(ESPN)
Posted on 05/24/2014 12:34:55 AM PDT by Bratch
Full Title:
ESPN commentator Stephen A. Smith refused to backdown on Friday after he came under fire for defending Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban’s comments about bigotry in a recent interview. Despite being labeled an “Uncle Tom” and a “sellout” by some in the black community, Smith made it clear that he stands by what he said “100-fold.”
“‘Stephen A. Smith is a sellout,’ ‘Stephen A. Smith is an Uncle Tom,’ ‘Stephen A. Smith ain’t black,’ ‘you ain’t one of us’ — these are the kinds of things that were said to me yesterday,” Smith said on ESPN’s “First Take” Friday.
Regardless, he said he doesn’t care who disagrees with him and they would be smart not to expect an apology.
(ESPN)
“When I say I don’t give a damn… that does it no justice,” Smith said. “I stand by everything that I said yesterday tenfold, 100-fold. And I don’t care who in the black community disagrees with me — I’m not interested in their disagreement on this particular issue because they are not looking at the bigger picture here.”
While Cuban did say he’d “cross the street” if he saw a black kid in a hoodie at night, he also said “in the same breath” that he’d have reservations about a bald guy with tattoos all over his body, he continued.
“Everybody wants to ignore that,” Smith said. “I don’t want to say everybody because I’m not speaking for everybody. … We want to pounce on him making this statement and alluding the black folks or talking about somebody in a hoodie that happens to be black… He talked about the prejudices that exist in all spectrums by all of us. Are we going to sit here and literally act like we don’t have any prejudices?”
Smith went on to argue that what Cuban said is “100 percent correct.” The commentator also addressed the “elephant in the room,” which he said many white people won’t talk about out of fear of being labeled “racist.”
“I look at our unemployment rate consistently being double that of folks in white America. I do understand that, to some degree, there’s a level of racism that we all have to overcome… but that doesn’t mean every single issue is race related,” he said. “Sometimes it is about how you represent yourself, it is about how you present yourself.”
He wasn’t even close to done:
“When I talk about not having a command of the English language, and still you want a job, and you want to have a career, but you don’t want to get your education, you don’t want to go out there and pound that pavement. Everything’s about the sprint, it’s not about the marathon, it’s not about you putting forth the necessary effort and due diligence over the long haul to get the thing you need. That’s a reality in our community.”
Smith also explained that not everyone in the black community can be Lebron James, Jay Z or Dwayne Wade — because they are “special.”
The rappers and professional athletes don’t represent the real “American dream,” they represent a “fantasy turned reality,” he added. Rather, Smith said he looks at himself as a good representation of that dream.
“Queens, New York City, left back in the fourth grade, grew up poor, the lever of education that I had was a public school system, I ultimately graduate from high school, I go to a historically black institution like Winston-Salem State University, I graduate with honors, there is no journalism program, I still graduate with honors, I still beat out thousands of people to get an internship… and I’m on national TV everyday.”
Trust us, you want to watch the entire segment via ESPN here.
-PJ
Nice to see SOME semblance of intelligence. I avoid ESPN, so thanks for posting this.
Smith often calls into Hannity’s show too. He says he’s a social lib fiscal conservative. But I think he’s a closet conservative.
And this is the point. Prejudice is natural and even required in life. If a snake has a particular pattern or head shape you know its poisonous. If a spider has an hourglass or fiddle on its back you know to avoid it. If food smells a certain way you know it has gone bad. Showing prejudice in these ways are a protection.
People judge you by the way you dress and carry yourself. I’m a black man and I’ve never experienced overt racism. But then again I carry myself in a certain manner. No black man has ever robbed someone wearing khakis and a polo shirt, for example. People judge you for how you look it’s natural. Blacks who dress like hoodlums and complain about profiling are like people dressed in clown suits complaining
that no one takes them seriously.
While Smith is too “in your face” aggressive-—not a style I like in reporters, but I understand it’s his “schtick”-—he is more often than not right. He is one of the few talking common sense about social issues on ESPN.
They do this deliberately to seperate themselves from the hoodie crowd, to advertise to the world that they are professionals and would like to be treated that way. And they are.
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People of other races/ethnic groups do the same thing. It generally benefits a person to NOT have outlandish tattoos and piercings or to wear non-business attire. ....I was a salaried professional at a defense contractor and it wasn’t until the late ‘70s that were we permitted to have facial hair or wear anything other than a white shirt with our suits and ties at work. .....Yeah, I’m an old dog.
Bravo....Stephan Smith!!! You are right on the money....you hit the truth nail right on the head!!! Fact is: Mark Cuban has it pegged to a “tee”!!! Trayvon Martin was nothing more then a broken family teenage, street thug, drug dealer and criminal...and, George Zimmerman was nothing more then a nutcase, insane, wannabe cop and vigilante murderer!!! Trash is trash....nothing more!!!
Until the majority of African Americans get real and come to realize that Obama, the NAACP, CBC Sharpton, etc. are not, nor have ever been, their friends and allies, they will go nowhwere.....real fast, other to stay buried in their own created “Obamabot” economic and opportunity slavery!!! And....that’s a ditto for all minority or other types of “so-called, deprived” Americans.
There is no such thing as a free lunch....period!!! Ya wanna “role model” African-Americans, take a solid look at Mr. Stephen Smith....end of story!!!
Blacks who dress like hoodlums and complain about profiling are like people dressed in clown suits complaining
that no one takes them seriously.
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Liked your entire posting! Thanks for being a FReeper.
If anything, conservative blacks are the Nat Turners.
This is what's wrong with the black community. Their blackness comes first. If they would just open their minds, educate themselves on how the democrats have discriminated against them for decades to keep them on the plantation, and be Americans first and foremost - they would be in a much better place in their lives.
The last honest thing that s.o.b. ever said.
Proof that this issue is so simple that even a border-line retard can get it right.
Steven A. Smith is not a celebrity and is certainly not like lebron or jayz.
Those two are known around the world, smith is known by a few hundred thousand {maybe a million} avid sports fans, and no one can name any thing significant about smith.
He goes to work every day, makes a good living, and goes home at night.
He can walk into any grocery store, furniture store or any other retail store in almost any place USA and nobody would know him from a can of beans.
Steven A. Smith has no uniqueness in his career, he is just a talking head on an all sports network, that less that .001% of the American public has ever heard about. Unique??? Hell I'm more unique than that, NOBODY has ever heard of me.
That's worth repeating. Well said!
Come to think of it. That would actually be a really interesting social experiment for a black man to make. Dress in a nice, well made suit. Make note of reactions, attitudes, and how interactions go. Then do the same thing while wearing a typical ghetto getup. Document same. I’d be willing to bet on what the outcome would be.
If you are a betting man, I'll give you pretty good odds for every dime I have on that one.
Takes a special kind of idiot to say that.
Criminals who are not complete fools understand the advantage that can be gained by not looking like obvious criminals.
Read the posts again....he was referencing victims, not the criminals. BIG difference.
As in complete opposite.
When black women cross the street as black men in hoodies approach are they racists?
I heard one of the radio talk show guys, I think it might have been Jay Severin, say that if he was walking down the street at night, and saw a man in a hoodie walking towards him, he would move to the other side of the street. He said it wouldn’t matter what race the guy was, so he supposed that meant he was prejudiced against hoodies.
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