It’s one thing to be ignorant of the reality of being black in America but it’s an entirely different thing to be dismissive of the reality of racism in America even when it’s being video taped for you.
On Thursday former Chicago Bear great and Hall of Fame linebacker, Brian Urlacher, showed his true colors as he took to Instagram to prove his ignorance, arrogance and total lack of human empathy. In other words, he finally took his mask off.
Ole boy wrote with his own fingers, “Brett Favre played the (Monday Night Football) game the day his dad died, threw 4 TDs in the first half, and was a legend for playing in the face of adversity. NBA players boycott the playoffs because a dude reaching for a knife, wanted on a felony sexual assault warrant, was shot by police.”
This is what this dun wanted the world to understand about him. He wanted everyone to know that he cares nothing about Jacob Blake’s life or the pain that black folks in America are and have been dealing with for 401 years in this country.
To try to compare Brett Favre’s dad dying to a man being shot in the back in front of his children is reprehensible. A man dying naturally and a man being shot by police that two days later allowed a white kid to walk past them with a smoking AR-15 that was just used to kill two people and injure another without so much as questioning him is outrageous.
You would think that because he played a sport from youth league, high school, college and into the NFL that he would have a slither of empathy for black lives. Why not? He played with black teammates at least in high school and 70 percent of them were black in college and in the pros. So he’s spent more time with black people than most whites folks ever will.
He’s heard the challenges and experiences of racism that they’ve dealt with in life. He’s not knew to this. However, by making that simple post he told the world that he never really cared about them in the first place. It’s impossible to write that and care about anyone other than yourself.
He also liked a post calling for Kyle Rittenhouse, the 17 year old white kid responsible for the deaths of two protesters, to be released from police custody.
When we say that there is “White Privilege” in America this is a prime example of it. The privilege is in the fact that my white counterparts don’t have to have the “talk” with their kids about how to handle the police when they interact with them like all black folks have to.
We have to teach our children how not to die during a confrontation with the police during a simple traffic stop and God forbid that it’s any more serious than that.
The privilege is in the fact that they don’t have to care about what happens or worry about their family, neighbors and friends when they get stopped by law enforcement.
Is it a death penalty to walk away from the police or have a felony on your record? Is it a death penalty to pass a fake $20 bill? Is is a death penalty to go to bed at night in your own home? Is it a death penalty to jog through a neighborhood. Is it a death penalty to play with a toy gun in the park at 12 years old all by yourself? Is it a death penalty to tell the police during a traffic stop that you’ve got a licensed weapon in the car and that you are simply reaching for your wallet? If you’re black it is. If you’re white in America none of those are even arrest-able offenses and they sure aren’t death penalties.
To spend that much time around black folks and call them brothers and family as often as sports teams do and to show that level of disgust toward a man that was shot in the back 7 times is disgusting. Thanks Brian Urlacher for taking the mask off and showing us who you really are. Stop me when I start lyin’!
Playas Thesaurus:
- Dun: noun – the person in question, dude, guy, etc. It’s whoever I’m talkin’ about and its non-gender specific.
2) Ole boy: noun – the person that I’m currently talkin’ about.