"I'm not saying the whole city is racist -- that's not what I'm saying. But we do get stereotyped here. Like, when (city council members) were watching the video of my club. They looked at the way people were dressed and said, 'How do you get that element in your club?' Well, what do you mean by 'element?' Just because they're black? Is that the 'element' you're talking about?"
Nick Barnett, June 2006
During the offseason in Green Bay, Nick Barnett ran into a little trouble with the Green Bay City Council that reeked of racisim.
Nick Barnett owns a nightclub in Green Bay called the Club FiveSix UltraLounge and last spring the Green Bay City Council decided to revoke the clubs liquor license. The reason given? The high number of complaints and police calls to the club. The only problem with this reasoning was the fact that there were several neighboring clubs that had higher numbers of incidents and police calls that were happily granted their liquor licenses. In fact, the only differentiating factor seemed to be that those clubs were white-owned businesses, where as Barnett is half African-American.
To compound the issue, while Barnett was fighting it out with the Green Bay City Council, he was issued a wrtten warning by a white police officer for jay walking. Barnett's two white companions who were walking with him were not warned. Barnett, ever the gentleman, played it off as no big deal, but now that the story had made it to the local press, the Mayor of Green Bay stepped up. He asked the City Council to reconsider the liquor license and they relented. Alls well that ends well.
As a white guy, I sometimes hear these stories and think to myself "Everybody is too sensitive theses days". I mean, is this really racisim? Is it classisim? Is it anything?
Friday afternoon my wife was standing at the Packer gate waiting for Packers to sign her autograph ball. A little boy, all of 8 years old stood beside her along with his mom. He told my wife that he couldn't stay because he was playing in his pee-wee football championship that afternoon. The child couldn't hide his excitement, his life was all about football. My wife said to him "You should tell the players when they stop. Tell them that tonight's your championship game". "I'll only tell the white players" the child repliled without a hint of hesitation. The boys mother looked at her son, surprised by his candor, and asked "Why would you say that?" "Just because" the boy said, again without hesitation. My wife crouched down and looked the 8 year old in his eyes. "Son", she said, "If you want to make it as a football player then you can't be a racist".
It's warming to the heart to know that if his football career doesn't work out he can always work for Aushwabenon Police department, or the Green Bay City Council. Racism is alive and well in America.
As a parents of two little shennanigans myself - what that child said needs to be taken with a grain of salt. In fact its not the child at all - any racism remarks by children come directly from the parents mouths - and you can bet that mother or father make those remarks behind the confines of their home, thinking its safe - until their child says things like that in public.
ReplyDeleteThat's truly the sad part, it's right there under the surface. You're 100% right though, I never blame the child. This falls squarely on the parents. What's odd was that the mother was equally surprised at her son's point of view. But did she react strongly, pointing out to her child that those sort of opinions are simply wrong? Nope. She left that to my wife.
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