What’s My Name?

By Michael-Louis Ingram, Editor

BASN

(first presented September 22. 2008)

 

PHILADELPHIA (BASN/BASN NEWSROOM)— On the latest edition of ESPIN’s “The Sports Reporters,” columnist Bill Rhoden of the New York Times, a semi – regular participant on the show, made mention of the continual calling of Dallas Cowboys’ defensive back Adam Jones by his more infamous nickname of “Pacman.”

While this has been an ongoing thing among the talking heads and some reporters, the depth of this was magnified further when Rhoden revealed dialogue heard during the radio broadcast of last week’s Eagles-Cowboys Monday Night Football game.

With Marv Albert and Michael Irvin handling the on-air duties, according to Rhoden, the issue of the name was slung back and forth in a troubling discourse. Irvin, who has long been there, done that, and emerged fully as a human being, made a point of calling him Adam Jones – his proper name; emphasizing the young man’s desire to carry on and get a fresh start since his re-admission into the NFL as an active player.

Albert, on the other hand, apparently wouldn’t let it rest, calling Jones by the name he formally asked everyone to stop calling in a press conference weeks before the beginning of the regular season.

So Albert, for all his recognition as a broadcaster and voice of the New York Knicks; who, unlike Jones, actually has a record (A 12-month suspended sentence for assault and battery which was pleaded down from an original charge of forcible sodomy – which could’ve sent the little panty – wearing putz to the Joint for life) seemingly insisted on calling him Pacman.

Now, I don’t know about you, but where I come from, them’s fightin’ words.

On the Sunday Night game between the Cowboys and Green Bay Packers, on-air play-by-play man Al Michaels called him both names over the course of the game; which could be attributed to old habits dying hard.

But I don’t buy it. Why?

Because production meetings are done in advance for broadcasts to deal with specific things like nicknames, pronunciations of difficult surnames, trivia, etc. In fact, when we are in the press box at a game, cheat sheets and information cards are provided with some of the aforementioned items.

So there is no spontaneity in the show in that regard; what there is to say and how it gets said has, for the most part, been predetermined.

Which makes the deliberate disrespect on the part of the press in doing this even more damning — because it is being done with no regard for Adam Jones.

So a little shit like Albert can do his dirt in his Victoria’s Secret lace number (all the while pleading with the public to “respect his privacy”) but he can piss on a young man who is trying to correct himself?

When you see it like that, when it’s done like that; you call it what it is – profane.

So Nigger Jones (you’re just as easily calling him that, with impunity) is a piece of shit because Albert and his talking head colleagues say so.

Now if Jones made some fists rain down on Albert’s perverted little ass, they would arrest him for assault.

But because Jones has to be a good darkie, he can’t fire back.

And through ESPIN’s poison prism, the euphemistic “athlete” and “nigger” remain one and the same.

The atmosphere is now so toxic on-air that even the host of Sports Reporters, John Saunders, also used the pejorative “Pacman” when he opened the show.

So, in my humble opinion, calling the lot of them a boatful of muthafuckas (and they are a boatful of muthafuckas!) isn’t profanity; because you can’t be more profane as when you intentionally, deliberately refuse to recognize someone’s humanity.

As ex-athlete and ESPIN contributor Qadry Ismail spoke on a wrap – up show Sunday evening, I recalled how I met him in Tampa when his Baltimore Ravens played the New York Giants in 2000.

He had a sign next to his interview spot with “Cod – Ree” (proper pronunciation of his first name) so reporters and questioners would get it right.

From what little I know of the brother, he strikes me as someone who would not tolerate being called out of his name, especially after he made it clear how to say it.

Which is why I was hoping someone else closer to the issue would speak up like Michael Irvin did and not be such a bitch – ass about something they know is wrong and something they would not tolerate themselves.

ESPN stands for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network; and you better believe when their ass gets in trouble for something, they push the ‘entertainment’ aspect to the Nth degree so they can wiggle out of being perceived as ‘real’ journalists; knowing the only people they are entertaining are themselves – and their sponsors.

After all, that is what masturbation was designed to do…

Slaughter on Pennsylvania Avenue

Which brings us back to Barack Obama and his ballot box reality; in spite of a crushing financial recession, the murdering of American citizens, the pimping out of American soldiers to fight an unjust war, widespread corruption, and an unprecedented buyout of subprime, subslime madness created by his opposition’s cronies, the American people are still undecided.

In a recent speech, Obama implied the American people were not stupid.

My brother, they are stupid. If they weren’t stupid, Bush would never have been re-elected; dirty tricks or no dirty tricks in Florida.

And now, a polled third of your own party have to cross that most important of Rubicons — getting past your race; and not the one which gets checked off as human.

“There is no way I am voting a Nigger for president!”

Don’t pretend it hasn’t been said or thought; because the constipation of this culture has provided cause and effect for such thoughts to flourish and thrive, let alone exist.

As much as the fuss has been made about Obama’s ascendance, the looking glass is too intense for a lot of folks who wanted this tea party to have a different set of guests.

Just as Black folks are berated about “being victims” because of a racist society (Oh, that slavery thing happened so long ago — why don’t you people just get over it????) they are ignored more when the truths laid out in that noble piece of paper called the Constitution are the only glue in a compact made at the behest of a group of men who were slave holders themselves.

And when some of these truths become self evident and are redressed, they go off with not the ‘bang’ but the ‘whimper.’

It will be interesting to see which candidate will bring up the fact Congress apologized for slavery first — especially since the press refuses to speak on it. Maybe it will come up in one of the debates — not!

Someone far wiser than me once said those in power would destroy everything before sharing anything; and no, it wasn’t Reverend Wright.

If John McCain or Obama wins this election, it won’t be because the better man won; but if McCain wins — it will be because of one reason…

Once you confirm someone to be human, they can never be rendered inhuman ever again.

How many human beings will pull the lever on November 4th; and how many inhumanities may occur as a result?

always outnumbered – never outgunned.

michaelingram@blackathlete.com/basneditor@basnnewsroom.com