"The Right Angle"

Heidi Parent

Double Standard?

You be the judge

by Heidi Parent
07/16/03

Did you see the huge Jesse Jackson-led protest the other day at Wrigley Field over Dusty Baker's comments? Well, maybe I should first ask you if you even heard Dusty Baker's comments. If you didn't, here's what the Chicago Cubs manager had to say about black and Latin players' ability to play in the heat:

"It's easier for most Latin guys and it's easier for most minority people because most of us come from heat. You don't find too many brothers in New Hampshire and Maine and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Right? We were brought over here for the heat, right? Isn't that history? Weren't we brought over because we could take the heat? Your skin color is more conducive to heat than it is to the lighter-skinned people. I don't see brothers running around burnt. That's a fact. I'm not making this up. I'm not seeing some brothers walking around with some white stuff on their ears and noses."

Now, did you see Jesse and his merry band, otherwise known as the Racism Police, demanding Dusty's resignation? How about Al Sharpton and his roving group of all-purpose protesters? Did you read the statements released by the NAACP, La Raza, the ACLU, and the ADL? How about the press release from the MLB Commissioner's Office disavowing Dusty's comments? Of course you didn't, because there weren't any protests and there weren't any statements. And that's why conservatives are jumping up and down shouting, "Did'ja hear what he said? Hey, double standard!"

After all, when Jimmy "The Greek" Snyder said that blacks are better at sports because "during the slave period, the slave owner would breed his big black with his big woman so that he would have a big black kid," he was branded forever as a racist.

When Los Angeles Dodgers general manager Al Campanis told Ted Koppel on "Nightline" that "(blacks) may not have some of the necessities to be, let's say, a field manager, or perhaps a general manager," he was also branded and forever labeled.

Now my point here is not to support, defend, or disapprove of what Baker, Snyder, or Campanis said. After all, I think it's pretty obvious the above three statements are all pretty inane. My point instead is to highlight the unbelievable double standard being exhibited by the Racism Police.

After Snyder and Campanis made their comments they were scorched for weeks by the media and subsequently lost their jobs. Moreover, one would think that the Racism Police would have their antennas up for any statement they might interpret as racially insensitive. So why aren't they out in force over Baker's comments? Well, when we look back at some other like statements they chose to ignore, it is clear their antennas are pretty selective.

For example, when Jesse Jackson called Jews "Hymies" and New York "Hymietown" where were they?

Ex-Ku Klux Klansman and now Democrat U.S. Senator Robert Byrd vowed during World War II to never to fight "with a Negro by my side. Rather I should die a thousand times, and see Old Glory trampled in the dirt never to rise again, than to see this beloved land of ours become degraded by race mongrels, a throwback to the blackest specimen from the wilds." But that's not Byrd's only absurd comment. Just a couple of years ago in a lecture on the floor of the U.S. Senate he said, "There are white niggers. I've seen a lot of white niggers in my time." I didn't see Byrd excoriated in the mainstream press or tracked down and attacked by the Racism Police for either statement.

But evidence of their double standard doesn't end there. San Francisco mayor Willie Brown once described a successful legislative battle this way: "We beat those old white boys fair and square." Donna Brazile, Al Gore's presidential campaign manager, called Republicans "white boys" who seek to "exclude, denigrate, and leave behind." Director Spike Lee said he disapproves of interracial marriages and will "give interracial couples a look. Daggers. They get uncomfortable when they see me on the street." And then there's The National Association of Black Social Workers who actually drafted a position paper calling white adoptions of black children "cultural genocide."

How many of these statements caused an uproar on the level of Campanis's or Jimmy The Greek's? How many of these people lost their jobs? Not one. Why not, you ask? Well, it's quite simple; all of the comments were made by minorities, or in the case of Byrd, a liberal Democrat, and therefore they were given a pass. Which, in my opinion, is a huge double standard. In fact, one could even interpret the Racism Police's lack of action against the people who uttered these statements as condonation, which destroys every ounce of their credibility.

But for some reason they don't see it that way. You see they believe that a member of a group can say whatever he wants about fellow members, no matter how ignorant or fatuous, and the comment will not be considered racist. Dusty Baker, for one, agrees with this view, "As a black manager, I can say things about blacks that a white manager can't say, and whites can say things about whites that blacks can't say."

So the argument that Dusty and others are making is that it is okay for a black person to utter a vacuous stereotype about blacks just because he himself is black and therefore it shouldn't be considered racist. But why not? Is the comment any less wrong? Is the statement "all black people have rhythm" any less ridiculous, any less false, when uttered by a black person? Is "all Jews are cheap" any less false when uttered by a Jew? Is "all Irish are drunkards" any less false when uttered by an Irishman? Is…well, you get my point.

The way I see it, either everyone gets a pass or no one should. Either the Racism Police apply their definition of a "racist comment" universally or not at all. Whether you're in favor of the former or the latter, an ignorant comment is an ignorant comment no matter the race, creed, color, religion, or political affiliation of the source.

Above all, however, it's important to keep in mind that people have all sorts of stupid opinions. But no matter what someone says or believes, it doesn't mean it's true. If I believe people born with brown hair on Tuesdays before 3:00 a.m. in hospitals whose names end in S will grow up to be great jai alai players, it doesn't make it so. Moreover, do you really think that anyone with any sense is going to change his opinion about the ability of jai alai players who weren't born with brown hair on Tuesdays before 3:00 a.m. in hospitals whose names end in S after hearing my comment? Of course not. In fact, I'm quite certain that our advancements in genetic science have clearly shown that there is not a single shred of evidence linking hair color to athletic ability. But if I choose to disavow the evidence to the contrary and continue to believe what I believe, why get yourself in a twist? It's just an opinion, one just as silly and moronic as Baker's. And it should be discounted as such.