Political And Racial Agendas Ruining Sports

[row_33]

Simple with full equality and men and women winner take all

 

 

I would welcome Serena taking on Nadal at Wimbledon over five sets

 

 

 

Or the top defender in the WNBA stopping LeBron when he is trying

 

 

[Juror#8]

On 6/10/2018 at 9:43 PM, GG said:

 

Thanks for adding to the story you started a few years back.

 

But I want to address the quoted above.  To me, that's big part of the continuation of the troubles.  It's not just that moving on up "to the deluxe apartment in the sky" is exponentially hard, but there's little pride among people who are left behind for those who moved on up by means other than the jump shot or selling crack.  The unspoken cultural guilt is a heavy burden that's levied on the people who rise up and out.  It's the opposite reaction to every other minority/immigrant community that started at the bottom and then rose up.   People who left the slums were revered and used as examples for children.

 

Perhaps Black History month should feature the anonymous teachers, doctors and accountants who simply strive to lead an ordinary middle class life.

 

 

 

 

You couldn’t be more correct here in nearly everything that you said. 

 

I went to visit an old friend at Jessup after my post. I realized that I hadn’t talked to him in over a year. He was understandably down but talking reclamation and personal development. He’s planning to take classes and get his g.e.d.

 

He talked more about those efforts from a parole resume context than a personal edification context but at least he has a plan. 

 

We had a good convo about old times and south east back in the hay (as in “hay day”). He kept asking me how I was doing and I deflected. He asked me was I working and I was evasive in my answers (he knows I went to school but has no clue about my profession or my lifestyle). 

 

He asked me where I was staying and I lied. 

 

Bold faced lied. 

 

Just felt bad because there he was struggling and in the jumpsuit. I just couldn’t bring myself to talk about me at all. So deflected back to him and kept my world off the table. 

 

I just told him I was going to put some bread on his commissary to keep him focused and engaged and I left. 

 

After I left, I went to the old stomping grounds and met up with a buddy of my, Hasheem. I just was able to get him connected with a Manpower contact I knew so he could get some some work. He’s two years out of prison and was having trouble finding work. He worked at Goodwill and in landscaping but couldn’t stay on because he’s irresponsible. 

 

Now to your point, I didn’t drive my nice car when I went. 

 

I made a conscious decision not to. 

 

It seemed to me inauthentic and unrelatable and not genuine. 

 

I didnt want to project any success. I was more concerned with just fitting in and talking **** and not upsetting the cultural apple cart. I just didn’t seem to be keeping it “real.” 

 

So I drove my fiance’s old Rav4 which we’re going to give to her younger sister because we just bought her a new Camry. 

 

That thought process - the not driving my car, not liking to talk about where I live or my family, trying to avoid projecting a sense of success, fear of being called or even thought of as a “sell out,” is so clearly mental poverty in its most noxious form. 

On 6/10/2018 at 9:23 PM, Azalin said:

 

I didn't want to quote your entire post, only for the sake of keeping it brief. You provide an insight all too rare around here; an opportunity to see things from a point of view not shared by most of us. I'm grateful for that, and would appreciate it if you were able to find the time to post here more frequently.

 

And it's good to see someone who knows the proper use of the word verisimilitude. 

 

Thanks for the shout out man. So many different perspectives around here that I appreciate. I’m just glad to be able to bring a difference lens and angle to add something (hopefully meaningful) to a discussion. 

 

Thanks again man and I hope you’re well. 

[Juror#8]

On 6/11/2018 at 9:53 AM, LeviF91 said:

 

Post more, mother!@#$er. 

 

Haha!!! I’m working on it. My agreement with my fiancé, so that she would be my fiancé after I creatively gerrymandered the boundaries of fidelity, was that I spent more time with family and less time away from the house or focused on my iPad. 

[TakeYouToTasker]

Just now, Juror#8 said:

 

Haha!!! I’m working on it. My agreement with my fiancé, so that she would be my fiancé after I creatively gerrymandered the boundaries of fidelity, was that I spent more time with family and less time away from the house or focused on my iPad. 

 

I'm thrilled to hear that you were able to salvage your relationship.  I remember how distraught you were over the whole situation. 

 

God bless and God speed.

[Juror#8]

On 6/11/2018 at 11:58 AM, TakeYouToTasker said:

@Juror#8

 

Our backgrounds are more similar than you might imagine.  My family was plunged into poverty some time right around my first birthday.

 

My mother grew up homeless in Las Vegas.  The oldest daughter of alcoholics, my maternal grandfather a gambling addict who had his paycheck spent on the blackjack tables before he bought a loaf of bread.  They lived in a cave he dug out in the hidden side  of an underpass.  They upgraded to a small camping trailer after a years time.

 

My father worked as a carpenter when he got back from Viet Nam (a time which left him with deep mental and emotional scars he's never recovered from), until the trussing of a house fell on him breaking his back.  The construction company held out on paying him restitution and tied him up in a legal battle he couldn't afford, until he finally settled for far less than was even required to pay his medical bills because his family was starving.

 

My mother supported us for the next 4 years on tips working in a ****ty dinner while he slowly nursed himself back to health.  We lived in the slums in West Vegas.  I didn't know it until I as older, but my mother made most of my clothes herself because my parents couldn't afford them.  Like you, I received second hand books and homemade wooden blocks for Christmas.  There were other Christmas' where I went without.

 

I was the first member of my family to go to college.  My work ethic and my inability to view myself as a victim are what allowed me to climb out and break the cycle.  They are, in retrospect, better than any Christmas present I ever could have received.

 

I know what a woat is.  I know what it's like to go hungry.

 

It's one of the reasons I believe so strongly in the philosophy I espouse.

 

The truth is that I don't expect most people born into situations like yours, or mine, to pull themselves out.  And for those who do, they'll be replaced by some other poor bastards who fall into poverty.

 

It's not a problem that can ever be solved for the masses by someone else.  It's a problem that can only be solved for the individual by the individual themselves. 

 

I appreciate you sharing your background. I tend to come from a place sometimes where I think I see everything in the Matrix code while most everyone else is swimming in a world of impracticality simply because I’ve dealt with some disadvantage. 

 

I also work off weird assumptions that most white folks haven’t dealt with disadvantages so their outlook on the scope of avenues for the gritty, unpretty part of the world is more academic and the product of enchantment and theory than anything else. 

 

Messages like yours, and even Joe’s earlier, serve to put that back into more perspective. 

11 minutes ago, TakeYouToTasker said:

 

I'm thrilled to hear that you were able to salvage your relationship.  I remember how distraught you were over the whole situation. 

 

God bless and God speed.

 

Thanks man. Much appreciated. That was a rough time. Can’t believe it was almost 5 years ago. Lesson learned. 

[TakeYouToTasker]

13 minutes ago, Juror#8 said:

 

I appreciate you sharing your background. I tend to come from a place sometimes where I think I see everything in the Matrix code while most everyone else is swimming in a world of impracticality simply because I’ve dealt with some disadvantage. 

 

I also work off weird assumptions that most white folks haven’t dealt with disadvantages so their outlook on the scope of avenues for the gritty, unpretty part of the world is more academic and the product of enchantment and theory than anything else. 

 

Messages like yours, and even Joe’s earlier, serve to put that back into more perspective. 

 

The sentiment is absolutely reciprocated.

 

In my experience I've found that while there are a nearly unlimited amount of pitfalls to the bottom, leading folks of nearly every background and persuasion into destitution, there are exceedingly few ladders to the top, and even for those few ladders which exist, the ability to expend an inordinate amount of individual effort and discipline to be able to jump up and grab that first rung is required.

 

I don't think it's that unusual for people to build their assumptions on a foundation of what they know (or think that they know), based on the sum of their own experiences.  And that's not a crime, or even something requiring apology; but rather is a norm of the human condition.  We all see the world through the lens of our own experience.

 

I simply appreciate the willingness of any other traveler to bend those assumptions a bit as new evidence presents itself.  It's been nice to meet you along the road.

Edited June 14, 2018 by TakeYouToTasker

[K-9]

39 minutes ago, Juror#8 said:

 

 

You couldn’t be more correct here in nearly everything that you said. 

 

I went to visit an old friend at Jessup after my post. I realized that I hadn’t talked to him in over a year. He was understandably down but talking reclamation and personal development. He’s planning to take classes and get his g.e.d.

 

He talked more about those efforts from a parole resume context than a personal edification context but at least he has a plan. 

 

We had a good convo about old times and south east back in the hay (as in “hay day”). He kept asking me how I was doing and I deflected. He asked me was I working and I was evasive in my answers (he knows I went to school but has no clue about my profession or my lifestyle). 

 

He asked me where I was staying and I lied. 

 

Bold faced lied. 

 

Just felt bad because there he was struggling and in the jumpsuit. I just couldn’t bring myself to talk about me at all. So deflected back to him and kept my world off the table. 

 

I just told him I was going to put some bread on his commissary to keep him focused and engaged and I left. 

 

After I left, I went to the old stomping grounds and met up with a buddy of my, Hasheem. I just was able to get him connected with a Manpower contact I knew so he could get some some work. He’s two years out of prison and was having trouble finding work. He worked at Goodwill and in landscaping but couldn’t stay on because he’s irresponsible. 

 

Now to your point, I didn’t drive my nice car when I went. 

 

I made a conscious decision not to. 

 

It seemed to me inauthentic and unrelatable and not genuine. 

 

I didnt want to project any success. I was more concerned with just fitting in and talking **** and not upsetting the cultural apple cart. I just didn’t seem to be keeping it “real.” 

 

So I drove my fiance’s old Rav4 which we’re going to give to her younger sister because we just bought her a new Camry. 

 

That thought process - the not driving my car, not liking to talk about where I live or my family, trying to avoid projecting a sense of success, fear of being called or even thought of as a “sell out,” is so clearly mental poverty in its most noxious form. 

This is upsetting. As it should be. And I don’t mean that towards you personally at all because your decisions on how to present yourself to your friends comes from a place of deep empathy and respect, imo. 

 

But you touch upon upon a subject that my sister and other educators in inner city school environments often lament and that is the deliberate lack of effort and classroom participation by obviously bright and gifted students because they didn’t want to be rejected by a less talented peer group or worse, ostracized, bullied, or worse. I can’t imagine that kind of pressure on a kid already pressured by the sheer environment he’s in. Was that an issue for you growing up? 

[keepthefaith]

54 minutes ago, Juror#8 said:

 

 

You couldn’t be more correct here in nearly everything that you said. 

 

I went to visit an old friend at Jessup after my post. I realized that I hadn’t talked to him in over a year. He was understandably down but talking reclamation and personal development. He’s planning to take classes and get his g.e.d.

 

He talked more about those efforts from a parole resume context than a personal edification context but at least he has a plan. 

 

We had a good convo about old times and south east back in the hay (as in “hay day”). He kept asking me how I was doing and I deflected. He asked me was I working and I was evasive in my answers (he knows I went to school but has no clue about my profession or my lifestyle). 

 

He asked me where I was staying and I lied. 

 

Bold faced lied. 

 

Just felt bad because there he was struggling and in the jumpsuit. I just couldn’t bring myself to talk about me at all. So deflected back to him and kept my world off the table. 

 

I just told him I was going to put some bread on his commissary to keep him focused and engaged and I left. 

 

After I left, I went to the old stomping grounds and met up with a buddy of my, Hasheem. I just was able to get him connected with a Manpower contact I knew so he could get some some work. He’s two years out of prison and was having trouble finding work. He worked at Goodwill and in landscaping but couldn’t stay on because he’s irresponsible. 

 

Now to your point, I didn’t drive my nice car when I went. 

 

I made a conscious decision not to. 

 

It seemed to me inauthentic and unrelatable and not genuine. 

 

I didnt want to project any success. I was more concerned with just fitting in and talking **** and not upsetting the cultural apple cart. I just didn’t seem to be keeping it “real.” 

 

So I drove my fiance’s old Rav4 which we’re going to give to her younger sister because we just bought her a new Camry. 

 

That thought process - the not driving my car, not liking to talk about where I live or my family, trying to avoid projecting a sense of success, fear of being called or even thought of as a “sell out,” is so clearly mental poverty in its most noxious form. 

 

Thanks for the shout out man. So many different perspectives around here that I appreciate. I’m just glad to be able to bring a difference lens and angle to add something (hopefully meaningful) to a discussion. 

 

Thanks again man and I hope you’re well. 

 

Very interesting.

 

Sort of related.....

 

I've hired 2 former felons that were jailed for a few years each.  The first one worked well for us for a few months and then after the "newness" of the job and freedom wore off we saw him sliding into some bad habits, unreliability and poor job performance.  Try as we did I had to fire him for doing something pretty bad. 

 

The second person started working here about 2 years ago and is an absolute jewel and now an important member of the team.  A real keeper and we've been able to bring him along in terms of responsibility and compensation.  He and I couldn't be happier with how this has progressed.

 

Both were incarcerated but had very different experiences in prison.  The first one described it as very rough and tumble among the inmates and bragged about biting off a guy's pinky finger in a fight.  The other was one of the lucky ones and got hired by the in-prison company and worked a job in the distribution of prison supplies for 2-3 years and learned a lot.  Came in the door to us with some unexpected business skills.

 

Obviously staying out of the criminal system and working toward productive goals is best but I have often said that jail time for many should be much shorter, harsher initially and then much more rehabilitative leading up to release.  The person in the first example left prison no better than when he entered.  The second completely different. 

 

Edited June 14, 2018 by keepthefaith

[Koko78]

59 minutes ago, Juror#8 said:

 

Now to your point, I didn’t drive my nice car when I went. 

 

I made a conscious decision not to.

 

Not landing your private helicopter in the middle of the yard was probably a good idea.

[row_33]

12 minutes ago, Koko78 said:

 

Not landing your private helicopter in the middle of the yard was probably a good idea.

 

some clients require that you drive the good car, it would make their neighbourhood look bad if you had anything under top-shelf

 

 

[GG]

19 minutes ago, K-9 said:

This is upsetting. As it should be. And I don’t mean that towards you personally at all because your decisions on how to present yourself to your friends comes from a place of deep empathy and respect, imo. 

 

But you touch upon upon a subject that my sister and other educators in inner city school environments often lament and that is the deliberate lack of effort and classroom participation by obviously bright and gifted students because they didn’t want to be rejected by a less talented peer group or worse, ostracized, bullied, or worse. I can’t imagine that kind of pressure on a kid already pressured by the sheer environment he’s in. Was that an issue for you growing up? 

A respected friend posted this on FB recently.  

 

This is the mentally that needs to change for any progress to happen.  

[shrader]

1 hour ago, K-9 said:

This is upsetting. As it should be. And I don’t mean that towards you personally at all because your decisions on how to present yourself to your friends comes from a place of deep empathy and respect, imo. 

 

But you touch upon upon a subject that my sister and other educators in inner city school environments often lament and that is the deliberate lack of effort and classroom participation by obviously bright and gifted students because they didn’t want to be rejected by a less talented peer group or worse, ostracized, bullied, or worse. I can’t imagine that kind of pressure on a kid already pressured by the sheer environment he’s in. Was that an issue for you growing up? 

 

Being shamed for success has to be one of the most self-destructive behaviors you'll ever see.  The sooner people stop giving a damn about what others thing of them, the better we will all be.

[3rdnlng]

3 hours ago, GG said:

A respected friend posted this on FB recently.  

 

This is the mentally that needs to change for any progress to happen.  

That's a hell of a poignant picture.

[Azalin]

4 hours ago, Juror#8 said:

 

Thanks for the shout out man. So many different perspectives around here that I appreciate. I’m just glad to be able to bring a difference lens and angle to add something (hopefully meaningful) to a discussion. 

 

Thanks again man and I hope you’re well. 

 

No thanks necessary. It's a pleasure to have you aboard. 

[Koko78]

2 hours ago, 3rdnlng said:

That's a hell of a poignant picture.

 

I'll say. The guy on the bottom right is going to be #metoo'd in about 30 years for grabbing the other's ass.

[TakeYouToTasker]

12 minutes ago, Koko78 said:

 

I'll say. The guy on the bottom right is going to be #metoo'd in about 30 years for grabbing the other's ass.

 

And the guy on the bottom left is going to be pilloried on twitter by SJW's for not being willing to grab the ass of another man.

[/dev/null]

58 minutes ago, TakeYouToTasker said:

 

And the guy on the bottom left is going to be pilloried on twitter by SJW's for not being willing to grab the ass of another man.

 

Did you just assume gender?

 

 

 

[row_33]

Crabs in a barrel

 

 

[Pine Barrens Mafia]

12 hours ago, TakeYouToTasker said:

 

And the guy on the bottom left is going to be pilloried on twitter by SJW's for not being willing to grab the ass of another man.

 

But the guy on the left is grabbing junk.

[4merper4mer]

21 hours ago, Juror#8 said:

 

Haha!!! I’m working on it. My agreement with my fiancé, so that she would be my fiancé after I creatively gerrymandered the boundaries of fidelity, was that I spent more time with family and less time away from the house or focused on my iPad. 

Dude you were doing so well and then you turned in Sage, Ed and countless others who got married and disappeared.  You aren't eating lentils all day are you?  Balance dude, balance.