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What's My Name, Fool? Sports and Resistance in the United States
by Dave Zirin
"Out from the greed, myths, freeloading, cover-ups, censorships, and gouging of big time commercial sports comes the clear voice, honest pen and vigilant eyes of David Zirin. Put this book down only to pray, eat and sleep." |
(Dave Zirin on why he wrote "What's My Name, Fool? Sports and Resistance in the United States") Storming the Castle: Why We Need To Know Our Radical Sports History
July 14, 2005
In High School, I was a 5' 10" inch center for the
fearsome Friends Seminary Quakers in New York City. It
wasn't pretty, but I lived for it and didn't care if
the opposing center could spit on my head. I just
loved sports. My walls were shrines to Magic Johnson,
Lawrence Taylor, and Keith Hernandez. Every stat,
every record, and every rule existed only to be
memorized. Weekends were for playing ball until
sunset.
But somewhere along the way, I got a life. 'Operation
Desert Storm', and the L.A. Riots burned across my TV
screen. As the world seemed to turn upside down,
sports began to seem meaningless at best, and at
worst, against any concept of social justice. This
became jarringly clear during the 1991 Gulf War when I
saw "my team's" mascot thrash a person in an Arab suit
at half court while the jumbo-tron encouraged chants
of U-S-A. Limping away from the arena, I concluded,
that sports were part of the problem, and cheering
blindly was like going to see 'Rambo' to admire the
special effects while ignoring the Vietnamese
villagers Stallone was stamping out like bugs.
Then in 1996, a basketball player named Mahmoud Abdul
Rauf refused to stand for the National Anthem. Rauf
believed the flag to be "a symbol of oppression and
tyranny," and was willing to suffer the consequences.
His courage was stunning, but even more shocking was
the howling cries for his head. When Rauf was
suspended, some news reports resembled lynch mobs. But
others likened him to Muhammad Ali, whose title was
stripped for being a draft resistor during the Viet
Nam war. This was a history I barely knew. As Rauf
began to buckle under the tremendous pressure of right
wing bombast, it became clear that our side needed a
history of the resistance in US pro sports. To aid
this effort, I started writing a column called Edge of
Sports, and just completed my first book "What's My
Name, Fool? Sports and Resistance in the United
States."
When some friends back home heard what I was writing,
a Friar's Club Roast seemed to spontaneously generate.
These guys seemed to magically morph into a gaggle of
Henny Youngmans in baggy jeans. "Pro Sports and
radical politics?" one budding Borscht Belter smirked.
"That will make a helluva pamphlet!" Or "What's your
next book, Dick Cheney's Diet Tips? John Ashcroft's
Favorite Black History Moments?"
Everyone had a jibe. But my buddies are like Shaquille
O'Neal's free throws: simply way off. The history of
how social struggles have exploded onto the playing
field is vibrant, thrilling and very real. More
importantly, it's a tradition that arms us with the
ability to challenge the dominant ideas in that swoosh
adorned ivory tower known as the Athletic Industrial
Complex. The problem is that its political teeth have
been so thoroughly extracted that the most compelling
parts of the story, the parts that have the most to
show and teach us today, reside forgotten in the dust
heap of history.
For example, we may know that baseball was segregated
until 1947. But we don't know the story of Lester
"Red" Rodney, the sports editor of the Communist
Party's newspaper the Daily Worker. Rodney ran his
1930s sports page as an organizing center to fight for
baseball's integration. This campaign garnered over a
million signatures, collected at ballparks around the
country. ["Red" Rodney is still with us at age 95, and
interviewing him for this book was an experience I
will never forget].
We may know that Jackie Robinson was the first player
to integrate baseball. But we know him only as a kind
of quiet suffering black saint, who did it "the right
way," under the paternal eye of Dodgers General
Manager Branch Rickey. We don't know him as the person
who thought, "'To hell with Mr. Rickey's noble
experiment. To hell with the image of the patient
black freak I was supposed to create.' I could throw
down my bat, stride over to the dugout, grab one of
those white sons of bitches, and smash his teeth in
with my despised black fist. Then I could walk away
from it all."
We may know that the great boxing champ Muhammad Ali
refused to fight in Viet Nam. But we don't know he
consciously stood with the National Liberation Front
in Vietnam, - the resistance - saying, "The real enemy
of my people is here. I will not disgrace my religion,
my people or myself by becoming a tool to enslave
those who are fighting for their own justice freedom,
and equality."
We may know about the famed Black Power Salute, of
Tommie Smith and John Carlos at the 1968 Olympics. But
we don't know that they wore beads to protest
lynching, went without shoes to protest poverty, or
that John Carlos wore his shirt open because as he
said to me, "I was representing shift workers,
blue-collar people, and the underdogs. The people
whose contributions to society are so important, but
don't get recognized."
We may know about Billie Jean King's "Battle of the
Sexes" tennis match against Bobby Riggs at the
Astrodome. But we don't know how intertwined that
tennis match was with the fight for Title IX, one of
the enduring victories of the women's liberation
movement of which King was proudly a part. We also
don't know that King was far more than a symbol. She
also started a union for women's tennis players to
fight for equal pay.
We need to know this history because it is a living
history - which is precisely what makes it so
threatening. As Carlos said to me, "So much is the
same as it was in 1968. Look at Mississippi or
Alabama. It hasn't changed from back in the day. Look
at the city of Memphis and you still see blight up and
down. You can still see the despair. It's alive"
He's right. But it's also alive anytime athletes today
attempt to use their platform to speak on social
issues or draw inspiration from struggles in the
street. It's alive when NBA Most Valuable Player Steve
Nash says, "The war in Iraq is based on oil," while
wearing a t-shirt that reads "No War! Shoot For
Peace." It's alive when then-Toronto Blue Jays slugger
Carlos Delgado made clear that he wouldn't stand on
the steps during the seventh inning stretch to God
Bless America because the war in Iraq is "murder based
on lies". It's alive every time when the NBA's Etan
Thomas shows up at anti-death penalty events to read
his slam poetry; poetry that calls out the racism of
the system in utterly stark terms. And it's alive when
the US Congress feared calling Barry Bonds to testify
on steroids for concern that he would say to them what
he has been saying to reporters, namely "Why is
steroids cheating but making a shirt in Korea for 50
cents and selling it here for $150 isn't?"
Knowing this history positions us to support and
embrace athletes who go out on a political limb,
risking their careers for principle. This method
allows us not only engage and embrace the Etan
Thomases, Carlos Delgados, and other 21st century
Athletic Rebels but also the fans that thrill to their
exploits.
My friends believe that having "some kind of theory"
or analysis drains the life out of sports. The
opposite is in fact the case. By confronting the
messages pumped out through our play, we can dissect
what we like, what we dislike, and begin to challenge
sports - and our society - to change.
When warplanes fly overhead we can ask how many
physical education classes are cut to pay for each
Blue Angel.
When college athletes are pilloried for taking
under-the-table payoffs, we can ask whose blood,
sweat, and tears paid for the brand spanking new
enormo-dome that grace their campuses.
When insanely sexist commercials trade on women's
oppression for the high cause of selling beer, we can
make clear that this has no place in sports.
When the announcers on Fox become as aghast as a
Southern belle when a touchdown dancer gets raunchy,
we can ask why a network that pays Bill O'Reilly
millions and promotes shows like Who's Your Daddy? and
The Littlest Groom has the right to be the purity
police.
When our cities are soaked by sleazy stadium deals, we
can stand up as sports fans and say, "Hey, we love
baseball, but I'm not going to give a billionaire a
$350 million present for the privilege of watching
it."
By speaking out for the political soul of the sports
we love, we do more than just build a fighting left
that stands for social justice. We also begin to
impose our own ideas on the world of sports - a
counter morality to compete with the rank hypocrisy of
the pro leagues. These are ideas that can embrace and
cheer competition. That can appreciate the artistic
talents of athletes and the strategy of coaches and
players alike. That can thrill to seeing Barry Bonds
swinging a bat, or Michael Vick shredding a defense,
or Mia Hamm kicking a soccer ball. But unlike the
mainstream sports jabber, it's a morality that
recognizes male and female athletes - and all women -
as human beings with minds as well as bodies.
It also needs to understand that the incentive of
athletes to speak out for social justice lies not in
their individual brilliance but in our ability to
build a struggle outside the arena and in the streets.
If we want more Muhammad Alis, more John Carlos', and
more Billie Jean Kings - if we want to see a gay male
athlete have the courage to risk his neck by coming
out - then we need to build a broader movement for
social justice outside the arena, so our "heroes" will
also have people to look up to.
In that fight we need every drop of history,
experience, and tradition we can get our hands on. As
Tommie Smith himself said about his famed Black Power
salute, "It's not something I can lay on my shelf and
forget about. My heart and soul are still on that
team, and I still believe in everything we were trying
to fight for in 1968. [It] has not been resolved and
will be part of our future."
Dave Zirin's new book "What's My Name, Fool? Sports and
Resistance in the United States" is now in stores. You
can receive his column "Edge of Sports," every week by
e-mailing [email protected]. Contact
him at [email protected].
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