It generally feels pretty gimmicky to say, “What if so and so said this?” in discussions of race, because the context gets warped. In this case, though, because we’re talking about an Asian man who has time and again encountered racism in his career (Lin used to be called a “chink” when he played college ball), it seems more apt than usual. What if an Asian sportscaster heralded the arrival of a new black basketball star by writing about how all the women were going to love his big penis? What if an Asian director introduced Spike Lee at the Golden Globes as “Spike ‘Superfly’ Lee”? What if an Asian anchor, famous for his antagonistic racism, went on ESPN to say that the only reason Tiger Woods is popular is because he’s black? We already know what would happen with that last one: The anchor would be fired and written off as a bigot—Limbaugh was. I’ll be shocked if Mayweather faces any similar repercussions.

I wrote about all the nonsense Jeremy Lin has had to deal with courtesy of too many famous black Americans. It’s a fucking shame.

10:09 am  •  15 February 2012  •  16 notes