Mr. Smith made comments in this vein yesterday on CNN while speaking with Don Lemon. Might I ask what is so wrong with his statement? The only criticism I have of it is that he doesn’t take it far enough. Athletes of all races have contributed to the “thug” culture which is widely evident today. Watching many sports is a constant parade of players – black, white and brown – thumping their chests and talking about “our house” and behaving in ways most youth leagues would not allow ten year olds to behave. I applaud Mr. Smith’s remarks and those much like them made by Reverend Al Sharpton. Refusing to recognize the violent culture promoted by many of today’s athletes and celebrities is enabling that same culture and it is a disservice to parents struggling to raise children in such and environment.

It’s not so much the comments themselves, but the fact that they’re not really coming from an honest place. The Big Lead’s point is that Steven A. sees an opportunity to make money, by marketing himself as this conservative moral critic of sports. He’s joining the “NBA as thugs” movement to achieve that goal.

In 2006, eight different Cincinnati Bengal players were arrested for various reasons. One player has been arrested four times in six months. The Bengals cant seen to keep their Black players out of trouble.

Dan Fogarty wrote:

It’s not so much the comments themselves, but the fact that they’re not really coming from an honest place. The Big Lead’s point is that Steven A. sees an opportunity to make money, by marketing himself as this conservative moral critic of sports. He’s joining the “NBA as thugs” movement to achieve that goal.

I’m having trouble containing my temper writing this. Trust me when I tell you that whatever I end up hitting “submit comment” on isn’t as strong as I want at this moment.

Deep breaths. OK, here goes….

Dan Fogarty, why would you suggest that it’s a “fact” that Smith’s remarks “aren’t coming from an honest place”? Who in the … world are you to suggest you have insight on what Stephen A. Smith’s motives are? Are you The Amazing Kreskin? Who are the people at The Big Lead, whatever that is?

Since when does employment by Rupert Murdoch require some sort of viewpoint transformation? You work at Mediaite, so I’m sure you must have caught the thread in which the Fox network was pissed all over on its own airwaves by the writers of Family Guy (which is fitting — if you wanna piss on somebody, it helps to be a skunk). Don’t you think it’s possible to work for News Corporation without being forced to become a Hannity clone? (Hmmm…perhaps you think that way since there is such a strict leftist outlook at Mediaite, from Abrams to Hall to MacNicol on down and you think that’s the way business is done everywhere.)

Maybe, Dan, just maybe Smith is “joining the ‘NBA as thugs’ movement” because there are too many maddog NBA players who are thugs! Didya ever think of that? Or is that something that you won’t allow yourself to say out loud (even if you think it) because you’ve had it hammered into your brain by the P.C. Police that you’re a bad person for considering it?

Well, let me relieve your tension (or anyone else who might be reading) — you’re not. As a black man, it frustrates me to no end the way too many black men live down to expectations and THEN blame everybody else for being afraid of them. And since white people are too afraid to say what needs to be said, thank goodness Stephen A. Smith isn’t.

Don’t cast aspersions on his integrity just because you may not have any of your own!

I’m inspired!

Dan Fogarty says:
January 5, 2010 at 7:33 pm

So the point is that because Smith talks about this from a cultural standpoint, he’s modeling himself after other personalities owned by the same parent company. Not because he believes that, not because he’s experienced it… rather, because of his parent company. Is there any evidence of that? Has Smith become more of a “sports shouter” since joining FOX? Well, no… and your article says as much.

Looks like a hit piece to me. Smith, like a number of other prominent Black figures, criticizes people of his own ethnicity, and quickly he becomes the enemy. We’ve seen it with Bill Cosby… heck, we even saw it after Obama’s “Father” speech and Jesse Jackson’s desire to “cut his *** off.” And of course, what better way to smear someone, then to say, “Hey, he works for FOX,” even if there’s EXPLICIT and MENTIONED EVIDENCE to the contrary. Apparently, Mr. Fogarty doesn’t even read his OWN articles. After reading this one, I can see why.

Absolute trash.

(WTG- Smithee!)

Dan, excuse the ignorance of some of the readers on this site…

They miss the point completely, maybe because (much like with Glenn Beck) they haven’t followed Stephen A’s career. Cheetos, anyone? Stephen A. Smith was the “black athletes are not thugs” cheerleader back when he was with ESPN. Long before it was “cool” to assert that if you are black and play in the NBA, then you are a thug. A. Smith follows the coin.He’s no longer a well-respected sports journalist.

And Smithee, I refuse to believe you are “black” if you are insinuating that all NBA players are thugs — or that the league is filled with them. Hate yourself much? It’s a disgusting blanket statement to make. Just because we’re talking about the NBA (where 76% of the players are black), when there is a single incident immediately they are ALL thugs. Please name me another incident in the past two years where an NBA player acted like a “thug”? I’ll wait… A group of 500 some-odd basketball players and we’re calling 76% of them thugs because the action of one. So all Republicans are racist because ImNotBlue is a racist? Not fair.

What about Michael Vick? Ever hear of Pac-Man Jones? Plaxico Burris? Wanna get white? Brian Giles (white!) beat up his girlfriend in public this past year. All white baseball players are wife-beating hicks, right? You Smithee, as a “black man” are a disgrace to your ethnicity. To make a blanket statement like that…a sad, sad man.

Your statement about black men living down to expectations and then blaming everyone else… You are talking about some of the wealthiest black men in the world. Many of who have turned themselves into mutli-million dollar entities. What expectations do you have for them? They ALL have jobs. What do YOU, Smithee, want from them? What should they have done with their lives? Sit around and “fume” like a self-loathing black man on a message board all day? They’ve exceeded all expectations. And because one black man carries a gun (how about all those white hicks at the tea party rallies, huh? they’re a hoot..but all white people aren’t hicks…) hey turns the NBA into a league of thugs. How sad you are.

tjl wrote:

And Smithee, I refuse to believe you are “black” if you are insinuating that all NBA players are thugs — or that the league is filled with them. Hate yourself much? It’s a disgusting blanket statement to make.

Yeah, I know, tjl. That would have been a disgusting blanket statement to make. THAT’S WHY I DIDN’T MAKE IT.

Here’s what I actually said:

Maybe, Dan, just maybe Smith is “joining the ‘NBA as thugs’ movement” because there are too many maddog NBA players who are thugs!

I did not say “76% of them [are] thugs because of the action of one.” I never even implied that — you pulled that out of your nether regions. This is a perfect example of what happens when your brain is afflicted with political correctness; you leap to unfair conclusions about the thoughts and motives of other people because you’ve been trained like Pavlov’s Dog to react with outrage when the “wrong” words are said.

Neither did Stephen A. Smith insinuate all black NBA players were thugs; if you had actually, y’know, read what he wrote instead of buying into Dan Fogarty’s carbon copy of that whoozat blog’s logic-challenged conservaphobic analysis, you would have seen this (bold mine):

For every foolish act like Plaxico Burress, Ron Artest or Arenas, there’s a Grant Hill, Shane Battier or LeBron James — guys who will be employing Black athletes one day, either in an executive or ownership capacity.

But their [the latter three's] behavior is not what is influencing Black America’s youth, specifically its cultural ambience. It’s the culture of tattoos (jailhouse or otherwise) enjoying increased prevalence and notoriety. This hyper-masculinity syndrome. This alpha-male environment that stimulates the worst in an educated individual like Crittenton (Georgia Tech), preventing a sensible young man raised by both of his parents from walking away from a crazy incident that could cost him millions in potential earnings. Even worse, it’s jeopardized the career of Arenas and his six-year, $111 million contract, plus an additional $50 million deal with Adidas allegedly over a gambling debt that amounted to less than $500.

“It’s truly sickening,” one African-American front-office official told me Sunday afternoon. “There’s just no excuse for this. This is a $4 billion industry guys are trying to turn into a $2 billion industry. There’s just a flagrant lack of appreciation for the position they’re in … mainly because of someone wanting to look more like a man, not be punked, acting literally like prisoners locked in a prison yard with one another. It’s utterly ridiculous.

You wanted an example in the past two years when an NBA player has acted like a “thug.” I don’t know why you narrowed it to two years — I suspect that it’s so 2004′s Fight Night in Motown couldn’t be included, as if that’s been erased from the public’s memory — but that’s OK, it’s no problem. Here’s an all All-Star lineup! Ladies and gentlemen, Kevin Garnett. How about this? Kobe Bryant and Ron Artest. Kobe has a habit of punishing players who manage to block his jump shot with an elbow to the face: Here he is pulling that trick on Manu Ginobili. Finally, some vulgar off-court chest-beating from Shaquille O’Neal.

You question whether or not I am really African-American, tjl. Not only am I black, I’m twice as black as Barack Obama. If you thought I would be stung by your statements “Hate yourself much?” and “You, Smithee, as a ‘black man’ are a disgrace to your ethnicity,” sorry to disappoint you. When I hear nonsense like that, I’m delighted, because the more you actually say such things out loud or put them in print, the more likely it is that you will someday actually ask yourself how you’ve come to believe that certain mindsets are incumbent upon certain ethnic groups. If you ever get around to the really serious analysis of your own assumptions, your mind will be opened as if with a crowbar. You will reject the idiocy of people like the passionately ignorant pseudointellectual Janeane Garo-fool-o, who insists that black Republicans suffer from “Stockholm Syndrome.”

If you ever reach that point, maybe you can progress to the point where you’ll question why it’s so wrong for black people to criticize other black people when all white liberals do is “hate themselves”! Chris Matthews is pasty as a ghost, Garofalo is at least half-Italian, and Olbermann’s father is (gasp!) German — but none of them can stand those eeeevil white people! They have a coronary when they see thousands of them gathering at the Tea Party events! They state without irony their fears that the Ku Klux Klan will be revived! And Christopher Columbus, the British Empire, the Pilgrims, the founding fathers of America, the trailblazing pioneers, etc. — they’re the classic villains of the progressive movement.

Why is it OK for whites to pile all over other white people, but I can’t voice my disgust that every other “WANTED” mug shot shown on the evening news is potentially a distant cousin?

Especially considering the fact that their misdeeds have an effect a law-abiding citizen like me in a real way. My life now spans five decades and I’ve never been arrested (which some race hustlers would have you believe is impossible), but when I’m shopping, I get shadowed by security. Do I blame the security guard? Heck no — it’s not his fault. It’s not MY fault. It’s the fault of stinking orifices like this guy, who robbed an 88-year-old white widower as he was withdrawing cash from an ATM to pay for his late wife’s funeral. Orthis walking pile of manure, who repeatedly punched a 101-year-old woman in the face to steal her purse (partial list).

Those are the guys whose unsavory traits can be found in a guy like Arenas, who was thought to be too unconventional, successful, and dedicated to his craft to succumb to it, but apparently not. It doesn’t matter how much money you make — you can’t get any more “thug” than brandishing a gun in a locker room over a card game debt. I’m not afraid to say that, and can’t imagine why anyone who cares about black people would be.

Link correction: Or this walking pile of manure, who repeatedly punched a 101-year-old woman in the face to steal her purse (partial list).

LN- You wrote that white men are too afraid to say what needs to be said. LN, as a white person, actually more eggshell really, you’ve got my dander up. So I must say what I’ve been afraid to say. You sir are a dumb ass. Call me on it if you must but I’M WHITE AND I’M ANGRY, pacifically at you!!!…Jeez, I wonder if that makes me a teabagger?

Ted wrote:

LN- You wrote that white men are too afraid to say what needs to be said. LN, as a white person, actually more eggshell really, you’ve got my dander up. So I must say what I’ve been afraid to say. You sir are a dumb ass. Call me on it if you must but I’M WHITE AND I’M ANGRY, pacifically at you!!!…Jeez, I wonder if that makes me a teabagger?

1. I’m pretty sure you’ve already called me a dumb ass.
2. You can’t be “ANGRY, pacifically” — it’s impossible. Check your dictionary.
3. Your personal life is none of my business. Let’s keep it that way.

tjl says:
January 6, 2010 at 2:47 am

You Smithee, as a “black man” are a disgrace to your ethnicity. To make a blanket statement like that…a sad, sad man.

I don’t know if these statements could be any more obviously racist, tjl… but I suppose in the future you could try. Apparently, LN isn’t allowed to think a certain way, and still be “Black.” That’s racism… to suggest that ALL Black people think one way, and because LN doesn’t, he isn’t… it’s also offensive and racist to think that because he doesn’t think that way, he’s a disgrace to his ethnicity.

Take your racism, and your white hood, elsewhere.

Ted says:
January 6, 2010 at 3:45 pm

Same goes for you too.

Although, I feel more pity for you. Anyone who writes this: “Call me on it if you must but I’M WHITE AND I’M ANGRY, pacifically at you!” is either 8 years old… or deserves lot of sympathy. Wow.

Smithee: Again, you let your true colors show. A self-loathing “black” man. It’s sad. You talk about the “tattoo culture” (jailhouse???) and complain that the “aggression” that Kevin Garnett took (one incident, mind you that suspended him for ONE game) makes him a thug. In fact, he’s a role model — and because you can’t stand seeing black men in power or black men with money, you chastise them for their success. Ever watch baseball? Ever see a WHITE pitcher throw a ball at someone because they hit a homerun off of them the inning prior?? Happens ALL the time. White anger, white power possibly? I’m sure you don’t feel that way since you would much rather be a white man.

Do you want links? Should I give you links to white people doing dumb shit? Or is that not fair because we should give white people a break?

Do you need a history lesson on what “your people” went through? Is that an excuse for violence? No. But can young black men be angry? Certainly. Does the fact that he has tattoos and listens to rap music mean he’s a thug? No way. And let me ask you this…what have you done to help the young black youth? You criticize, call them thugs… what are you doing? Sitting on the sidelines claiming every black man who grew up on the streets with one parent and no role model in their life needs to stop complaining? Thanks, Michael Jackson, you’re a real “black” man. You make me sick. You want to be me? Fine. Be a white man for all I care. You know I’m twice as white as you are but once a week I take a my young BLACK little brother (not by blood, but by foundation.. and love) who has no father and I spend the day with him. Help him with his homework, play thug..i mean basketball, listen to music (he likes rap, I prefer O.V. Wright) and I make his day. And I am twice as white as you are, sir. He has a right to be angry. I don’t blame him one bit. I blame frauds like you. His father isn’t around, so the self-rightous, self-loathing black men in the community sit on the sidelines and tell him not to be angry.

Thanks for chipping in Smithee. But we’ll take it from here…

ImNotBlue and LN – DAMMIT PEOPLE!! I’m ANGRY and as I said pacifically at LN but now more pacifically at Blue because like always he/she sticks his/her big fat nose in it. Blue, I have not called you a dumb ass in a long time…DON’T TEMPT ME BUSTER!!!

ImNotBlue — your act is tired. You’re not an intellectual. You hardly know what you’re talking about. Take my white hood elsewhere. Must be nice to hide behind that computer screen and talk to someone like that. You’re not blue, you’re a pussy. Take that and run with it.

I know what Ted’s favorite Italian meal is — Pasghetti.

It’s so nice when the material writes itself.

So what’s wrong with pasghetti? Jeez LN.

Ted says:
January 6, 2010 at 4:37 pm

ImNotBlue and LN – DAMMIT PEOPLE!! I’m ANGRY and as I said pacifically at LN but now more pacifically at Blue

Yes… you said it pacifically twice now. And it’s funny each time.

tjl says:
January 6, 2010 at 4:38 pm

Must be nice to hide behind that computer screen and talk to someone like that.

Yeah… darn me for speaking behind this screen… while you speak from… um… behind the screen. But not to worry, if you were here in person, I’d tell you the same thing. I have no problem confronting racists.

ImAPussy: email me. I’d love to meet — tjl201034@yahoo.com I’ll wait..