Agreed.
If we worked from within to change and get rid of those black criminals who end up joining the ranks of those within the legal system, then a lot of the issue will be solved.
But we're left with the "chicken eatin' poverty pimps" masquerading as preachers trying to tell everyone that it's society's fault, instead of demanding some personal accountability for one's actions.
If you're a black pro athlete who owns a sweet ride and lives in a ritzy neighborhood in this country, chances are good you've been busted for DWB.
Driving While Black.
"It happens to me all the time, especially in Tampa," says Atlanta Braves outfielder Gary Sheffield, who grew up in Tampa. "I go home to see old friends, and I get stopped. Or if I'm driving slow, looking at my old neighborhood, I get stopped. It never happens in my truck, just in my nice cars."
Denver Broncos defensive tackle Trevor Pryce says an officer followed him home once, pulled him over and said, "I don't think this is your car." And Pryce replied, "Why, because I'm black and driving a Corvette?" Pryce has been pulled over for DWB so many times he has a new strategy. "I pull up right next to cops," he says, "roll down my windows and play my music as loud as I can. Nobody would do that driving a stolen car, right?"
"It's happened to me eight or nine times," says Miami Heat guard Jim Jackson. "I asked one cop in Dallas why he pulled me over, and he goes, 'Oh, we're just doing random checks.' Right. Random checks of black men in nice cars."
When comedian Chris Rock was pulled over on a DWB, he jokes, "It scared me so bad, I thought I had stolen my car!"
Three times this summer, Miami Dolphins running back Ricky Williams says, Fort Lauderdale police have stopped or hassled him for nothing more than the color of his skin.
"One cop pulled me over for no other reason than I was a black man driving an expensive car [a Hummer]," says Williams, the former Heisman Trophy winner who moved to south Florida after being traded to the Dolphins in March. "They said later it was because my tags were expired. But it was a handwritten temporary license they couldn't possibly have been able to see. For that they call the drug dogs and I get handcuffed?" The stop and search lasted an hour and a half, Williams says, and then he was ticketed for expired tags and for not having his driver's license and proof of insurance in his possession.
Twice cops have knocked on his front door to tell him his garage was open, Williams says, and then asked him for proof that he owned his cars. They questioned him about what he did for a living and how much he paid for the cars. It's the kind of frustration that white athletes never have to deal with.
Williams has started taking the long way to work so he doesn't have to drive past a police station. Other guys just give up and drive crappy cars. Sometimes these guys don't even have to be in a car.
"You go into a Tiffany's in the mall," says Jackson, "and right away you notice the lights [brighten]. Then the clerk follows you around, pretending she's just cleaning up. I came out of a restaurant once and the valet goes, 'Man, what did you do to get a car like this?' I was like, 'I got a job, that's what I did!'"
The dreadlocked Williams says that when he flies first class, more times than not attendants ask to see his ticket, assuming he's in the wrong seat. Houston Rockets forward Glen Rice wasn't allowed to check into a five-star hotel by a woman behind the desk who insisted, "I know what you're about."
"What am I about?" asked Rice, who refused to leave until he was given a room. The desk clerk called police, who recognized Rice and advised the woman to give him a room. That's when Rice said no thanks and walked out.
Says Jackson, "I don't think most of white America understands how it feels. You work hard to be successful, to get some nice things, and people treat you like you stole them."
"I guess cops think we're drug dealers," says Latrell Sprewell, the New York Knicks guard. "It pisses you off, but what pisses you off more is that when they see who you are, they suddenly change it to, 'Uh, I pulled you over to, uh, can I have your autograph?'"
When you mix cops with young men who feel persecuted, things can get volatile. "I feel myself boiling over," says Jackson. "But if I started yelling at the cops, next thing you know, I'd be in jail." Or worse. Remember the four young unarmed black men on their way to a basketball tryout who were profiled by troopers and stopped on the New Jersey Turnpike, then had 11 shots fired into their van, wounding three of them?
Williams was so frustrated by his treatment after one DWB stop that he started to walk home in protest, got a block and a half, then sat down on a curb and cried. "It hurts your feelings," he says. "Nobody likes to be treated like a criminal."
And we wonder why so many black athletes are angry.