Generally, we stick to Philly sports news and commentary around here. However, this deserves my attention, and it deserves your attention.
Yesterday on ESPN's First Take program, a program that admits to just throwing shit to the wall and seeing what sticks, had one of the most ridiculously idiotic talking points in recent memory for a "sports" show. Now, nobody in their right mind would sit there and listen to the likes of Skip Bayless, Stephen A. Smith, and Robert Parker and actually formulate an opinion based on what these idiots say day after day. People who do simply don't have the brain capacity to understand the way society is meant to be. On the other hand, Stephen A. Smith put it perfectly when Parker made things very awkward on the set of First Take, of course with the typical Skip Bayless baiting, which he's done with the race card before. Uttering phrases like "he's not down with the cause" and bringing up Tiger Woods when talking about Robert Griffin III was just utterly dispicable.
BlackSportsOnline.com editor Robert Littal ripped Parker for the comments and added the most amazing quote I've seen in a while regarding race mixed with sports:
If being a cornball is being engaged to someone you love, not speaking like [rapper] Trinidad James, not getting in trouble and playing the QB position at a very high level, I wish more NFL players would be cornballs.
Stephen A.'s response was most definitely echoed by many, if not all the people who watched. [Huffington Post]
“Well first of all let me say this: I’m uncomfortable with where we just went. RG3, the ethnicity, the color of his fiancee is none of our business. It’s irrelevant," Smith told his "First Take" cohorts. "He can live his life any way he chooses. The braids that he has in his hair, that’s his business, that’s his life. I don’t judge someone’s blackness based on those kind of things. I just don’t do that. I’m not that kind of guy."
Watch the video of the awkward conversation after the jump. And, just an FYI, I love watching Griffin play and if we have to deal with him for years to come, the rivalry against the Redskins will be back and in full force.
UPDATE: ESPN has since suspended Rob Parker from on-air appearances for the time being.
Comments