Word To My Brothers

Let me begin by sharing my credentials as a black man. Although I clearly don’t have dark skin, and there can be no doubt that my ancestry is unquestionably of the Caucasian persuasion, I think there is enough historical precedence to identify me with the African American community. How can that be? Well, many of you will remember that Bill Clinton was sometimes referred to as “America’s first black president.” Hey, if a white man who is the former governor of a small southern state qualifies as a “brother,” there’s no reason why I can’t be one, too.

Besides, Jesse Jackson is now saying that Barack Obama is “acting like he’s white.” Who would know colors better than Mr. Rainbow Coalition himself? So if Clinton is black and Obama is white, I feel perfectly comfortable speaking as a black man on behalf of men of all colors.

Isiah Thomas, coach of the New York Knicks, made the news this week because he seems to believe that there is one standard for black men and a different one for white men. Mr. Thomas says it is deeply offensive to him when he hears a white man refer to a black woman as, well, you know, the “b-word.” A black man doing the same thing, however, is, according to Thomas, not such a big deal. It must be a part of that culture, kind of like Michael Vick’s dog fighting.

Here’s my problem with Mr. Thomas: How does a man’s being black or white give him the right to talk to any woman, black or white, in a degrading way? Call me old-fashioned, but I was raised to treat women (and all people for that matter) with respect, not to talk about them or to them in offensive ways. I think that should go for men of all colors and ethnicities, whether their name is Isiah Thomas or Don Imus.

Imus was way out of line with his comments about a group of female college basketball players, and the public outcry was loud and understandable. His career went up in flames after leaders in the African American community began calling for his head.

Here are my questions: Will Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson come out publicly and call for Isiah Thomas to be fired? Is there a boycott of the New York Knicks in the works? Where is the outrage?

What will be next? Some “gangsta rapper” will come out and say that black men get a pass when it comes to roughing up black women because it’s “different” for them. Sharpton and Jackson will administer a gentle slap on the wrist, and the whole episode will be chalked up to the “African American culture.”

As a black man, I find this exceedingly offensive.