In recent years, victimhood has become quite seductive, often generating sympathy and greater opportunities, especially considering the DEI initiatives implemented in institutions, large and small, across the country.
But are these initiatives really useful? Do they do what they are supposed to do and give a boost to people who really need it? Or do they simply perpetuate the victim mentality? Do they create a culture of mediocrity and handouts?
This concept in the framework of football was the topic of conversation by Jason Whitlock, Warren Sapp and Marshall Faulk.
The trio spoke specifically about former Black players who remain in the NFL in senior or “front office” positions after their playing careers come to an end.
“Once you’re done, you’re done,” Faulk says. “Other than calling games and working on television, you don’t see many prominent former players.”
Whitlock believes this lack of opportunities for former Black NFL players is a direct result of having the wrong mindset.
“What’s your mindset when you’re done?” he asks. “If it’s not, ‘What can I contribute to the league or my former team,’ your mindset is wrong.”
Faulk disagrees, pointing to racial barriers as the main reason such opportunities are rare.
“I don’t disagree with you, but the opportunity has to be there,” he says. “If the opportunity existed, they wouldn’t implement all of these diversity/inclusion measures,” such as the Rooney Rule, which is an NFL policy that requires league teams to interview ethnic minority candidates for head coaches and senior positions. soccer. .
“If opportunity was just opportunity and it was equal, then we wouldn’t need any of these things,” he continues.
But Whitlock, who remains adamant, assures that it is because “former black athletes” have a “wrong mentality.”
He points to Warren Sapp’s career and remembers how he “wanted to go out and create his own opportunities” on the field during his playing career, and clearly, it served him well, leading him to the Hall of Fame.
“That dog mentality that made you a great football player has to prevail in real life,” Whitlock says, “and it’s about creating opportunities for yourself.”
“I came from nothing,” he explains, and “created opportunities my whole life.”
For example, one of the first opportunities he created was taking the only newspaper job he could get, which paid just $5 an hour.
“I believe [the opportunity]” he tells Sapp and Faulk.
“No, no, no, they gave “They give you five dollars to do the job,” Faulk says. “You took the opportunity.” [because] “The space was open.”
“Remember, there was Warren Sapp before Warren Sapp, [but] We just didn’t know,” he explains, because “he couldn’t go back to Miami when he wasn’t getting drafted into the NFL.”
“And do you know who created those opportunities?” Whitlock responds. “Sam Bam Cunningham. They went down and ran over Alabama, and everyone started saying, ‘I need to get some black players.’
“No, the opportunity came when they realized, ‘Oh shit, they can play at this level,'” Faulk responds.
But for Whitlock, black people have been creating opportunities for themselves since they came to this country.
“No one freed us from slavery,” he says. “We go out and take that, but black people, white people, believers, whatever. People died for it; “It wasn’t given, it was created…America is about what you are willing to take and create.”
Whichever side of the conversation you fall on, their debate is fascinating, full of interesting points on both sides, and worth watching. Check it out for yourself below.
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