talisaynon Posted June 21, 2009 Share Posted June 21, 2009 It's the 21st century Slavery is over. Reds announcer Marty Brennaman caused a stir when he called fans of the Cubs the most obnoxious in baseball for throwing balls on the field during a game at Wrigley Field last week. It's not the first time someone has complained about the behavior of fans in the ballpark and was followed by the latest fracas between Red Sox and Yankee fans and a brawl-filled weekend series between rooters of the Phillies and Mets. All of that kind of pales in comparison to abject racism spouted from the stands at the players on the field, though. Torii Hunter spoke to the Riverside Press-Enterprise before the start of a series at Fenway Park this week and related how he'd treated during earlier trips to Boston. "My first five or six (years), I was 'That N-word.' Some people would chant that out, some people would throw beer or whatever . . . batteries." The Boston Herald picked up on the story today and spoke with David Ortiz, Hunter's former teammate with the Twins. "He told me those complaints before, but what can I do about it?" said Ortiz. "You know how it is. When you play for the other team, you're going to hear some (stuff) like that - wherever you're at. He's aware of that. "(But) he heard some stuff that I'm surprised at. One of the security guys told me it was true. They were screaming that kind of stuff at him. That's not right." http://mlb.fanhouse.com/2008/04/23/torii-hunter-has-heard-racial-taunts-at-fenway-park/ Get your backwards ass state to the 21st century pronto. Thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thor99 Posted June 21, 2009 Share Posted June 21, 2009 There are dickheads in every fanbase. I guess calling Ortiz a gorilla is just fine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
talisaynon Posted June 21, 2009 Author Share Posted June 21, 2009 There are dickheads in every fanbase. I guess calling Ortiz a gorilla is just fine. http://www.weeklydig.com/news-opinions/news-us/200801/boston-racist-city The day after last week's New Hampshire primary, Chris Matthews, speaking on MSNBC's Morning Joe, reintroduced the perception that New England and especially Boston have yet to shed their racist pedigree. Speaking about the upset of Barack Obama's poll-projected win, Matthews suggested that voters had been lying to exit pollsters. "Me think paleface speak with forked tongue," he said, in an ironically offensive accusation of racism. Joe Scarborough, the show's host offered, "I'm used to people saying that we in the South have race problems ... But, talk about New England." "Boston?" Matthews replied. "Boston?" He added, "There's different kinds of prejudice in the North than there is in the South, but it exists. It may not be 'I think I'm better than you,' but it might be 'I don't want to live next door to you.'" The choice to label New England, and single out Boston in particular, as racist, has rekindled an old debate among pundits who remember Charles Stuart in 1989 (who murdered his pregnant wife and blamed a "black man," sparking city-wide racial profiling by the BPD), and Barry Bonds' 2004 assertion that he'd never play for the Sox because "Boston is too racist." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
talisaynon Posted June 21, 2009 Author Share Posted June 21, 2009 http://myespn.go.com/blogs/truehoop/0-29-6/Black-Athletes-Have-Long-Seen-Boston-as-Racist.html Black Athletes Have Long Seen Boston as Racist January 3, 2008 2:20 PM ESPN's J.A. Adande wrote eloquently a few weeks ago about the irony of seeing the Celtics as a white team. (Interesting set of comments about that article.) Past and present, you can make a case that the Celtics have been as pro-black as any team. Today, John Gonzalez of Boston magazine investigates the notion that Boston is racist. Credit him with taking a very sober and reasoned approach, which, probably appropriately, doesn't really reach a conclusion about whether or not Boston is particularly racist. What he found was a lot of black athletes willing to confirm that the city has long had that reputation. He also found players like Al Jefferson who wonder what all the fuss is about. The truth, I suspect, is not definitive. There's no such thing as a bad city. We're talking about the actions of thousands if not millions of sports fans. They are not organized. Some of them are racists, like in every city. Bad things have happened in the past. Do all those things happen disproportionately in that one place? Tough to say. But all sides should be heard with an open mind, and Gonzalez sure did the requisite listening. But more than anything, Gonzalez found a disappointing willingness among Bostonians to pipe up. His story ends like this: While reporting this story, I reached out to the Celtics, Red Sox, and Patriots, asking for interviews with current players, coaches, and front office members. The Celtics gave me the runaround before ultimately passing. The Red Sox and Patriots failed to do even that much; they simply didn't acknowledge the requests. An attempt to speak with Mayor Tom Menino, who made improved race relations a key issue during the Boston Miracle, was met with similar stonewalling. Countless e-mails and phone calls to the mayor's public relations office yielded platitudes from his flacks, but no interview. The city's reputation for racism endures because we don't want to talk about it, because the press seems more interested in reporting on the controversy than in initiating a useful dialogue, because athletes are more careful today than they've ever been. There aren't many Bill Russells anymore-someone who speaks his mind because his conscience demands it. Russell once told me he thought of himself as a man first and a basketball player second. These days, with millions riding on endorsement contracts and a capricious media to navigate, candor is seen as bad business. In a way, that's understandable, but it would be a powerful thing to hear from more of today's athletes. Because what Russell realized that so many current players still don't is this: The best way to move forward is often to deal with the past. To that end, the city itself could probably learn something from the experiences of Guy Stuart, the Kennedy School lecturer. Before he came to Boston, Stuart, who is white, spent a decade working in black communities in Chicago. It was there that he learned a useful lesson: If you want to improve race relations, "don't go around simply saying you're not racist." UPDATE: More insight on the same topic from Vincent Thomas of SLAM. He concludes that, as a black man, he now has no trouble rooting for the Celtics, but he doesn't wonder where the hesitation comes from: You gotta admit, those Celtics squads -- especially from the mid to late 80s -- were downright NBA aberrations. It almost looked weird. You would be hard-pressed to find a playoff squad that rotated in three white players for more than 15 minutes a night by that time. The Celtics, on the other hand, would feature five, sometimes six white players in a nine-man rotation. And they were so good as a team and so tough to beat that it irritated the folks in black neighborhoods. They had made the NBA "theirs" and here comes a team full of Birds, Mchales, Waltons, Ainges, Jerry Sichtings and Scott Wedmans. There was nothing The Chief or freckle-face DJ could do to put lipstick on that pig, no lily to gild right there. Some of the media coverage played into racial stereotypes. Boston was portrayed as smart, tough, and industrious. To let writers and announcers tell it, the Celtics used skill, resource, fortitude, guile and toughness to outwit and outplay the predominantly black squads that relied solely on athletic gifts. (Interestingly, though, this enterprising squad's coach, KC Jones, a black man, never hoisted the Red Auerbach Trophy as coach of the year.) Some of these perceived slights or biases were just that -- perceived, drummed-up -- umbrage. Still, it resulted in deep, pervasive, long-lasting backlash within the black community. ****ing embarassing. God what a **** town. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thor99 Posted June 21, 2009 Share Posted June 21, 2009 http://www.weeklydig.com/news-opinions/news-us/200801/boston-racist-city The day after last week's New Hampshire primary, Chris Matthews, speaking on MSNBC's Morning Joe, reintroduced the perception that New England and especially Boston have yet to shed their racist pedigree. Speaking about the upset of Barack Obama's poll-projected win, Matthews suggested that voters had been lying to exit pollsters. "Me think paleface speak with forked tongue," he said, in an ironically offensive accusation of racism. Joe Scarborough, the show's host offered, "I'm used to people saying that we in the South have race problems ... But, talk about New England." "Boston?" Matthews replied. "Boston?" He added, "There's different kinds of prejudice in the North than there is in the South, but it exists. It may not be 'I think I'm better than you,' but it might be 'I don't want to live next door to you.'" The choice to label New England, and single out Boston in particular, as racist, has rekindled an old debate among pundits who remember Charles Stuart in 1989 (who murdered his pregnant wife and blamed a "black man," sparking city-wide racial profiling by the BPD), and Barry Bonds' 2004 assertion that he'd never play for the Sox because "Boston is too racist." I don't give a **** about Boston, I grew up in NY. There is just as much racism on LI as there is anywhere else in the world. I'm sure I can find articles on racism in NY. I just don't feel the need to pretend one area of the country is somehow better than another. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thor99 Posted June 21, 2009 Share Posted June 21, 2009 http://myespn.go.com/blogs/truehoop/0-29-6/Black-Athletes-Have-Long-Seen-Boston-as-Racist.html ****ing embarassing. God what a **** town. Howard Beach. I can play this game too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
talisaynon Posted June 21, 2009 Author Share Posted June 21, 2009 http://www.bostonmagazine.com/articles/playing_through_the_pain/ Playing Through the Pain <H3>Ask sports fans from across the country to describe Boston, and you'll hear this: "City of Champions." Ask athletes themselves the same question, and you'll hear it described in very different terms: as a city of racists. If it's not a fair label anymore, as so many of us insist, then why won't it go away?</H3> By John Gonzalez Illustration by Thomas Fuchs. Page 1 of 5 A quarter of the way into his first season in Boston, things are going as well as anyone could have expected for Kevin Garnett. He Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thor99 Posted June 21, 2009 Share Posted June 21, 2009 http://www.bostonmagazine.com/articles/playing_through_the_pain/ Always talking, yet you're completely clueless Thor. Jesus this thread is about how racist Boston is, can't you read? No, actually I can't read. I'm completely clueless. I guess you can't read where I didn't deny anything you posted. There are racists in every fanbase, including some that post here. To somehow denigrate an entire fanbase and city because of a couple of bad apples is hippocritical at best. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blackout Posted June 21, 2009 Share Posted June 21, 2009 boston = racist city thoughts? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gainzo Posted June 21, 2009 Share Posted June 21, 2009 There are dickheads in every fanbase. I guess calling Ortiz a gorilla is just fine. Seems like talisaynon is having a bad day. Daddy issues maybe? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CrazyCarl40 Posted June 22, 2009 Share Posted June 22, 2009 What does Boston being thought of as racist have anything to do with baseball? This seems to be put on the wrong forum. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maxman Posted June 22, 2009 Share Posted June 22, 2009 What does Boston being thought of as racist have anything to do with baseball? This seems to be put on the wrong forum. I am going to file this one under politics and call it a day. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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