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Wed 28 Sep, 2005 12:14 am
The Speech Everyone Is Talking About: Etan Thomas
Etan Thomas Electrifies Anti-War Washington
by Dave Zirin
Every generation the wide world of corporate sports produces an athlete with the iron resolve and moral urgency to step off their pedestal and join the fight for social justice. A century ago, it was boxer Jack Johnson, flaunting, as WEB DuBois put it, "his unforgivable blackness." In the 1930s, "the Brown Bomber" Joe Louis and track star Jesse Owens took turns spitting in Hitler's eyes, and Mildred Babe Didrikson continued to show that a woman could be the equal - if not superior - of any man. In the 1940s and 50s, Jackie Robinson, Pee Wee Reese, and the Brooklyn Dodgers advanced the cause of civil rights through the transgressive act of the multi-racial double play. In the 1960s, Muhammad Ali, Jim Brown, Bill Russell, David Meggyesy, Tommie Smith, and John Carlos showed how mass struggle could ricochet into the world of sports with electric results. In the 1970s, Billie Jean King used a wicked forehand, and took to the streets, to demand equal rights for women, and Curt Flood showed the labor movement - and the bosses - how to go from crumbs to a bigger piece of the pie. In the 1980's Martina Navratilova came out of the closet and onto center court, with her girlfriend on her sinewy arm in plain view of all.
Today we may just have a figure to join their ranks in the NBA's Etan Thomas. Regular readers of this column will know that I have interviewed the Washington Wizards' Power Forward on numerous occasions and highlighted his views on everything from the death penalty to the ravages of Hurricane Katrina. He is also the author of a book of poems called More Than An Athlete.
But this past weekend, Etan made a play for pantheon status. Etan took it to that Ali level, by delivering a blistering poetical speech as part of the weekend's antiwar demonstrations in Washington DC. His contribution, which was played in its entirety on Democracy Now!, is being hailed as "the best of the day" in various nooks and crannies of the blogosphere.
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Here is the transcript. Read and pass it along - it has the power to topple tyrants.
Yes, you're nothing but a bunch of victims. THOSE DAMNED REPUBLICANS!!! ITS THEIR FAULT!!!
Ahhhhh, WELFARE. Everythings great now, I am no longer poor. I JUST GROVEL AT THE FEET OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT FOR MY SUSTENANCE. I am not a serf, not a tool of the Democrats. Stale, Pale and Male, thats the problem; SUBJUGATE THEM to our will, and everything will be dandy. We know whats right, POVERTY HAS BESTOWED IT UPON US.
Instigate wrote:Yes, you're nothing but a bunch of victims. THOSE DAMNED REPUBLICANS!!! ITS THEIR FAULT!!!
Ahhhhh, WELFARE. Everythings great now, I am no longer poor. I JUST GROVEL AT THE FEET OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT FOR MY SUSTENANCE. I am not a serf, not a tool of the Democrats. Stale, Pale and Male, thats the problem; SUBJUGATE THEM to our will, and everything will be dandy. We know whats right, POVERTY HAS BESTOWED IT UPON US.
Do you have a point or is this supposed to be a point? It would have been more impressive if you'd actually bothered to address any of the points made in the speech. Sadly you prefer right wing sloganeering which is about as useful as left wing sloganeering. Very sad.
Actually Englishmajor, until you posted this I had not even heard about this Etan Thomas speech...you don't suppose not everyone is talking about it do you?
Comical lines from the speech have to be at the end: "Maybe this trip will make them see the error of their ways. Or maybe next time, we'll just get out and vote. And as far as their stay in the White House, tell them that numbered are their days." Earlier Thomas mentions among others Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, Tucker Carlson and (Rudolph) Giuliani. It may interest Mr. Thomas to know that these men are not in the White House.
From what I can make of this, the picture is clear...more left wing propaganda now being dressed up in sports stars babbling. I am quite sure it is all the talk in "various nooks and crannies of the blogosphere". The fact that it is hidden away in nooks and crannies indicates how stupid it is.
Good speach. I'll have to check out his book.
(or did Amigo mean to check it out from the library?)
I should think you'd be all for this trip sturgis. Lots of rough trade down there. :wink:
I probably mean pick it up in the book store look at it and put it back. I already have to many books to read and buy like "the confessions of an economic hitman" by John Perkins. You'll find it in the nooks and crannies.
I lived that trip. I grew up in the projects.
The obvious is lost on some, so I'll spell it out.
It's not about handouts or free anything. It's about h-y-p-o-c-r-i-s-y and not having a clue how real people are living. It's about not knowing how to govern because the governor is so removed from the realities of the governed that he (his party) have never experienced such reality and have no fears of ever having to experience it.
Great speech. Wish it could really happen.
Amigo wrote:I lived that trip. I grew up in the projects.
That's the way I grew up and I've spent my life getting and staying out for me and my cubs.
Meanwhile suddenly everyone is celebrating the ghetto life. Thugs, rappers, red neck women...... what's wrong with this picture? They've never really been there, that's what's wrong.
Same principle in operation with pussy bastards who send kids to war but never served themselves.
"I'd show them working families that make too much to receive welfare but not enough to make ends meet. I'd employ them with jobs with little security, let them know how it feels to be an employee at will, able to be fired at the drop of a hat"
You don't have to go to the 'hood to find this. This is every middle class family.
"I'd take away their opportunities, then try their children as adults, sending their 13-year-old babies to life in prison."
Who takes away an opportunity from a hard working person? A 13 year old is a baby? This 13 yr old must have been convicted of a pretty serious crime to do life.
"They keep telling us all is equal."
Um... We are all equal. We all have equal opportunity to improve ourselves. We are all equal under law.
Just another whine-bag looking for more handouts.
woiyo - And do you suppose Jeb's kids are getting the same legal treatment for their DUI's and drug addictions as say... the kids of a mother in the Bronx?
blueveinedthrobber wrote:Amigo wrote:I lived that trip. I grew up in the projects.
That's the way I grew up and I've spent my life getting and staying out for me and my cubs.
Meanwhile suddenly everyone is celebrating the ghetto life. Thugs, rappers, red neck women...... what's wrong with this picture? They've never really been there, that's what's wrong.
Same principle in operation with pussy bastards who send kids to war but never served themselves.
Your right. Inless you've been there you don't know s**t about poverty. look at the last post.(oops, post before last)
squinney wrote:woiyo - And do you suppose Jeb's kids are getting the same legal treatment for their DUI's and drug addictions as say... the kids of a mother in the Bronx?
Don't know.
How old are the "kids" of the Bronx mom?
Is it a first offense for Jeb's kids and the kids from the Bronx?
How fast was each going?
Any property damage in either case?
I need facts, not speculation.
woiyo, What do you think cost the country more? Corporate handouts or Welfare handouts? I know. Because I took the time to read on the subject to make sure my brain was bigger then my mouth before I opened it. I've lived around rich and poor. I know who works harder, Who suffers more, Who pays the taxes and who fights the wars. It's easy to judge people. It's among the most common and easiest thing to do. To find the truth. That is what you won't do. I can see it.
squinney wrote:It's not about handouts or free anything. It's about h-y-p-o-c-r-i-s-y and not having a clue how real people are living. It's about not knowing how to govern because the governor is so removed from the realities of the governed that he (his party) have never experienced such reality and have no fears of ever having to experience it.
So every politician should have to be poor and live in the hood before they can govern?
Equal misery for everybody?
I think the problem is that we
want the politicians to govern us. The less they are in my life the better.
blueveinedthrobber wrote:Same principle in operation with pussy bastards who send kids to war but never served themselves.
Except for the simple fact that this particular war is full of volunteers. All of the American Forces volunteered. They were not drafted. Many of the men and women serving now volunteered after the U.S. had already gone to Iraq, they knew what existed and yet they enlisted. So this is not about 'sending kids to war but never served themselves' it is about some ignorant people who think the prepared speech of a basketball player are the most glorious words ever spoken.
It is about leaders who never served sending people to war. There is a presumed contract that soldiers will be compelled into harm's way to defend our country not to be caught in the crossfire of a foreign country's civil war.
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