north of Biloxi. I understood that he was the last worthwhile thing to happen to Hattiesburg that someone outside of Hattiesburg would know about (at least until that episode of “My Super Sweet 16). But the Packers, a team that’s at least 1000 miles away, were getting more love than the team that was right down I-10. Yeah, the Saints were still being called the “Ain’ts” and had no hope of reaching the playoffs. But what about team loyalty, or at least being loyal to the team that’s closest to your town? Jim Mora was giving Biloxi a free show every Sunday night by blowing up in front of the cameras and somehow, that wasn’t enough to hold Biloxi’s attention.
On top of that, people just wouldn’t shut up about Favre. I couldn’t escape from him. I’m the kind of person that tends to avoid following trends and rebels against whatever is the hot thing at the time. If everyone else likes it, I ignore it until it goes away and discover it on my own. It’s why I still haven’t listened to Alicia Keys’ latest CD. But I wasn’t allowed to do that with Favre. He was forced down my throat as the greatest thing since someone decided to put air inside of pigskin and throw it at people.
And to top all of that off, my girlfriend around that time had a friend across the street that was related to Brett Favre. They were distant cousins, but cousins nonetheless. They were closely related enough to where they shared facial features and she knew he was related to her, but distant enough that their names were spelled differently (Farve). Surprisingly, she was like me. She was sick of this guy.
I didn’t want to hate on the hometown boy, but it just became ridiculous down there. For one, he wasn’t even a hometown boy, like Ronald Dupree or Chris Jackson. He was from Kiln, MS, which is all the way over in the next county and really, isn’t even on the Coast. He didn’t go to Mississippi Gulf Coast CC or even Perkinston. He went to Southern Miss. He had no real ties to the Coast, and yet was embraced as the biggest start to ever come out of there. It just didn’t make any sense to me.
So when the Packers would play, I’d almost always root against them. Besides, that’s back when the Cowboys and 49ers were still good, so I’d support those teams, mainly because they were the only ones I really knew. Eventually, Favre overpowered my personal vendetta and the Packers won the Super Bowl. It was a sad day in the Martin household, or at least, in my bedroom. I doubt my parents really cared about my player-hatred.
After that, I would move on to Jackson State University, about two hours north of Hattiesburg (provided you’re obeying the speed limits). Up there, they didn’t care about Brett Favre. They had their own colleges in Jackson, like perennial powerhouses JSU, Belhaven, and Millsaps, whom you might remember from a famed ESPN clip where a football team lost a game after the opposing team scored a touchdown after about 30 laterals were thrown to get the ball in the endzone. That was Millsaps. It’s the only way Jackson colleges ever get on TV. Millsaps Fever! Catch it!
Also, we were close enough to Ole Miss and MS State to where they got most of the attention.
Being away from all of those fake Packers fans gave me the opportunity to see what everyone else had figured out years before me: That Brett Favre was a great football player. It also gave me the chance to learn the hard way that one should never bet against Brett Favre. I lost way too much money doing that.
Ironically enough, when I started betting on him, the Packers were stinking up the joint. Karmic justice at its finest.
Along the way, I watched him teach the top, fall off, almost get run out of town, turn a hater like me into a fan, and almost reach the pinnacle again. Not a lot of players in the NFL get the chance to do that. John Elway might be the only other one in my short football memory.
But aside from all of the records he broke and amazing games he played, the lasting memory that I will have of Brett Favre is of him throwing snowballs at his teammates in the middle of a playoff game. And maybe his brown teeth, but mostly the snowballs. I mean, here was one of the greatest quarterbacks to ever throw a spiral and he was wasting his Hall of Fame arm beaning his teammates in the back with poorly packed snowballs. His Mississippi upbringing was showing through.
Two months later, he shocked the world by walking away from the game after his team was a win away from going to the Super Bowl. Surely, they’d be in contention again next year. Why didn’t he walk away during the three years that the Packers weren’t worth the chalk that marked the yards on their historic field? Why now, when he had turned the football world on its ear by making the Packers a legitimate team again at the age of 37?
He just didn’t want to play anymore. That’s all there is to it. But he went out on his own terms, and as an athlete, that’s really all you can ask for. No one made him go and his body didn’t betray him. And while I’m sad he’s gone, I’m still happy for him. I’m happy that he walked into his retirement press conference and I’m happy that he found such joy in doing something that it made him cry to stop doing it. What more can you ask for in life?
I guess maybe a chance to start an NFL game. At least, that’s what you’re asking for if you’re Aaron Rodgers. Be careful what you wish for, kid. You’re about to get it.
Do you want him to win or don't you?
Barack Obama gave a brilliant piece of oratory last night. I didn’t see it, but reading the transcripts on the internet the next day uplifted me, inspired me, and pissed me off, because I don’t have cable right now and I couldn’t watch it.
The speech was made in response to the furor that people had been engaging in regarding Obama’s former pastor, Jeremiah Wright, who was also a part of his campaign. He had recently made some comments that white people would call “inflammatory (which they did)” and black people would call “your regular Saturday morning at the barbershop (I think I just heard someone yell the word “cracker.”)” Wright was let go from Obama’s campaign as a result.
There have been some black people who are faulting Barack Obama’s decision to let his pastor of 20 years, go. This is the man who introduced Obama to his Christian faith, baptized him and his children and married him to his wife. To fire someone with whom you share such a deep and personal relationship, to some, is unthinkable. And there are many pastors who believe that Barack has unleashed some sort of unthinkable, unspeakable, evil upon the Black community.
And already, there are those who feel that Obama’s speech is a way for him to spin the damage done by Jeremiah Wright. There are those who feel like he was only saying what he had to. These people claim that there was no way that Barack could have attended this man’s church for 20 years and not known that he was a hate-monger. This is merely a ploy to save face in the aftermath of what could potentially end his run at the White House.
Barack Obama is on the verge of making history. He is closer to winning the Presidency than any non-white male has ever been. He is the first among us to have a realistic shot of becoming President. Did you really think that he’d risk throwing all of that away for Jeremiah Wright? What did you think he was going to say?
Let me state, first of all, that I believe that he believed every word of the speech he delivered. I don’t believe there was any deception or hidden agenda behind his words. I believe that, even though it was probably a prepared speech, it came from his heart and the world that he described in that speech is what he truly wants for America. I believe that should he become President, this is what he’ll work towards.
Having said all of that, it didn’t matter who was delivering the speech, I don’t think that any politician would have been well-served by getting behind the podium and saying, “Man, you ain’t neva’ lied!”
The fact is, there are two versions of America. There’s the America that Black people see and then there’s the America that everyone else sees, and to a certain degree, both of them are real and true. There’s a reason why a lot of Black people listen to such people as Louis Farrakhan or Al Sharpton or read books about the Black Panthers and Malcolm X. It’s something that Black people have known since we got off the boat. You heard Barack allude to it in his speech. It’s not that we’re all cracker-hating people. You have to go to the Arab world or most Indian reservations to find that nowadays. No, it’s just that the realities of the world that many of us have lived in don’t always match the vision that America has tried to sell to everyone else. Naturally, we respond better to a message that we believe is reflecting reality.
The problem with that message is, it only resonates with Black people. Doesn’t matter how true it is. Doesn’t matter how many cops you saw beat up your cousin or how many white women have followed you around the store, or how many times you were called the n-word in high school. As Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton have learned, no white people are going to vote for you to govern them if you’re unapologetically going to put Black folks at the front of the line. And if you think white people are a hard sell, just ask the harmonious Barack Obama how hard it is to get Asians, Latinos, and East Indians on your side if you’re black.
My point is, you can’t get the White House talking about what you’re going to do for Black people. And you can’t get to the White House if you show you’re in favor of a message that White folks are gonna think is threatening. Black people are like, 12% of the population. There isn’t a single candidate that we can elect all by ourselves. If that was the case, then Dick Gregory might have had a chance. So for any Black candidate to have a realistic chance, they better have the message that Barack has had.
Again, none of this is to say that Barack is being disingenuous about his feelings on race, but it is to say that unless he wanted to watch his Presidential aspirations go down faster than three shots of Patron at the club, he had to distance himself from everything that his former pastor was saying. He can feel that way behind closed doors all he wants to (if he does), but as far as white folks are concerned, he doesn’t agree with anything that came out of his mouth. And Black people, if you really want him to be President, then you’ll just shut up and let him do it.
The speech was made in response to the furor that people had been engaging in regarding Obama’s former pastor, Jeremiah Wright, who was also a part of his campaign. He had recently made some comments that white people would call “inflammatory (which they did)” and black people would call “your regular Saturday morning at the barbershop (I think I just heard someone yell the word “cracker.”)” Wright was let go from Obama’s campaign as a result.
There have been some black people who are faulting Barack Obama’s decision to let his pastor of 20 years, go. This is the man who introduced Obama to his Christian faith, baptized him and his children and married him to his wife. To fire someone with whom you share such a deep and personal relationship, to some, is unthinkable. And there are many pastors who believe that Barack has unleashed some sort of unthinkable, unspeakable, evil upon the Black community.
And already, there are those who feel that Obama’s speech is a way for him to spin the damage done by Jeremiah Wright. There are those who feel like he was only saying what he had to. These people claim that there was no way that Barack could have attended this man’s church for 20 years and not known that he was a hate-monger. This is merely a ploy to save face in the aftermath of what could potentially end his run at the White House.
Barack Obama is on the verge of making history. He is closer to winning the Presidency than any non-white male has ever been. He is the first among us to have a realistic shot of becoming President. Did you really think that he’d risk throwing all of that away for Jeremiah Wright? What did you think he was going to say?
Let me state, first of all, that I believe that he believed every word of the speech he delivered. I don’t believe there was any deception or hidden agenda behind his words. I believe that, even though it was probably a prepared speech, it came from his heart and the world that he described in that speech is what he truly wants for America. I believe that should he become President, this is what he’ll work towards.
Having said all of that, it didn’t matter who was delivering the speech, I don’t think that any politician would have been well-served by getting behind the podium and saying, “Man, you ain’t neva’ lied!”
The fact is, there are two versions of America. There’s the America that Black people see and then there’s the America that everyone else sees, and to a certain degree, both of them are real and true. There’s a reason why a lot of Black people listen to such people as Louis Farrakhan or Al Sharpton or read books about the Black Panthers and Malcolm X. It’s something that Black people have known since we got off the boat. You heard Barack allude to it in his speech. It’s not that we’re all cracker-hating people. You have to go to the Arab world or most Indian reservations to find that nowadays. No, it’s just that the realities of the world that many of us have lived in don’t always match the vision that America has tried to sell to everyone else. Naturally, we respond better to a message that we believe is reflecting reality.
The problem with that message is, it only resonates with Black people. Doesn’t matter how true it is. Doesn’t matter how many cops you saw beat up your cousin or how many white women have followed you around the store, or how many times you were called the n-word in high school. As Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton have learned, no white people are going to vote for you to govern them if you’re unapologetically going to put Black folks at the front of the line. And if you think white people are a hard sell, just ask the harmonious Barack Obama how hard it is to get Asians, Latinos, and East Indians on your side if you’re black.
My point is, you can’t get the White House talking about what you’re going to do for Black people. And you can’t get to the White House if you show you’re in favor of a message that White folks are gonna think is threatening. Black people are like, 12% of the population. There isn’t a single candidate that we can elect all by ourselves. If that was the case, then Dick Gregory might have had a chance. So for any Black candidate to have a realistic chance, they better have the message that Barack has had.
Again, none of this is to say that Barack is being disingenuous about his feelings on race, but it is to say that unless he wanted to watch his Presidential aspirations go down faster than three shots of Patron at the club, he had to distance himself from everything that his former pastor was saying. He can feel that way behind closed doors all he wants to (if he does), but as far as white folks are concerned, he doesn’t agree with anything that came out of his mouth. And Black people, if you really want him to be President, then you’ll just shut up and let him do it.
Corporate America Hates Sports
Does it make me old-fashioned to say that I’m tired of the corporate circus that surrounds big sporting events today?
I’m old enough to remember the days when games like the Super Bowl and the NBA All-Star Game were all about the game itself. Back when I was a kid, you got the game and some commercials and that was it. Back then, there were no marketing executives trying to convince me that I really cared to see Jordin Sparks butcher her own song. Silly me, I thought I was tuning in to see an athletic competition.
I’m really tired of all of the extras that dare to turn these events into all-in-one entertainment extravaganzas. I can’t imagine that anyone is tuning in just to see someone blow through three or four songs during a halftime show, when they could get the DVD and watch an actual, fully realized performance. And people who are there to watch the game don’t care who’s performing in what, because they were going to watch the game anyway. You’re not expanding your audience, you’re just giving the actual sports fans a longer piss break.
Are they trying to create a family experience with all of this, something the whole family can watch together? I’d say no, because for one, the big sporting events always start around 9, which is when responsible parents are sending their kids to bed. But let’s say that they were letting them watch the entire game, despite the fact that these kids have school the next day.
The only one who’s really watching the game is Dad and maybe Son, if there is one, but these damn mini-concerts keep getting in the way. Mom doesn’t really care, and neither does Daughter, because they stopped showing musical acts that play on MTV because America is prejudiced against nipples. So the men aren’t happy, because Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers are getting in the way of the football analysis, and the women aren’t happy, because, let’s face it…it’s Tom Petty. He’s not exactly a sex symbol. Not even in his own house.
I don’t know how it was with white people, but black households decided that they weren’t watching the Super Bowl halftime show the second it was announced. My girlfriend and I spent the entire halftime show making a list of other acts that we would have rather seen. Guns N’ Roses would have been 100 times more exciting, just because of the hope that Slash might go after Axl with his guitar.
I think back to the nameless college football halftime show from a few years ago when Ashlee Simpson performed and shockingly, everyone booed. I didn’t watch it, because I don’t watch college football (on the grounds that it isn’t a real sport) and I don’t watch Ashlee Simpson (on the grounds that she isn’t a real singer), but I remember wondering “How did they not see this coming?”
Ashlee Simpson’s fanbase is comprised of people who haven’t developed things like discernible taste (required to know that Ashlee Simpson isn’t talented) or attention span (required to watch a football game) and, by all accounts, was giving a horrible performance. College football fans are some of the most passionate, yet rude and belligerent fans outside of Philadelphia. And none of them like Ashlee Simpson. Now, any marketing student, even the ones sleeping the back of the classroom, can see that there is no crossover appeal here. At some point, someone should have pointed out that this was a bad idea and having her continue to sing just ran the risk of her getting hit with a foreign object. There weren’t any Ashlee Simpson fans anywhere watching that game and there weren’t any college football fans anywhere that even thought to themselves, “Man, I can’t wait to hear Ashlee Simpson sing.”
But these are the things that happen when you let marketing people have some control over your product. First, your stadium winds up with a ridiculous name (like Minute Maid Field) and second, your game winds up with a bad halftime show. Marketing execs really believe that ratings will go up if “interchangeable-pop-star-of-the-week” makes an appearance at a sporting event. This just isn’t the case, because the best you can hope for is an even swap of the audience. The sports fans are going to the bathroom and the tasteless kids who like this “music” are going to sit and watch. The only time this has ever worked out in the marketing department’s favor is when Prince performed, and only because he did songs from “Purple Rain.” If he had done songs from “The Rainbow Children,” I guarantee you there would have been a full-scale, South Park riot.
So why do they continue to do this, even though all they’re doing is filling the world with sadness? Sure, it’s for the money, but mostly because marketing execs don’t think in real world terms. They use corporate buzzwords when they think, so for future reference, if anyone you know ever uses the word “synergy” in a sentence, you know they’re about to do something stupid next, like try to convince you that the best thing to do at a biker rally is hold a live wrestling pay-per-view. Your only recourse is to whack them in head with something before they can complete their thoughts on how you’re stealing free TV every time you don’t watch the commercials.
Who benefits? They do, I guess. It certainly isn’t the viewer. There has never been a time in human history where a person has been forced to sit through a Destiny’s Child performance and felt like a winner at the end, except for that time that Michelle tripped over her own two feet and fell flat on her face. And yet, that’s what we got, over and over, at the 2003 All-Star Game. Because, according to the marketing department, that’s what we all really wanted. Not a showcase of the NBA’s biggest stars and the last All-Star Game that Michael Jordan would ever playing, but Beyonce warbling over some beat that even the most desperate rapper wouldn’t freestyle over. God Bless Corporate America.
I’m old enough to remember the days when games like the Super Bowl and the NBA All-Star Game were all about the game itself. Back when I was a kid, you got the game and some commercials and that was it. Back then, there were no marketing executives trying to convince me that I really cared to see Jordin Sparks butcher her own song. Silly me, I thought I was tuning in to see an athletic competition.
I’m really tired of all of the extras that dare to turn these events into all-in-one entertainment extravaganzas. I can’t imagine that anyone is tuning in just to see someone blow through three or four songs during a halftime show, when they could get the DVD and watch an actual, fully realized performance. And people who are there to watch the game don’t care who’s performing in what, because they were going to watch the game anyway. You’re not expanding your audience, you’re just giving the actual sports fans a longer piss break.
Are they trying to create a family experience with all of this, something the whole family can watch together? I’d say no, because for one, the big sporting events always start around 9, which is when responsible parents are sending their kids to bed. But let’s say that they were letting them watch the entire game, despite the fact that these kids have school the next day.
The only one who’s really watching the game is Dad and maybe Son, if there is one, but these damn mini-concerts keep getting in the way. Mom doesn’t really care, and neither does Daughter, because they stopped showing musical acts that play on MTV because America is prejudiced against nipples. So the men aren’t happy, because Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers are getting in the way of the football analysis, and the women aren’t happy, because, let’s face it…it’s Tom Petty. He’s not exactly a sex symbol. Not even in his own house.
I don’t know how it was with white people, but black households decided that they weren’t watching the Super Bowl halftime show the second it was announced. My girlfriend and I spent the entire halftime show making a list of other acts that we would have rather seen. Guns N’ Roses would have been 100 times more exciting, just because of the hope that Slash might go after Axl with his guitar.
I think back to the nameless college football halftime show from a few years ago when Ashlee Simpson performed and shockingly, everyone booed. I didn’t watch it, because I don’t watch college football (on the grounds that it isn’t a real sport) and I don’t watch Ashlee Simpson (on the grounds that she isn’t a real singer), but I remember wondering “How did they not see this coming?”
Ashlee Simpson’s fanbase is comprised of people who haven’t developed things like discernible taste (required to know that Ashlee Simpson isn’t talented) or attention span (required to watch a football game) and, by all accounts, was giving a horrible performance. College football fans are some of the most passionate, yet rude and belligerent fans outside of Philadelphia. And none of them like Ashlee Simpson. Now, any marketing student, even the ones sleeping the back of the classroom, can see that there is no crossover appeal here. At some point, someone should have pointed out that this was a bad idea and having her continue to sing just ran the risk of her getting hit with a foreign object. There weren’t any Ashlee Simpson fans anywhere watching that game and there weren’t any college football fans anywhere that even thought to themselves, “Man, I can’t wait to hear Ashlee Simpson sing.”
But these are the things that happen when you let marketing people have some control over your product. First, your stadium winds up with a ridiculous name (like Minute Maid Field) and second, your game winds up with a bad halftime show. Marketing execs really believe that ratings will go up if “interchangeable-pop-star-of-the-week” makes an appearance at a sporting event. This just isn’t the case, because the best you can hope for is an even swap of the audience. The sports fans are going to the bathroom and the tasteless kids who like this “music” are going to sit and watch. The only time this has ever worked out in the marketing department’s favor is when Prince performed, and only because he did songs from “Purple Rain.” If he had done songs from “The Rainbow Children,” I guarantee you there would have been a full-scale, South Park riot.
So why do they continue to do this, even though all they’re doing is filling the world with sadness? Sure, it’s for the money, but mostly because marketing execs don’t think in real world terms. They use corporate buzzwords when they think, so for future reference, if anyone you know ever uses the word “synergy” in a sentence, you know they’re about to do something stupid next, like try to convince you that the best thing to do at a biker rally is hold a live wrestling pay-per-view. Your only recourse is to whack them in head with something before they can complete their thoughts on how you’re stealing free TV every time you don’t watch the commercials.
Who benefits? They do, I guess. It certainly isn’t the viewer. There has never been a time in human history where a person has been forced to sit through a Destiny’s Child performance and felt like a winner at the end, except for that time that Michelle tripped over her own two feet and fell flat on her face. And yet, that’s what we got, over and over, at the 2003 All-Star Game. Because, according to the marketing department, that’s what we all really wanted. Not a showcase of the NBA’s biggest stars and the last All-Star Game that Michael Jordan would ever playing, but Beyonce warbling over some beat that even the most desperate rapper wouldn’t freestyle over. God Bless Corporate America.
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