PLACING KOBE BRYANT’S DEATH IN PERSPECTIVE

Beneath the Spin*Eric L. Wattree

EXCELLENCE IS THE KEY TO BLACK EQUALITY
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PLACING KOBE BRYANT’S DEATH IN PERSPECTIVE

I placed a simple comment on Facebook, and I couldn’t believe how some people freaked out. But it struck me as a teaching moment. The response I received not only demonstrated how we’re having our minds stolen from us, but how effective that effort has been. So I think it’s worth discussing, at least briefly.
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I posted the following:

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“I was greatly saddened over Kobe's untimely death, and even more saddened by the death of his daughter, Gianna. But I'm about Kobe'ed out at this point. Millions of people have died since Kobe, so shouldn’t we be just as mournful over them? I’m a father and a grandfather more than I am anything else, so every time I hear about this tragedy it depresses me greatly – not so much about Kobe, but about his baby girl. So let’s move on – PLEASE!!!”

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In response, most people simply took it like I meant it – while I'm sorry about what happened to Kobe, we shouldn't treat it like the fall of Rome. But in a few cases, I got the kind of hostility that made it seem like I told them they shouldn’t mourn their mother, and all simply because I stated an opinion. One person told me to mind my own business, and another suggested that I should get off the social media.
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Well, I’m not getting off of social media. I expressed an opinion, and that's what people do on social media. In fact, that’s what gives social media it’s value, the many varied opinions shared on multiple subjects. Such comments are designed to stimulate the mind, and encourages people to think. So no opinion should be taboo, regardless of its content.
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Making any subject taboo is anti-intellectual, and anti-intellectualism is the establishment’s most potent tool for keeping us brainwashed. They use it to herd us like cattle. It’s called “group-think.” Anti-intellectualism is what makes it possible for people like Donald Trump to exist. If you'll notice, the dumber a person is, the more likely he is to be a Trump supporter. The reason for that is they've been trained to be guided by their emotions instead of their brain.

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In that regard, with Black people being shot and killed by police through their windows while watching television, and others dying on the street of hunger and freezing to death in the elements, and then on top of that, having a lunatic in the White House putting children in cages and trying to turn the entire damn country into a prison camp, going into deep mourning over the death of a rich man who bounced a ball for a living is a major “wakeup-and-get-a-life" moment.
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Most people can't even recite the names of the other people who died in the crash, yet their lives were just as precious as Kobe's. Thus, they're not mourning a person, they're mourning fame. So it's important for us to remember that while we might feel sorrow over Kobe's death, he wasn't Jesus. So while we should mourn the death of a family member, a situation like Kobe's rate a "I'm sorry to hear that", and move on. We might want to set a day or two aside to recall who he was, but going on and on about it is ridiculous. Yes, I mourned - I'm still in sorrow - but I'm in mourning for Gianna and her mother much more than I am for Kobe. I'm mourning over the pain it brought into their lives, not because I considered Kobe to be like Jesus. I mourn over anyone's death, not just Kobe's.
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But many of us tend to take the death of a celebrity to a ridiculous extent, and that clearly shows how much control the White man has over our minds. In spite of everything that’s happened to us since his death, some people are still mourning over Prince, and never even met the guy. I mean, give me a break! That’s not mourning, that’s called a distraction. The establishment can cut our throats, and then take our minds off  what they've done in the here-and-now by simply saying, “But wasn’t that horrible about Prince?”, and we’ll forget all about the fact that they just took school lunches from our children, stole our Medicare, and threw the elderly out on the street. We'll allow them take us to an entirely different zone and forget all about the fact that they just cut our throats.
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They’ve been playing us like that for years, so we've got to learn to remain focused and prioritize what's really important in life. I just read a comment by a conservative Trump supporter that said Martin Luther King would be against the Democrats – and it was a Black bigot hugger who said it. So in spite of all of the years since Martin's death, they're STILL trying to use the death of a Black icon to cloud our minds. It's called misdirection, or changing the subject. They do it routinely. That's why every time Trump is caught with his hand in the cookie jar, instead of trying to denying it, they say, "Yeah, but what about Obama?", and then come up with a lie you have to argue with them over, effectively changing the subject. 

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Regarding Kobe, one commenter, said, "I am not about to stop praising Black excellence." And that gets to the crux of the matter. It points out another way that they use distraction to redirect our minds. We’re being indoctrinated into accepting their view of what constitutes Black excellence. There’s no doubt about the fact that Kobe was excellent at what he did, but what Black people need to consider is, was what Kobe did intrinsically excellent in itself? The man bounced a ball for a living. What intrinsic value does that have for the Black community, or humanity as a whole? Let me answer that - solutely none. In fact, if basketball had never been invented humanity wouldn’t have even missed a beat.

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So the bottom line is, through no fault of his own, Kobe was engaged in the kind of distractions that actually hurt the Black community, because they used him to keep us focused on the frivolous rather than the serious matters in life. Black people need to be focused on the things that can move us forward as a people - things like math, science, and engineering - not on how well we can bounce a damn ball.
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Life is not a game. Playing games is for children. While the White man is grooming his kids to own the racetrack, he's dangling a carrot before ours to become the damn horse – and if you want to see how they treat horses, just look at Colin Kaepernick.

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So I’m not saying that we shouldn’t feel bad about what happened to Kobe, but we should be careful about who we enshrine as our cultural heroes. While Kobe was undoubtedly skilled at what he did, so is a mechanic, but the White establishment can use Kobe's skills to manipulate us as a people – and they do. Kobe was famous because the White man made him famous. Kobe was good, but he wasn’t special. The Black community is filled with young people with his kind of talent in many areas, but we don't freak-out if something happens to one of them. So the only thing that makes Kobe different is he was just lucky enough to be chosen by the White man for their purpose.  
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The White man controls the sports leagues, the media, and the publicity machines. And he uses that machine to keep brilliant Black minds seeking wealth and fame instead of pursuing their true excellence, the excellence that's locked within their minds. That serves the White establishment’s purpose, because without true Black excellence, and the development of our intellectual creativity, all the Kobe Bryants in the world can’t move the Black community forward.
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Kobe stands as a symbol of wealth and fame for other young Black people to aspire to if they choose to shun knowledge for celebrity. But that serves the White man's purposes, not ours. The White man selects a handful of Black people and make them superstars in order to hold millions of Black people down. So while we can, and we should, admire what Kobe accomplished, we shouldn’t worship him for a minute. We should worship knowledge. Because the White man didn't enslave us because he could beat us up - he was able to enslave us because he had a knowledge of gunpowder that we didn't possess, and he had his mind on conquest while we were thinking of other things. We can't allow that to continue to happen. It's essential that Black people learn to remain focused.
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And I’m not just blowing smoke. I believe in what I’m saying. My son, Eric Jr., is in his university's Basketball Hall of Fame, and he had several friends

that went into the NBA. When he went into high school he walked through the door as their starting center. In fact, they didn't even wait for him to get to high school. When he graduated from middle school they started working with him during the Summer. But when he graduated from college, I noticed he had already started living the celebrity lifestyle – clubbing every night, and running around in expensive cars, and hanging out with beautiful, high-living women. I didn’t like that, because I felt that it was a frivolous lifestyle, and I was losing the down-to-Earth son that I’d put so much effort into raising. So I encouraged him to pass up trying to go into the NBA and develop his mind and character and pursue a life of substance instead, and that's exactly what he did. I didn't put all of my efforts into raising a human being to make bouncing a ball the high point of his life. I felt that he had more to offer to the world, and I was right. He ended up going all over the world with the President of the United States.
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He's gone on to become quite successful and greatly admired by everyone who knows him.  Currently my grandson, Eric III, is a starting player at Oklahoma City University, and I was curious to know if my son regretted the advice that I'd given him to give up playing ball himself. So we recently discussed the subject, and he said he didn't regret it for a minute. In fact, he said, he was glad I intervened, because if I hadn't, his two sons wouldn't be here. And I know exactly where he was coming from. I wanted to be John Coltrane and go all over the world playing my saxophone, but when Eric Jr and his sister, Kai, were born, I had to make a decision, and I don't regret it for a minute either. THEY became my fame and fortune, and no amount of celebrity could replace them for a second. That's exactly why I'm sitting here writin' instead of giggin', and I'm thrilled about it. 

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ERIC III

Life is about much more than trying to be a celebrity and chasing a dollar. Life is about happiness, personal development, and enjoying your family. Eric ended up producing two sons who are following in his footsteps. Eric III, who is headed for Wall Street, and Eli, a hell of a writer, and currently in military intelligence. THEY are my claim to fame, and they can take my bows for me, because whatever they accomplish, is my accomplishment. They allow me to face any man in the world eyeball-to eyeball, regardless of his wealth and power, and challenge his greatness. I can walk into the White House and challenge Donald Trump to compare his kids to what I've produced. That gives me stature, and it says it all.
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So ballin' is fun on the playground as a child, and it can be helpful in getting a young person through college, but I've taught my kids that it's only a means to an end, and not an end in itself. Our people have gone through far too much to spend our lives playing games - no matter how much they pay us. Where would we be if Martin and Malcolm had decided to dedicate their lives to bouncin' a ball, or Rosa Parks had decided to shake her ass for a living? We wouldn't be very well off, I assure you.
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Excellence breeds respect, and the Black community has ample evidence of the value of excellence,

knowledge, and character currently walking among us. Who commands more respect, Barack Obama, or Donald Trump with all of his wealth? Obama is, without a doubt. As a direct result of Barack’s excellence, he’s brought honor to our entire culture.
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Prior to Barack Obama coming along, in spite of all our athletic ability and "soul", there was a raging debate going on in this country about whether or not Black people were inherently inferior. It was being alleged by many that Affirmative Action was the only thing that allowed Black people to compete with their White counterparts. But since Barack Obama, you rarely, if ever, hear anyone trying to make that claim today – in fact, Trump spends his every waking hour trying to prove he’s even close to being as competent as Barack Obama, and as a lifelong bigot, it's driving him crazy. But Donald will just have to be content with going crazy, because he'll never be able to compete with Obama. Barack learned as a child that what we so dismissively call "soul" is actually intellectual brilliance straining to be unleashed, and he developed that brilliance into becoming one of the greatest presidents this country has ever known. He's the Charlie Parker of American politics.
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So it’s important for Black people to remember that God made birds to fly, fish to swim, and man to think. So we should always honor knowledge, character, and intellect over all other things. But the White establishment would have our Black youth believe that their highest aspiration in life should be the opportunity to run up and down some basketball court or football field with a ball. That “keeps us in our place”. But if you stop and give it just one moment’s thought, it becomes clear that any dog can outrun us. So what’s the point?

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So, again, I'm very sorry that Kobe met with the untimely tragedy that befell him, but we’ve got to keep life in perspective. People die every day, but there are a lot more important things in life to focused on other than bringing life to a standstill over a man with the ability to bounce a ball – and taking the time to develop our intellect, and devising a strategy for surviving our current condition should be at the very top of that list. We must focus on keeping our culture alive. 
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So wipe your eyes, say goodbye to Kobe, and let's focus on moving our people forward.

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Eric L. Wattree
Http://wattree.blogspot.com
Ewattree@Gmail.com
BLACK WRITERS, INTELLECTUALS, AND INDEPENDENT THINKERS
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Religion: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does. 

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