Michael Vick Divide on ESPN

ratings?

 

i don't know, people in cramped quarters tend to seperate along racial lines, they just do. we identify w/ our skin color - saying 'race' really makes no sense to me - we're all human. i hear what you're saying luchadore, but there seems to be something animal in us that prevents us from really going all the way w/ that line of thinking - removing color from issues. its always been that way, always gonna be that way to some extent or other - until we breed ourselves tan - then it'll be eye color, hair color, or something else. we're bread to live in groups - that's how we made it - and we always look for group identifying things - its just the way it is. i just think its evolutionary, and until folks are honest about it - they've got things driving their thought processes they aren't even aware of. everybody is prejudice to some extent or other - some folks just don't act on it.

 

To me, it's a humane issue without color. Yes, Vick happens to be black, but I don't think dog fighting is a "black thing". There are a lot of redneck good ole white boys out there who love dog fighting and chicken fighting etc.

Yes the fact that it's Vick is getting excessive coverage, but I think it's as much that he's a celebrity as a "black celebrity" thing. It's a good opportunity for law enforcement and animal rights people to "get the word out" that this is a crime and won't be tolerated. I mean there was just a big dog fighting thing in NC recently and how many heard about it? And I believe it was white guys. But had it been EITHER Jake Delhomme or Steve Smith, it would have been big news regardless of race.

I don't think the Vick case is the right platform for race issues. The Jena 6 issue, no matter how you feel about it or which side you take is more relavent to racial issues in my opinion.

 

Sure, it helps, because it's honest. It is the truth that a sizable portion of the black community insists on injecting race into any criminal proceeding involving a black person, especially one with a famous black person. There is a deep-seated resentment in the black community because of their socio-economic status and past wrongs that leads to an attitude of "I don't care whether or not he's guilty, he should get off because black people were railroaded so often in the past." You can find a number of blacks who will actually say exactly that, although most seem to prefer to couch that sentiment in softer language.

Look, this isn't new. I keep suggesting that people read the debates between W.E.B. DuBois and Booker T. Washington because this goes all the way back to those days. You can pretty much tell which blacks have gone on to be successful businessmen and largely integrated into their communities by following Washington's theories, while the majority have followed DuBois in separating themselves from other races and demanding redress for past grievances.

You are wrong and you need to understand that. I'm sure that there are some whites involved in dog fighting, but it is not at all common. Meanwhile it is very common in the black community. I grew up in a rural town and had relatives out in various parts of Hickville, and no one that I know has ever even heard of dog fighting taking place there, but my black friends certainly did. The majority of black Americans have nothing whatsoever to do with it, but people who do engage in dog fighting are overwhelmingly black.

Wishful thinking. As vp noted, the crowd booed when someone suggested that Brady or Manning would have faced the same charges.

It's two branches of the same tree. In both cases, a sizable portion of the black community wants the black offenders to get off despite obvious guilt.

 

decade upon decade of victimhood perpetuated by so called black leaders for their own personal gain has come to fruition. What's not to understand?

 

that was Chuck Smith I believe. They even booed him when he pointed out what Vick did was a federal felony. They about rioted when they were told if Vick ever came back, it wouldn't be in Atlanta.

 

Part of the problem is in the way it was advertised. If you just got a random crowd of black and white folks, you wouldn't get reactions that extreme, but advertising it as a discussion of Vick was obviously going to bring out the people who support him regardless.

 

So people actually watched this huh?

 

Not me, no, but I like to run my mouth anyway.