Archive for March 9th, 2004

Lashawn wrote about it today and it just kinda provoked me to put my 2 cents in. The fact that R. Kelly got nominated for an NAACP Image Award while he’s got CHILD PORNOGRAPHY charges pending is mind-boggling. And in the interest of disclosing my biases, let me state right up front that I have never like R. Kelly as a singer. I’m pretty good about not fooling myself into thinking that I know celebrities, so I wouldn’t say that I have any personal animus towards him, I just don’t think he can sing. He’s like 7-up — never had it, never will. Well, at least I was neutral until all this madness with the tape started. (I did not see the tape, even though I have had opportunities. I always figured that if he was going to jail for making it, I would be just as culpable for watching it. So it might not be him. Gotta play fair.) Once the tape came out, my respect for him sank. I mean, regardless of whether he did it or not, why the devil would his next single after the scandal be “Ignition?” In the words of Kane, “Wha’chu on, hops? Dope or dog food?”

Anyway, my point in bringing this up is that the NAACP, by nominating R. Kelly, did the functional equivalent of walking through a lion cage in a wildebeest jumpsuit. For real. I had run out of jokes, the story was so old. Then they go and revive it by nominating him for an image award. The amount of stupidity involved there cannot be overstated. What kind of credibility can your organization have when you nominate an alleged child pornographer for an award? (I bet the folks at Vivid Video wouldn’t let that type of thing slip through.) Now, people are legitimately questioning everything about the NAACP, including its place in the America today.

I know the NAACP used to be about something, but what do they do now? Kweisi Mfume signed on to PETA’s blackout of Kentucky Fried Chicken. The logic behind targeting Black folks is ostensibly “because black people can relate to the suffering of chickens.” Obviously they never met me. I never met a chicken I didn’t like– fried, baked, in a taco…well, actually I did meet one I didn’t like. Boiled. (Yeah, boiled.) A friend of mine used to tell me that if the chicken goes extinct, I will be the prime suspect. And don’t think a bunch of vegans is gonna get me to change my mind. But I digress.

The NAACP is now a joke for everybody all along the political spectrum. From as far left as Aaron McGruder (creator of the Boondocks) all the way to the Armstrong Williams right, everybody has weighed in on the utter…I can’t even think of a word for how stupid this is. They’re just a joke. I’m not disrespecting the history of the organization, I’m just pointing out how far it has fallen. If anybody is disrespecting the history of the NAACP, it’s the current “leadership.” So basically, the NAACP has gone from W.E.B. Du Bois to Thurgood Marshall to Kweisi Mfume to R. Kelly? (One (or two) of these people just doesn’t belong) And I know, Kweisi Mfume responded to the uproar by changing the manner in which people are nominated, so nothing like this could happen again, but at this point, it’s just too late. I hope my grandmother cancels her membership.

Now I know I don’t want the Eagles to get Terrell Owens. If he can’t take it like a man that he got traded to Baltimore, how’s he gonna act on the Eagles? He’ll kill that team. I mean, hey, Thrash and Pinkston are no superstars. They’re probably not even starters. They know how to play and keep their mouths shut, though. And it’s not even like I mind mouthy superstar players, because I don’t. In the appropriate context. Pardon the cliche, but Philly really is a blue-collar town. Even AI, no matter what people may say about him, is blue-collar to the bone. He might beef with his coaches, but on the floor, that man is about trying his best to win a game. (We won’t get into that deal about practice.) T.O., I don’t know. The way he’s acting about this trade, I’m sure I don’t want the Birds messing around with him now. Let him go to the Giants and start acting a fool when Sherri– I mean Kerry– Collins starts throwing to Shockey too much. He doesn’t want to go to Baltimore because he knows that Big Ray is just waiting for him to cut up. Ain’t gon’ be no gettin’ up in the quarterback’s face when #52 is around. Not that the Eagles brass would listen to me anyway, but vote no on T.O.

Did the first stage of a research project I’m working on today. As part of the process, we had some high school students choose pseudonyms. I might’ve biased their choices by mentioning Ice Cube as an example, but that’s neither here nor there. One of them chose 2Pac and the other one chose Biggie. They’re both 9th graders; that means Tupac and Biggie have been dead for most of “2Pac” and “Biggie’s” lives. Wow.