{"id":611,"date":"2007-04-12T15:42:38","date_gmt":"2007-04-12T20:42:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bomanijones.com\/blog\/2007\/04\/12\/todays-discussion-of-race-in-america\/"},"modified":"2022-01-18T14:47:00","modified_gmt":"2022-01-18T22:47:00","slug":"todays-discussion-of-race-in-america","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bomanijones.com\/?p=611","title":{"rendered":"Today's Discussion of Race in America"},"content":{"rendered":"

Business…here’s a look at B.J. and Justin Upton<\/a>.
\nHere’s a funny from the chat session…I was accused by chatters, black and white, of showing favoritism to black people because I primarily write about black athletes.\u00a0 Could someone explain to me what else I’m supposed to do when I primarily write about football and basketball?\u00a0 Seriously, could someone enlighten me on that?
\nIn the last few days, I’ve gotten more e-mails that presume my position on a range of issues purely because I’m black.\u00a0 Since I’m black, I must just side with black people on everything.\u00a0 I must look for every opportunity to slam white people.\u00a0 You know, because I’m black.
\nWanna know the most frustrating thing about racism for any black person?\u00a0 That it’s stripped us of our humanity.
\nNot just in the obvious ways.\u00a0 To be human is to be unique, to be individual.\u00a0 To be black, however, is to be a part of a presumed monolith.\u00a0 Your views are always totally dictated by your race and allegiance toward Negritude, even though black people frequently complain about how black people don’t stick together nearly enough.
\nMy take is the same as Scoop’s and Jemele’s and LZ’s, according to so many readers.\u00a0 We all just look for a reason to jump on a topic involving race.\u00a0 That’s what we<\/em> do.
\nBecause it’s not just me, or her, or him.\u00a0 It’s we.
\nWe’re asked our opinions on anything another of us says, especially about race, though my colleagues aren’t asked to answer for us or each other in the same way.
\nI only write about black people because of some favoritism, even though there’s no reason to say that unless you have some presumption about what black people do.\u00a0 You know, because we’re all doing the same thing.
\nThe word is that we only talk about race.\u00a0 Check this archive page<\/span> and tell me where you see that.\u00a0 More importantly, show me where, in the stories where race is the major issue, how the story could have been done without discussing race.
\nBy my count, that was only about four of the first page.\u00a0 Maybe that’s less than my white counterparts, but there are a few theories on what that might mean.
\nMy voice is mine.\u00a0 It is no one else’s.\u00a0 I don’t represent black people.\u00a0 I represent the view of a black man, one influenced by the experiences that come from that, but one that’s individual within that blackness.\u00a0 I’m concerned with race because it’s at the center of this society, but I ain’t doing nothing because of what anyone else wants or some sort of allegiance.\u00a0 I’ve got a brain, and it’s not conjoined with any other.
\nIn other words, I offer a voice full of humanity.\u00a0 Whether anyone sees it that way or not.\u00a0 And that ain’t about to change.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Business…here’s a look at B.J. and Justin Upton. Here’s a funny from the chat session…I was accused by chatters, black and white, of showing favoritism to black people because I primarily write about black athletes.\u00a0 Could someone explain to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":56,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[96],"class_list":["post-611","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog","tag-boblogs"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bomanijones.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/611","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bomanijones.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bomanijones.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bomanijones.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/56"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bomanijones.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=611"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bomanijones.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/611\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bomanijones.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=611"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bomanijones.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=611"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bomanijones.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=611"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}