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LeBron VOGUE photo racist? Resembles King Kong? WTF?

playboy1972

By playboy1972
in The Tailgate

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playboy1972

playboy1972

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I personally think it is another case of Black Folk Paranoia. Everytime we do something, somebody come out the woodwork thinking it is racial. Just be happy a brother on VOGUE magazine in the first place. If he was on their with some black chic people would say " It look like black women need to be saved be some NBA player!!!" Ebony and Ivory........... Don't you remember the song. JEEEEZ.

http://msn.foxsports.com/nba/story/7955740/Am-I-supposed-to-be-mad-about-LeBron?MSNHPHCP&GT1=39002

7956452_36_1.jpg

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Mad Mike

Mad Mike

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whitlock is always sore in vagiant about something..screw him

Ummm, he is actually saying he doesn't see what the fuss is about.

Personally I think what you see in the picture reflects your own views more than anyone else's and I don't see what the fuss is about either.

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playboy1972

playboy1972

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whitlock is always sore in vagiant about something..screw him

Why do you say screw him? I have read a bunch of his stuff and he mostly gets pissed when people blame others for their plight. He seems to me, to be trying to get people to realize the state of mind that many people have about our own images. I think he makes us all think about what touches our nerves and what doesn't. IMO.

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playboy1972

playboy1972

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Ummm, he is actually saying he doesn't see what the fuss is about.

Personally I think what you see in the picture reflects your own views more than anyone else's and I don't see what the fuss is about either.

Paranoia, like I said. The first time I saw the photo, I thought of him playing ball with a beautiful women under his arm. I can see the dress resembles the actress in the movie, but to take that leap shows a lack of self asteem. Some people just view everything as a negative slight. Just tune into BET and you will have a field day with negative perceptions.

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Special K

Special K

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Is this seriously an issue with some folks??? I saw the magazine in the store the other day and thought nothing other than:

1. "I hate Vogue"

2. "LeBron and Giselle are on the cover, kinda cool."

3. "Even so, I'm still not buying that snooty magazine."

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Chachie

Chachie

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The "King Kong" theme (and I do think was intended by the magazine) is actually very cool. I like it.

If members of any cultural community are griping, then that's their call. I love the pic even if I can't stand LeBaby.

(Anybody heard from Tom Brady on this?) :)

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NavyDave

NavyDave

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How about reading what he says before insulting him, because people would think you are jumping to conclusions.

Am I supposed to be mad about LeBron? by Jason Whitlock

Jason Whitlock brings his edgy and thought-provoking style to FOXSports Columnist for the Kansas City Star, he has won the National Journalism Award for Commentary for "his ability to seamlessly integrate sports and social commentary and to challenge widely held assumptions along the racial divide."

Would someone please write a handbook? "What Will and Won't Piss Black Folk Smooth the **** Off" would be an international bestseller.

I'm black, and I'm pissed off most of the time, but I wouldn't leave home without the handbook. Not in these racist-ly confusing times. I can barely keep up with when I'm supposed to be disappointed as opposed to offended as opposed to being pissed smooth the **** off.

Right now I need to know where this LeBron James-Gisele Bundchen-Vogue-cover controversy falls. And just who am I supposed to be mad at, LeBron, the photographer, the editors at Vogue or Tom Brady?

Maybe they're all to blame. Maybe that's the point of this whole mess. Or maybe they're just as bewildered as I am.

According to the allegations, King James looks like King Kong clutching Fay Wray on the latest cover of Vogue, and the image, according to potential handbook writers, "conjures up this idea of a dangerous black man."

Hmm, to LeBron and his handlers, he looks like LeBron clutching a pretty white woman on the latest cover of Vogue, and the image conjures up the idea that LeBron can race up court with a basketball and a supermodel.

I agree with LeBron. The photographer captured him exactly as he is. You know, when he covered his body in tatts years ago, mimicking a death-row inmate, LeBron invited people to jump to the conclusion that he's dangerous. Yeah, that's the way the image-is-everything game is played. Ink is a prison and gang thing. Don't act like you don't know the origin.

Vogue put a mirror in our face, and we're complaining about the reflection. Half the black players in the NBA take the court each night in front of white audiences tatted from neck to toe like they're shooting a scene for Prison (Fast)Break.

When David Stern insisted on helping these players with their image by implementing a dress code, many of the players and their media groupies screamed racism. You see, showing up to work in a white T and iced-out (heavy jewelry) was their way of showing loyalty to their boys in the 'hood, a shout-out to the corner boys and girls.

And any time someone with common sense points out that athletes are making fools of themselves and feeding negative stereotypes, he or she is shouted down as a sellout, racist or out of touch.

Just look at how much heat the NFL takes for trying to stop Chad Johnson from bojangling. This is why a handbook to clear up the confusion is so necessary. When Johnson slaps in his gold teeth, dyes and cuts his hair into a blonde Mohawk, dances a jig in the end zone and makes life absolute hell on his black coach, that is fun and good for the game.

But when King James apes King Kong it is a terrible blow to the perception of black men.

Would we be having this discussion if LeBron struck the same pose on the cover of Ebony while holding Selita Ebanks? Think about it. And if we wouldn't be having the discussion, what does that say about us? Are we only bothered by negative images of black men when the primary/sole consumer of the image is white people?

Vogue ain't for us. Tyler Perry's new movie, Meet the Browns, was produced with us in mind. It had a great box-office debut, coming in at No. 2 with a take of more than $20 million. It also broke records for negative black stereotypes and simple-mindedness.

We ate it up, and I've yet to hear much of an outcry about a romantic comedy built around a single mama with three baby daddies, her loud-mouthed, weed-smoking, gun-toting Latino best girlfriend, a deadbeat daddy, a drunk sister and a deceased father who was a pimp-turned-preacher. I could go on. This list is endless.

Rather than reading and hearing universal condemnation of Tyler Perry, the drag-queen moviemaker is being hailed as a genius for recognizing what attracts us to the movie theatre.

I'm telling you we need a handbook. We need something athletes, entertainers, black and white folks can easily refer to when deciding how to react to the images we choose to project. The chapter on rap-music videos could be studied at major universities across the globe. I'd like for Bob Johnson, the founder of Black Exploitation Television, to pen that section when he comes off the Clinton campaign trail.

LeBron James is a kid, and his talents as a basketball player and absence of a father allowed him to "grow up" rather than be "raised." His stated goal is to be one of the richest men in the world. Like Paris Hilton, Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan, he is a child celebrity interested in increasing his fame and little else.

He's in very good and very deep company when it comes to being unconcerned with and unqualified for the job of representing black men in a positive light.

Hell, given our current state of confusion, I'm not sure Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. could handle the job.

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The Brave Little Toaster Oven

The Brave Little Toaster Oven

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In a column at ESPN.com, Jemele Hill called the cover "memorable for all the wrong reasons." But she said in an interview that the image is not unusual — white athletes are generally portrayed smiling or laughing, while black sports figures are given a "beastly sort of vibe."

So wait, white people smile or laugh all the time? Would you say that this is the "typical white person"?

Sounds like stereotyping white people to me....

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G.A.C.O.L.B.

G.A.C.O.L.B.

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So wait, white people smile or laugh all the time? Would you say that this is the "typical white person"?

Sounds like stereotyping white people to me....

Whatever it is it's true.

And I'm white.

But seriously, the uproar on this is bull****. Sorry but it is.

BTW, Giselle Bunchen isn't even the hottest model in Brazil.

I give you:

Daniela Cicarelli

daniella3-thumb.jpg

daniela_cicarelli_886.jpg

And my Brazilian gf says she can give me at least 10 more, easily, that are hotter (Cicarelli is just her favorite.)

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Bang

Bang

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Assigning a racial tone, saying it vaguely resembles an old King Kong movie poster and thus is saying black people are gorilla monsters is a HUGE stretch.

here's the poster.

A9739~King-Kong-Posters.jpg

OK, so he has her in his left arm and his mouth is open.

That means he looks like King Kong, in case you didn't know.

He's not looking at her, he's looking at us. She's not terrified, she's dancing.

My goodness, the similarities are eerie, aren't they?

It is simply looking for racism, and as we all know if you look hard enough for something, you can find it in just about anything.

It doesn't mean it's there, it just means you in your zeal can see what no one else does.

In my mind I see an athlete, strong and flush with conquest. He has the beautiful woman, the spoils of being such a bad-ass athlete. He roars because he's the king of the hill, and anyone who wants what he's got is going to have to beat him. (Which is the essence of sport in itself, isn't it?)

When we see an athlete who dominates, we call him "beastly" on occasion. does that mean we think he resembles a gorilla, and thus so do everyone with his skin color?

It means he possesses a savagery for competition. It means he will not yield unless you beat him.

(Last year Gatorade made Peyton Manning hatch from a football. (egg).

I didn't hear white folks complaining that the media was portraying us as Rodan.

But, in this country of course it means the honkies done ****ed up ag'in.

~Bang

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