Posted on 07/23/2007 10:46:58 AM PDT by newgeezer
All the breathless debates about Michael Vick are missing the point. The bigger issue has nothing to do with whether or not he deserves the right of due process, or whether NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell should suspend him, or whether Atlanta Falcons owner Arthur Blank should enable him or give him tough love. It's not even about whether ... Nike should be launching another designer shoe with his name on it.
All of those are minor distractions from ...:
How did someone like Michael Vick ever come to exist?
Are we really ready to have that conversation? Do we dare explore how a young man of such unique athletic gifts and such obvious on-field marketing appeal was allowed to turn into just another unfortunate mug shot and potential ruined life? How did that remarkable athlete get a $100 million contract with the Falcons, become Nike's poster boy, rake in endorsements ..., then find himself on the verge of blowing it all because of an incredible tale that seems to come straight out of some hardcore gangsta rap video?
... The ultimate symbols of black athletes in our society used to be men of substance and positive image. Men with social conscience and resolve such as Jackie Robinson, Curt Flood, Jim Brown, ... They carried a burden and deep-rooted responsibility to portray themselves with a sense of dignity, pride and purpose. Even ... rebels such as Muhammad Ali ... stood for something more meaningful than a multimillion-dollar shoe deal.
But somewhere between Jackie Robinson and Michael Vick, ... "Street cred" became the anthem of the modern black athlete, this misguided notion that the only way to appeal to the young demographic of the sneaker-buying public was to adopt the negative attitudes of the thug life popularized by black hip-hop/gangster rappers. ...
(Excerpt) Read more at stltoday.com ...
They didn’t always wear those baggy pants; one day at a department store in Cincinnati in the tire shop, a youth came through the back door, grabbed a new tire off the rack and sprinted toward the open garage door.
Within seconds, there were five of us in hot pursuit, all heels and elbows; after four blocks we were spread out like NASCAR racers on the 30th lap except for this one long-legged salesman from the accessories department still in sight down the street.
Tired, and disgusted, we trudged back up the street toward the stupidly abandoned shop and arrived just in time to see two of his companions drive off with a pickup bed full of tires.
Me, too. Exactly the same story, and it sounds like for much the same reasons.
For quite a few years now, anytime anyone wants to talk about the NBA, I say something like, "Thanks but, I really couldn't care less about gangsta-ball."
"National Felons League"... I like it. Thanks; I've been wondering what to call the NFL.
I have this image of Jimmy opening the car door for Paris and just stut stut stuttering away
No insult intended, but I’ll bet if my Lab could talk, he wouldn’t be apologizing for Pit Bulls.
I note Mr. Burwell does not mention OJ as a black hero of old.
This battle is over, and the thugs won. How do I know? Because white kids are emulating them.
BUMP for the truth.
Are they glorifying stereotypes or attributes?
I’m surprised he didn’t add Wilt Chamberlain. /s
There certainly have been plenty of examples that are better than Jim Brown. (Dr. J and Bill Russell come to mind, but I could probably name a hundred without too much effort.)
I will - you're just blaming the victim. Yes, the degenerate ghetto lifestyle is the product of a dysfunctional culture. But it's the legacy of slavery & discrimination that destroyed black families long before the Great Society.
IOW, it's all whitey's fault & will always be whitey's fault. Even those that arrived back around 1900 & even when Hispanics make up the future majority. Now pay up - reparations are in order.
We must understand that hip-hop is simply a recent symptom of a long-sick culture. Fighting dogs is another.
....Or the new Vic Mobile phone with selective call screening, for when you’re being hounded by the press.
It’s going to be interesting to check the money/timeline when this all got started.
The indictment starts out “Early 2001”, “May 2001”, “June 2001”. So this looks like it could have all began while Vick was in the spring semester at VT before he left school.
Those dates are before he was drafted by Atlanta. But I’m sure he had signed many lucrative endorsement contracts. And/or had a couple “personal” loans from other folks.
And another thing... it’s not hard for me to understand how someone can do these things to a dog....when he’s already admitted to knowingly giving herpes to at least one woman.
(Can anyone get ahold of a cache from VicksK9Kennels.com )
Did you miss the part about them killing one of the dogs by throwing water on it and then electocuting it, or throwing one down on the ground to kill it. They don’t just enjoy the fights, but the cruelty of them, apparently.
Is that an appropriate part of culture?
Violence of this nature dehumanizes people, IMHO. No, they’re not going to become serial murderers any time soon, although cruelty to animals often precedes violence to people according to some studies.
Then, you have those wannabe’s that either train their pitbulls to fight, or don’t train against aggression, and they end up killing the neighbor’s kid (what a surprise).
I am no PETA animal rights dingdong, but what they and others have done with these dogs is shameful.
Marcus Vick has had his share of "unfortunate" incidents, as well.
Yes, he was. He became one when he determined that Republicans encourage self reliance while Democrats encourage government reliance.
I read somewheres int he last few days that for some years, rap stars like Snoop Dog have glorified dog fighting in their songs/videos. Is this true? If so, why hasn't SD lost his commercial endorsements. He did an ad for Chrysler last year, IIRC.
Your comments about the degration of culture, society are 100% correct. However, I thnk Vick is a different case entirely, far worse. He's what, 28???.yet he's been involved in the dog fighting culture for 6 or more years. That's about 21-22.. Psychological studies of serial killers show they just don't start out killig women..they build up to it over some years..they start out torturing animals, maybe arson. So Vick had to be doing lots of bad stuff for years as a teenager..he didn't just oen day "jump" into the blood-sport pit of dogfighting...
“Animals don’t have rights to violate, people do...”
All God’s creatures have right to be treated humanely, even those that we raise for food. If you truly see nothing evil about dog fighting or think it’s no different than watching an action flick (the action is just pretend...didn’t you know?) then your brain is too screwed up for me to even try to figure out. I hope that you don’t have pets. No need to respond, I really don’t want to hear from you.
I'd agree, except it seems to me the 'older' generation has been saying that for a long, long time.
What you refer to as "white kids emulating" is nothing new. It goes at least as far back as Chuck Berry, and probably as far back as the jazz/swing era (if not further).
It takes a lot to inspire me to write an old fashioned letter and find an address to send it to. That commercial did though.
I just couldn't believe they did that. Any last shred of respect I had for Chrysler was gone the first time I saw that commercial.
There's funny and then there's legitimizing one of the worst of the worst scumbag POS street thugs. What Chrysler did was the latter.
How they couldn't see it before they made the commercial was lost on me.
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