ESPN Host Echoes Kobe on Trayvon: We Can’t Let Emotion Get in the Way of Facts

Kobe Bryant said in a recent interview that he wasn’t comfortable with several Miami Heat players protesting in support of Trayvon Martin, saying he doesn’t like the idea of reacting to an issue like that just because he’s African-American, and instead believes people just need to relax and listen to the facts instead of just blindly getting behind a cause. On Arsenio Hall‘s show last night, ESPN radio host and TV commentator Stephen A. Smith said that Bryant was “right on point” in his assessment.

Smith said it’s fairly evident black people are “outnumbered” in American society, but that doesn’t mean the African-American community has a “license to be unfair”; people need to “exercise a level of fairness and justice.”

Hall brought up the infamous Tawana Brawley case and admitted, “I went hook, line, and sinker with an opinion” only for things to change when the facts came out, so now patience must be a top virtue. Smith added, “When you make the mistake of jumping to emotional conclusions and being factually incorrect, your cachet diminishes.”

Watch the video below, via The Arsenio Hall Show:

[photo via screengrab]

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Follow Josh Feldman on Twitter: @feldmaniac

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