The Republican National Convention, shootings in Kenosha and a strike in professional sports -- three stories that are really one story, about race in America
Imagine NBA Stars -- outside giant sports arenas used as public polling and voting locations -- acting as poll watchers insuring that urban voters, Black and brown folks, file in unsuppressed by armed Para fascists.
Kenny Smith Walks Off the Inside Set. Jerry Falwell Jr.'s Link to Trump. Ramy Youssef - Shattering Muslim Stereotypes on TV. Yusuf Hawkins: Storm Over Brooklyn (Movie). Deadly Sins and Cardinal Virtues: A Voter Checklist.
After three playoff games were suspended in response to the police shooting of Jacob Blake, the Inside crew reacts to the postponement of the game and Kenny delivers a powerful message in support of the players.
Abdul Malik analyzes the major league sports stoppages from an organizing perspective.
"The Last Dance" is more than just the story of a legendary basketball team. It's a broader reminder that, in America, inequality touches everything -- including sports.
The truth is ugly as sin. The NFL is denying Colin Kaepernick employment not because he isn’t “good enough” but because he is being shut out for the crime of using his platform to protest the killing of black kids by police. NFL owners don’t make pariahs out of players who beat women or face accusations of murder. Kaepernick’s pariah status is about sending a shot across the bow at every political athlete—particularly black athletes—that they better toe the line.
Jackie Robinson, writing in 1972: I cannot stand and sing the anthem. I cannot salute the flag. I know that I am a black man in a white world. Jim Brown, the Cleveland Browns Hall of Fame running backin 2016 said he stands '100 percent' behind Colin Kaepernick. Further, Kaepernick 'made all the sense in the world' in explaining his position. This is part of a long tradition of athletes, especially African American athletes combining sport and protest. (* ESPN)
White male privilege is why we laugh at Lochte and vilify Douglas. Pay close attention to the words being used to describe them. A small angry minority is often effective at appearing to be the majority opinion. And the truth is, they aren't. They don't represent the millions of others who support Gabby Douglas. There was then, and still is, so much love, inspiration and joy for you and because of you - as an athlete, a person, a black girl, a black woman.
Universities giant and small, public and private, bring African-American men to campus at grotesque levels to earn the school millions in football and basketball revenues. Stories about academic freedom and free speech have been appearing in newspapers more frequently over the last few weeks. And curiously enough political actors on and off campus who traditionally have been least likely to be concerned about these subjects are becoming its major advocates.
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