Allen Iverson, its safe to drop that Hip Hop album now
Like most people who openly despise Tyler Perry and clearly pronounce the "er" at the end of the word "motherfucker" - I publicly had my blackness challenged the other night, a ritual that happens so often that I feel like a grizzled veteran who has done four tours of duty in that particular war of ignorance. I happened to be out with some friends, having a few drinks, talking about everything from Hip Hop to politics - when a friend of one of the people at the table said "Man, you sure do talk white, what's up with that?" Usually, despite my reputation for historically being a sociopathic hothead, I'd calmly tell the misguided brother that he desperately needed to reevaluate what blackness is - respectfully dropping jewels to the young man like so many elder statesmen of years past had graciously done with me, letting him in on the fact that a person's colloquialisms and lack of stereotypical idiosyncrasies have nothing to do with embracing the melanin they were born with. But I must have been having a bad day because all civility and decorum were abandoned as I punched that son of a bitch squarely in the throat, dragging his ass outside by his BAPE sweatshirt as he desperately gasped for air - me screaming at the top of my lungs "You really want to see how black I am motherfucker!!" Sure, that could have been handled differently, but I've been dealing with that sort of idiocy ever since my main focus in life became landing 360 Airwalk Ollie's and pulling off backside smith grinds - when I was in junior high, the mere fact that I rode a skateboard made my black peers feel as if I was a race traitor who would snitch on my fellow brothers and sisters if the revolution ever went down.
Forget about the fact that me riding a skateboard was the only difference between me and the other black kids, that I loved the same Hip Hop that they did, that I still cherished the voluptuous backsides of the 8 or so black girls who attended my junior high school - forget about the fact that many of my detractors couldn't answer a black history question if a man with an itchy trigger finger was having an epileptic fit while holding a loaded handgun to their collective heads. To most of them I was trying to be white, simply because my primary mode of transportation happened to be a skateboard - and because posters of Neil Blender and Mark Gonzalez shared wall-space with the likes of Run D.M.C and Whodini. Like I've said before, that time period was instrumental in terms of carving out the person that I am today - I constantly wax poetic about how both skateboarding and Public Enemy's "It Takes a Nation of Million.." album was the potent mixture that created the black man you all affectionately know as Humanity F Critic. All of that sounds good, but one part of the story that I always conveniently leave out, primarily because it makes the story less sexy - is how, briefly during High School, I went through a militant "Michael from "Good Times" phase to garner favor with the 12 black folks that went to my 99.9% white High School and to reestablish my "urban street cred".
It was sad man, I grew a wildly unmanageable Afro that melted any pick that I put up to it like it just saw the arch of the covenant, I wore these gaudy African beads that suggested that I was auditioning to be the newest member of X-Clan, I never left the house without wearing some sort of black medallion - and of course I only wore T-Shirts that exhibited my black pride, even sporting an "ANC" shirt years before I even knew what those particular letters stood for. The saddest part about this moment in time is all the sexual advances from girls named "Becky" and "Summer" that I openly rebuked just to maintain my silly militant image - that's why if time machines existed, I would go back to 1990 and have more white chicks on my dick than a Sybian.(..or a ticket scalper at a Kenny Chesney concert)
Before long I came to my senses and reacquainted myself with my skateboard, no longer feeling the need to wear my Afrocentrism on my sleeve like a tacky cuff-link a third-rate pimp might wear - and even though I have yet to bed a woman of the Caucasian persuasion, I have no problem with interracial dating, I have returned love letters that I wrote in blood to Janeane Garofalo to back that claim up.(and a restraining order) No one reminds me more about my current views being in stark contrast to how militant I once was more than my friend Danny, I can't tell you how many times we'll be at a bar and I'll have some PAWG(phat ass white girl) sit on my lap while saying "You know if we date I can't take you home to meet my mama, right?" - only for my lifelong friend to clap while sarcastically saying "What would Marcus Garvey say if he saw you being sexually suggestive with a 'pink toe'?"(Danny is white by the way)
But if you simply bring up the NBA to me my skin suddenly transforms into kinte cloth as if I was a superhero who only attended Justice League meetings during Black History Month - and I start to spouting off controversial screeds that make Malcolm X look like Clarence Thomas. For example, some might say the dress-code that the NBA imposed upon its players was an innocent gesture, trying to make their product more marketable and all - I personally believe that it was a ham-fisted attempt to make socially retarded, crotchety old white men feel more comfortable.(Maybe they are both the same thing?) The sports media, usually inept, is especially abysmal when it comes to the NBA - fights that happen in other sports are almost treated as an afterthought, but when a basketball fight breaks out not only is it ritualistically replayed every 5 minutes but the announcers act as if a black man throwing a right jab on a parque flooring is akin to murdering puppies. Remember a few years ago when Allen Iverson tried to put out that rap album, I understand the subject material wasn't exactly shedding a helpful light on the genocide in Darfur or childhood obesity - but the sports media, along with David Stern, acted as if spitting a 16 bar verse about violence was a hell-worthy trespass akin to having impure thoughts about a nun or kissing a girl on the mouth after an orgy. I sincerely think that David Stern is racist, I've never seen a commissioner have so much contempt for his own players - every time the man is asked to comment on some gripe that a player might have, he always finds a way to conveniently insult their intelligence.(Or lack thereof) The way sports pundits view Stern as a "take no shit" commissioner always irritated me, mainly because when people say that, there always seems to be a "he's really keeping those niggers in line" undercurrent to it all.
But in light of the recent Tim Donoghy scandal, where an NBA referee affected the point spread and bet on those games the he officiated - it wasn't covered with the same disgust by the media as a certain brawl at Auburn Hills was. I mean, the outcome of games were affected here - in a sports world that gleefully masturbates over Barry Bonds and stories about fall-from-grace Olympic sprinters whose 100meter times where not only wind aided, you'd figure that we'd still be getting bombarded with nonstop coverage, equipped with wordy commentaries about the integrity of professional Basketball being nonexistent. Not so much. Even David Stern, a man you think would rule with an iron fist based on his stance on basketball fights and misguided rap albums - not only tried to spin the Donaghy scandal as a promotional tool for the NBA, but also off the court violence:
"Amazing is where 81 points (by Kobe Bryant) happens, where Ben Wallace's hair happens, where Yao Ming happens, where caring happens." He pauses, then adds, "Where Donaghy happens, where clubbing happens, where registered weapons happen. We invite our fans to mesh up whatever happens. It's all there."
Jesus Christ. Allen, the coast is clear, you can drop that Hip Hop album now - there's clearly an opening.
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