Jason Whitlock is the True Buffoon

I was browsing online tonight when I stumbled across another slanted article on Fox Sports from the "Honorable Jason Whitlock." In his article he basically talks about how the black athlete is destroying sports and how they are buffoons because they, as he likes to call it, shuck and jive on the field. He is of the opinion that football should be played as if these professional athletes are in corporate America wearing a suit and tie with little or no emotion. In the same breath he talks about the guys being payed to play a game. I pose this question to Mr. Whitlock, if they are playing a game are they not to have fun? What is wrong with a little playful teasing as long as there is no malice or intent to show someone up individually? He goes on to make the argument that the Colts and Patriots are the most successful teams in the NFL because they not coincidentally have more white players than any other teams in the NFL; as if to imply that in order for a team to play well or be successful, one must have more whites or non-black athletes as he so cleverly tries to put it, to makeup for the incompetencies of the undisciplined, heartless and ignorant black player. He is falling right into the trap from the 60's where it was universally accepted that the black quarterback and athletes in general lack discipline, heart and intelligence, and were only able to function when being directed by their white counterparts. Now I truly understand why there are so few Black Head coaches in college and professional athletics even though blacks or non-whites make up close to 70% of the athletes.

What enrages me the most about his article, besides the choice of words that he chooses to use such as buffoonery, bojangling etc, is the sheer ignorance and venom that he speaks with. He is looking at the end results without understanding or addressing the true problem.

Let me state for the Record that I am Not going to make excuses for bad behaviour as we all have to understand right from wrong, but lets put this in perspective. Imagine if you grew up your whole life dirt poor, the family next door was dirt poor, the family down the street, also dirt poor. Daily you are surrounded by drugs, unemployment, domestic violence, murder, robbery, dilapidated buildings as you grow up. Now imagine waking up one morning at the age of 21-24 with $250 thousand to $2 million dollars in your bank account. What kind of person would you be? Wisdom at 40 or 44 years old is easy, life has a way of helping you gain understanding and retrospect, but at the age of 21 or 23 just how much retrospect and life experiences do you have to draw from? Can you really talk to someone from your old neighborhood about how to handle your new found wealth when you could very easily gather all the people from your old neighborhood together and would not be able to accumulate or have over time accumulated at any point in their combined lives, half the wealth these athletes are gaining overnight.

Imagine growing up seeing your mother work two to three jobs and still having the power cut off, no cable, having to eat cereal with water instead of milk. That "hood life" can be a double edged sword when you wake up rich overnight. One side of you will never want to be poor again so you will do any and everything you can possibly do to protect your riches. There will still be that other side that will want to enjoy all the things that in your wildest dreams would have never been available to someone from your background.

We need to quit being naive and foolish enough to think that once someone gets money all the problems and past experiences that has driven these individuals to succeed and fail will just disappear. If anything the money makes it worse as the problems are never truly addressed, but overlooked by the money as it relates to the athletes, and the talent as it relates to the NFL organizations and fans. I challenge Whitlock and any other person that thinks like him to actually get down on the ground level to help fix the problem instead of talking about it and blaming hip hop from the friendly confines of his office desk as he sips on his tall Starbucks Latte. One thing Pac Man Jones, Mike Vick, Tank Johnson, and all the other athletes he loves to bash and label as buffoons, have in common is that they have overcame personal tragedy and lived in some of the worst environments and family lives that one could ever imagine. Drug abuse, death, and prison, all things these "troublemakers" grew up with impacting and shaping their mentality. Instead of reveling in the trials and tribulations and scolding them, get out there and teach.

Here is the article for those interested: http://msn.foxsports.com/nfl/story/7343980