Nice banner on the
Buffalo News today. (August 25 2016.)
Athlete #1: Male.
White.
Athlete #2: Female.
Blonde. White.
Athlete #3: Female.
Asian,
Athlete #4: Male.
White.
Athlete #5: Female.
Blonde. White.
Don't go inside to
the Sports Section. It's as segregated as the front page. And the
gymnast doing the cutesy pose is rather nauseating. (My friends
daughter is a dancer and DON'T ask her to do a cutesy pose. She is
mute and every photographer understands the sign language she
demonstrates without an interpreter. Some signs are pretty well
universal. I digress.)
What percentage of
athletes in Erie County and Niagara County are African American?
And the News
couldn't put at least ONE on the banner?
I'll probably have
to wait until September 1st when they cover football.
But looking at the
feature article on WNY sports and pretty much all the teams are from
…. the suburbs and elite prep schools. A few rural schools are
mentioned. Overall, it's a rich white man's (and women's) sports
world.
What about the
Buffalo and Niagara Falls sports teams that also have soccer, golf,
volleyball, and whatever else passes for expensive after school
babysitting?
I'll admit that I
don't like sports. My library budget took a major cut this year but
the sports teams took an increase. You see, the baseball teams
needed new bats. It's called go to the local community stores and
business owners and get them to donate and cover the costs.
That is, if they can
afford it. Hiring workers that can't read at an appropriate level
hurts the bottom line. It's equally expensive for parents when their
children go to college and take the entrance/placement exams and have
to take remedial Language Arts and Math classes because their
children are not scoring at a high enough level.
I digress. Again.
Buffalo has a large
population of African Americans and to see all these rich white (and
1 Asian) teens being set up as paragons of athleticism is rather
insulting. To be fair, football is not being covered in this issue,
Buffalo schools (and pretty much every school) has these teams, and
African Americans do participate at higher rates in football.
Or is this just
another way to rub the lack of funding that Buffalo and Niagara Falls
has in their school systems? I will leave out the rural schools that
also struggle with funding as well.
A side note: As
much as we decry racism against the African American community, my
friend pointed out that it is always OK to bust on the poor whites
and people that live in the country. (Look at the demographics for
the Trump supporters.) I have no term or phrase to describe this
phenomenon. Yet these people would certainly benefit quite well from
socialist policies. Yet they are written off. I digress. Yet
again.
Suburbia and private
schools can afford more than the basics and this is just another way
to rub it in. The inner city has been struggling since the decline of
manufacturing and the “white flight” of the 1970's. The places
to which they fled are weathering the academic and athletic storm
quite well. They have the clubs, sports boosters, and whatever else
they need to serve their enlightened self interest. (And
entertainment.)
Yet the people who
would benefit greatly from extra curricular programs rarely, if ever
receive them. Programs that would interest students and encourage
them to stay in school.
Now I often rat out
sports as being unnecessary and a waste of money. Especially for
cash strapped school districts that are cutting teachers and
services. But this article just took the cake for me and I felt I
needed to say something about this.
It's like a covert
form of racism. See what we have and you can't because you are inner
city and poor?
Class-ist as well.
Rich people deserve some things and everyone else, just watches and
dreams.
Never mind who made
the profits possible that the rich people are living on.
I've jumped around
quite a bit on this and I'm just going to stop it here before I blow
another gasket.
Probably not my
greatest blog. But still. Something had to be said.
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