Democracy Part II

It's coming from the sorrow in the street,

The holy places where the races meet,

From the homicidal bitchin' that goes down in every kitchen

To determine who will serve and who will eat.

From the wells of disappointment where the women kneel to pray,

From the grace of God in the desert here and the desert far away,

Democracy is coming, to the USA.

-Leonard Cohen, Democracy

Do you know who Jemele Hill is? As one whose chosen background noise is ESPN more often than not, I do.  She is a black woman who has been on the various opinion talk shows where she was frequently the only female voice, and sometimes the only black person.  She can be pretty sharp, in several ways, first and most importantly, she knows her stuff, regardless of her race or gender, she is on merit one of the better commentators in the younger generation at ESPN, and the network has gradually recognized that and given her more precious air time.  She went from being a guest on Around the Horn, to having a half an hour argument show He Said/She Said, with Michael Smith, to hosting the 6:00 edition of Sportscenter, also with Smith.  Her personality, and it's contrast with Smith's mild mannered college boy demeanor set the tone for the first little show that mostly aired in one of the afternoon time slots.  It worked well enough that they decided to give it a bigger stage.

It worked, I think, because Ms. Hill shows something that is rare on news based TV: a strong, opinionated black woman.  Personalities like hers are often relegated to sit-coms where they become more or less lampoon material. Even with the immense popularity and influence of Oprah Winfrey in the industry, it is still all too rare to see someone who does not have to "whitewash" themselves to get ahead.  Her edginess and strong opinions about sports and culture, her willingness to verbally battle the men in a male dominated milieu is inspiring, and something I am glad to have my daughter observe and absorb.

ESPN has mostly gotten high marks for diversity in my book.  Going back to Stuart Scott with his distinctive narration of highlights (BooYah, and "Mama, there that man again") What made Sportscenter great was the way that the anchors got to invest themselves in the stories.  And so it is with great disappointment that I see that ESPN has suspended Jemele for two weeks for speaking out on social media about how Jerry Jones demanding his players stand for the anthem is pretty shady.

I know I might sound like a broken record at this point, but when corporations like ESPN and immensely wealthy people like Jerry Jones come down like this on people like Jemele Hill, it just makes the cries of injustice ring louder.  This anthem protest thing is exposing some of the knee jerk racism of our system like turning the lights on the cockroaches.  It may be confusing and starting to get worn thin in a lot of people's minds, but look at the Roger Goodell's and Jerry Jone's of the world, look at the powers that be at ESPN, they're starting to show their teeth. They're trying to silence the protest of the black folks and their using all the usual sorts of "reasonable" status-quo sorts of arguments, because that's what systems do: "she's violating the social media guidelines," "this is just not the appropriate time or place for that sort of protest,"

You may not care about sports, or watch Sportscenter, but you need to know who Jemele Hill is.  You may not care about football, but you need to know who Colin Kaepernick is.  Because of things like this, the world of sports is becoming a place where we are having very important dialogue about civil rights and freedom of speech.   Yes, that irritates some people who just want to escape into their games, but that is just tough.  Sports has taken the place of religion in a lot of people's lives, and it doesn't always do a very good job of instilling moral values in its devotees, but if it can give us a place to see how the wealth, power and control of the white and wealthy rolls over our rights and silences our voices...

Sail on, sail on,

O mighty ship of state,

To the shores of need,

Past the reefs of greed

Through the squalls of hate,

Sail on, Sail on, Sail on.