Chapter 6
Standing Up for Black Lives Matter Matters
On July 17, 2014, Eric Garner was choked to death by NYPD officer Daniel Pantaleo. It was videotaped and afterward shown on a continuous reel on every major news station. Although NYPD policy clearly prohibits the use of choke holds by its officers, that didn’t stop Pantaleo from literally choking the life out of Eric Garner while arresting him. No weapon was found on Garner, nor was he suspected of any other crime outside of selling “loosies,” a term for single cigarettes out of the package. To make matters worse, at the end of 2014, after hearing the case for two months, the grand jury decided on December 3 not to indict Pantaleo for the killing of Eric Garner.
A few months later, in February 2015, the NBA All-Star Weekend was held in New York City. The killing of Garner was fresh on everyone’s mind, with the event in the very city where this tragedy took place. I wanted to do something meaningful. Something powerful for the New York City youth who were understandably upset about what had happened. So I decided to hold a Black Lives Matter event. I wanted to do it for all the young Black and Latino men and invite different NBA players to discuss Black Lives Matter, including the recent killings by the police and how the youth can survive in a system that is built for them to fail.
I connected with Canaan Baptist Church in Harlem and they were more than happy to host the event. I warned Pastor Thomas Johnson that the program might be met with some controversy and criticism—considering how this would be happening during the NBA All-Star Weekend, and just coming off of the Eric Garner murder. The pastor told me that his predecessors in the church always prided themselves on activism and community engagement.
I connected with Paul Forbes and his Expanded Success Initiative program, and with some administrators at New York City public schools, who were also extremely interested in their students taking part in this event. The church’s capacity was a little over 2,500, and within a few days we had exactly 2,500 students confirmed to come. I reached out to Alonzo Mourning, Isiah Thomas, John Wallace, Chris Broussard, and Kevin Powell. BET connected me with actor Hosea Chanchez and we had our panel set.
As discussed earlier in the book, I then reached out to Emerald Snipes, daughter of Eric Garner, and invited her to participate. I told her she didn’t have to speak if she didn’t want to, but I wanted her to come if she felt up to it. She said she would be there.
Once word started spreading, there were a lot of people who didn’t like what they were hearing and didn’t want to see it happen. They attempted to pressure me and the church not to hold the event, or to water it down to the point that it resembled an NBA Cares program (no offense). Some NYPD officers said it sent the wrong message. Their key problem was with the term Black Lives Matter.
My family proudly wearing our Black Lives Matter shirts together.
I wanted to delve further into the misrepresentation and misinterpretation of the phrase Black Lives Matter with Bomani Jones, the sports journalist and ESPN cohost of Highly Questionable with Dan Le Batard. Naturally, he had many thoughts and opinions, as he has covered this topic multiple times.
Etan: I want to read a tweet of yours from a few years ago: “Why can’t people just be honest and say, ‘I really don’t care if black people die’? The excuses sound every bit as racist. We’re not fooled.” I would love to hear you expound on that quote.
Bomani Jones: Well, when an unarmed Black man is killed by the police, we wind up playing these intellectual games where the attempt is made to justify the fact that somebody has been killed. No matter what happened. For instance, Officer Darren Wilson, who killed Mike Brown, got over half a million dollars raised for him on Facebook and GoFundMe with the title “Support Officer Darren Wilson.” Half a million dollars!!
Etan: Well, Daniel Holtzclaw, the Oklahoma City police officer who was accused of sexually assaulting eight different African American women while on duty, raised seven thousand dollars in less than a week before GoFundMe was forced to take it down, but I’m sure his numbers would have ended up being comparable to Darren Wilson’s had it remained on the site.
Jones: And that’s just my point. That’s absurd! And the only thing that people know about these cops is that Darren Wilson killed an unarmed Mike Brown, or Daniel Holtzclaw raped and sodomized a bunch of Black women, and they donated! They said, “You know what, I would like to support this person and give my hard-earned money to them.”
So what winds up happening—if you start from that point, and think that’s something that should be rewarded, to do that means you have to justify whatever the action is . . . And they end up stacking up all of these nonsensical reasons and it leaves the rest of us to wade through all of this “logic,” because those people wind up getting the benefit of the doubt where we have to respect their perspective and disprove it before we get to any other discussion. And instead of dealing with the reality—that the value of the lives of Black people are placed lower than the value of the lives of everybody else in this country—we end up having to justify the forensic evidence and everything else and try to debate every ridiculous possibility that is raised as a justification for the police yet again killing this particular unarmed Black man . . . It would be a whole lot easier if people would just tell the truth. Just say, “Hey, we don’t care about the lives of Black people.”
Etan: And that’s why the term Black Lives Matter then becomes a “controversial statement,” which it really shouldn’t be.
Jones: There isn’t anything really bold about the statement Black Lives Matter . . . You would think that the response to that from more people would be, “Of course they matter, why wouldn’t they?” We didn’t even say that it matters a lot, just that it matters. They can’t even give us that it matters at all? Not even a little bit? It has to be met with the opposition of, “No, all lives matter”? . . . Instead of them asking themselves, “Why would this subgroup feel the need to point out that their lives matter? What is going on in society to make this subgroup feel that their lives don’t matter?”
Etan: Shortly after LeBron and D Wade and Chris Paul and Carmelo made their statements regarding Black Lives Matter before the ESPYs, you said that while you were glad they spoke out, you wanted to hear something from the white athletes who haven’t by and large been very vocal on this topic.
Jones: Not only that they aren’t speaking on it, but they aren’t being asked to speak on it. They aren’t even asked to pick a side, lend their voice, use their platform to “bring about change” like the Black athletes are consistently asked to do. The police are treated in the discussion as whiteness, right? It’s Black people on one side, and we have the police on the other, which I believe is also telling . . . But nobody really asks white players to weigh in on this discussion in any way, shape, or form . . . And if we’re going to be honest about this, mainstream America, if I may use your term, would be more apt to listen to a Peyton Manning or a Tom Brady or a Kevin Love if they had something to say on these matters. White athletes could have a tremendous effect on not only the psyche of the masses of mainstream America, but they could move the needle toward actual justice. There is tremendous unrealized potential and unused power . . . because white athletes are simply not asked or pushed to enter into the discussion, and that’s really unfortunate.
Etan: There is this notion out there, with Black media especially, that if you do speak on this you will be punished. Would you agree?
Jones: I think generally speaking that people would prefer not to offend. I think no matter the topic we are discussing, people would generally not want to isolate people, or lose supporters, and overall not offend anyone. And I can’t necessarily knock people for that because I can see where their point of origin is. Now, as far as the thought that you will be punished for saying certain things, you definitely run the risk of doing that . . . I do feel there are people who fear that those who are “on top” will punish them for stating what these views happen to be.
Etan: Do you think that some reporters and media personalities put the fear of offending mainstream America over the fear of offending the people in their own community?
Jones: (Laughing) Yes, people do put the fear of offending mainstream America over the fear of offending the Black community. I think people think that the community will understand their hustle and what it takes to get to the position they want to get to . . . I think it is far more harmful and far more toxic if someone is willing to come out and say something they don’t believe just because.
Etan: Maybe they would get a pat on the head from the executives. Maybe they would be rewarded by being moved up the ladder past other people who don’t always say what mainstream America wants to hear. So if someone wants to see them tap-dance, they bring their shoes nice and shined and ready, even if they don’t like tap-dancing and it actually hurts their feet to do so. It’s the price they pay.
Jones: Hmm, okay, I see what you did there (laughing).
Etan: But do you disagree?
Jones: No, I don’t. It happens.
Etan: I remember seeing you on Mike & Mike wearing the T-shirt that said, Caucasians, with a caricature of the Cleveland Indians logo. I live here in DC and we’ve been having our own battle with the racist name of our Washington NFL team. But you knew that by wearing that shirt, and drawing that connection to the topic of mascots and the level of offensiveness they possess, you were going to offend people in mainstream America. Take me through the reaction you received when you wore that shirt.
Jones: You know, the funny part about that was I am probably the only person in America who didn’t see or realize how that was going to go over when I wore that shirt.
Etan: Really? How did you think it was going to go over? Did you think mainstream America was going to draw the conclusion that, “Yeah, I would be offended if a team had a mascot of my people like that,” and see the error in having Native American caricatures for so many sports teams across the country?
Jones: Well, when you say it like that . . . (laughing). But yeah, I thought that it was so transparent and so obvious. I mean, we have been having the mascot conversation nationally for some time now. This wasn’t like a new discussion that I brought to the forefront or anything. The only thing about that shirt that turned out to be bold or anything was that I found out that a whole lot of white people were really offended and didn’t like the notion of the word Caucasians. That was perhaps the most surprising thing about it . . . It’s not like it said Pale Faces or anything like that. Caucasians was just about as technical of a term that we could have possibly used . . .
I thought that the logic was so clear and so transparent that if you tolerate and are comfortable with the notion of the Cleveland Indians, then you cannot have any issue with this shirt . . . But the hypocrisy of it all—that all you had to do was make a simple flip-flop with a nonoffensive image and they would be that irate—was just amazing to me. And the funny thing is, if you asked someone to logically break down why they were so upset and why they were so offended, they wouldn’t be able to.
Etan: What was the reaction from the people at ESPN?
Jones: Well, I didn’t have any disciplinary issues or anything like that, and I think part of it was, nobody was in any position to logically say what I had done wrong when they use that same image on SportsCenter when the teams play.
Etan: Do you think it would take something like flipping all of the cases of Black people being killed to them all being white in order for mainstream America to understand why we say Black Lives Matter?
Jones: That’s a really good question. I honestly don’t know the answer to that. I don’t know if it would make those same people make the connection to Black folks, just like me wearing the shirt didn’t make them see the connection to Native Americans like I thought they would. The ultimate issue is, there is a different set of rules when dealing with Black people than there is when dealing with white people. There is a different level of empathy when mainstream America hears that a Black man was killed versus when they hear that a white man was killed . . .
Etan: I was hoping it would make them open their eyes to say, “Oh, this is what Kaepernick was talking about, this is what John Carlos and Tommie Smith were talking about back in the 1968 Olympics, this is what Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf and Craig Hodges were talking about in the nineties.”
Jones: But you know what? There are some people who do make the connection. I don’t want to make it seem like nobody connects those dots, and hopefully, when people are reading this and hear us connecting those dots, it makes them think about this in a way that they never had before. But I think you will in fact find a lot of people who are more offended by a false accusation of racism than they are by any racism whatsoever, and I feel that they are defending their own self-esteem as much as anything else, because everybody wants to believe that they are good people . . . So Black Lives Matter in a lot of ways is about self-esteem, but in a totally understandable and justifiable way. Look, we matter, and we are going to reinforce the fact that we are fully human beings and that we should be treated like human beings. That is an assertion of one’s self-worth.
After the back-to-back murders of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, Washington Wizards guard Bradley Beal tweeted out the words Black Lives Matter around two a.m. on July 8, 2016. He was surprised to have been met with an onslaught of All Lives Matter responses as well as criticism about his timing, being that police officers were also killed in Dallas. One person wrote, Lost respect for you, while another wrote, Disgraceful. Beal did not issue a hurried response or a heartfelt apology to any of the All Lives Matter fans; instead, he offered a fervent statement on Instagram.
Beal is not someone who takes this topic lightly or simply gives a knee-jerk reaction. He is about doing the work. He attended one of President Barack Obama’s town hall meetings on the topic. He went not only because he was a Black man, but also because he was a Black athlete. He felt that he needed to hear the firsthand accounts, the experiences, the tragedies, and process everything. He has attended Obama’s speaking engagements before, and he has a desire to become more involved with My Brother’s Keeper, an initiative that aims to couple young men of color with mentors to address racial inequality in America.
Beal doesn’t believe that athlete activism is some type of a fad that will fade away and transition into something new. He believes that as long as injustice prevails, there will be athletes who feel a strong responsibility, and who step up to the plate to use their positions in ways that will push for change. He acknowledges that it may make some people uncomfortable, and may cause him to lose some of his own fans, but that’s a price he is definitely willing to pay for standing up for what is right.
Bradley Beal took time after practice to talk to me about Black Lives Matter and his willingness to speak out despite any criticism that comes his way.
Etan: We interviewed Ted Leonsis, the CEO of the Wizards, and he was saying how proud he was of you when you stood up and spoke your mind after the deaths of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile. When I asked him whether athletes will be reprimanded if they speak out on certain issues or controversial topics, he said that that’s not what they do here with the Wizards. Is that pretty much your experience here, that you have the freedom to speak on whatever it is that is on your heart?
Bradley Beal: Sure, because at the end of the day, we’re still human beings, we’re still a part of society. I think people sometimes get it misconstrued because they see us as athletes, they see us as role models, and they see us as celebrities, and that we are conformed to not speaking. And I will admit, some of us think that there is going to be too much backlash if they do decide to voice their opinion, so they remain silent and just stay out of it completely. But we live in a free country, and yes, our job description reads to play basketball. But at the same time, we are still citizens of the United States, and we are members of society, so why should we not be allowed to voice our opinion? Why should we not have a say in our everyday surroundings? About things that deeply affect our everyday lives?
If there is something that needs to be brought to light, professional athletes have one of the highest platforms to do so . . . What we say holds a lot of weight, so I feel that regardless of what backlash may come our way, or whatever people’s opinions may be . . . you’re voicing your opinion about something that needs to be brought to light as you personally see it . . . And when you say it, you have to stand on it. You can’t be that person who straddles the fence when the criticism and pushback comes your way.
Etan: One of the things I saw after you spoke out was the criticism that immediately followed. And it was really harsh. And as you said, you didn’t back off or retract your statement.
Beal: No, you can’t do that.
Etan: Let me refresh everyone’s memory to exactly what we are talking about before we go any further. After you received the criticism, your exact words were:
So b/c I say Black lives matter: 1. I don’t think ALL LIVES MATTER 2. I’m in favor of cops being killed? Some people are ignorant af. The issue at hand regards my race and I have every right to speak on it! If you don’t like it, it’s a big ass UNFOLLOW button on the top of my page. Saying all lives matter is like saying we all need air to breathe! We all know that!!!! Killing a cop is no better than a cop taking a life! Innocent black lives are being taken by those sworn to protect and serve, not murder! When does it come to an end? And you wonder why people rage? We aren’t getting justice, just more body counts! People are getting sick of this sh*t. So yes, Black Lives Matter!
After I read this, I was applauding in my living room. Because it was so strong and to the point and answered all of the criticism you were receiving, all of the attempts to twist and contort the message of Black Lives Matter, all the ridiculous attempts to divert the issue. But let me ask you this: did the criticism surprise you?
Beal: Honestly, it was just something that I felt needed to be said. I couldn’t just stay quiet and say nothing while I have this tremendous platform. But the criticism didn’t surprise me at all, really. It saddened me to see where we are as a society. You would think that some of the tragedies—like these two with Philando Castile and Alton Sterling—were tragedies that happened decades ago back in the sixties and civil rights era. These are things that we are supposed to be reading about in our history books, not experiencing in this day. So it made me sad reading some of the mentions on Twitter and some of the criticisms, because this makes it clear that some of our mind states are still there, that we haven’t progressed as far as we thought we have.
So in that aspect, you pay attention to it, but then again you don’t, because it’s about what’s right. Regardless of who it may have been, it’s simply not right. That’s not how human beings should be treated, that’s not how those sworn to protect and serve should do their job, and that’s not the way someone should lose their life to never be able to be with their families again. People don’t understand—these aren’t just cases or hashtags, these are actual people with children and families. Little daughters who will never see their father again. If that doesn’t bother you at least a little, then something is wrong with you.
Etan: Definitely agree. If we were talking about the Holocaust and we said the lives of the Jews mattered, I don’t think people would answer back with, “No, no, no. Not just the Jews—all lives matter.”
Beal: Yeah, it’s ridiculous. When people heard me say that Black Lives Matter, they just immediately responded with . . . All Lives Matter. And you can’t even begin to explain how heartless that comeback is. And I like that you made that comparison, because people need to see it in those terms. That would make people see how absolutely ridiculous the criticism is. Well, it should make them see it. And these killings by the police are on TV now, you see video clips of it, where you can see clear as day what happened. Why wouldn’t we say anything, but even more so, why wouldn’t the entire country be in an uproar? Why are you okay with what you have just seen? Why doesn’t it affect you at all? Why does your heart not ache like mine does after seeing this? Why would you not feel the urge to do anything to help this situation? Why would you not feel sympathy for the people who are going through this, but attempt to use that moment to proclaim that your life, which is not being taken away, is just as important as the people’s lives who are being taken away?
Etan: I do a lot of panel discussions and speaking to youth across the country, and I tell them that no matter what they are seeing in the media, with every police shooting, every not-guilty verdict, that their life does in fact matter. And a lot of the people who have those criticisms don’t understand staring out into a sea of hundreds of young people’s faces—Black young people’s faces, girls and boys—and have them look at you like you’re telling them something they’ve never heard before, or like they have a hard time believing their lives actually matter. Have you experienced that yourself?
Beal: Unfortunately, I know exactly what you are saying and have experienced that myself. That’s why I tell people, and other athletes as well, when they ask, “Do you feel that it is an obligation to be involved, or to speak out to raise awareness, or to speak at schools to young people?” I wouldn’t say it’s an obligation, but you should do it. Granted, everybody made their own way to the NBA, and everybody has their own life to take care of, but at the end of the day, we are still role models to kids. Some kids will only hear that positive message that their life matters from us. Imagine that, having the power to be able to instill a personal pride in a young person who didn’t have that before you spoke to them?
That’s a great power and responsibility to have. Us as athletes, we have the biggest platforms, especially NBA players, because we don’t have helmets on like the NFL players, so people know you, they know your face, they know your product, they know your brand, and they know your life. You can relate to them on a level that somebody else may not be able to. My mother used to always tell me that as a youngin. You don’t listen to Mom all the time, but when somebody else tells you the exact same thing that your mom says, it kind of registers with you. So I tell players all the time, it’s always good for them to hear it from someone else, especially in the position we are in, because what we say holds so much weight, it will stick with the kids. They will look and say, “Man, you had to deal with the same things that I am dealing with? You had people make you feel like your life isn’t important too?”
I got my nine-year-old daughter Imani involved in one of the Black Lives Matter panel discussions I moderated in November 2016. I wanted her to sing a song for the event’s opening because I thought her beautiful voice would really set the tone, but I also wanted her to get a chance to hear panelists like Swin Cash, Ilyasah Shabazz, Emerald Snipes, and Erica Garner. Swin discussed how the entire WNBA responded to the deaths of Philando Castile and Alton Sterling, how the league took a stance together and decided that they were going to be agents for change. Imani was so inspired I can’t even put it into words.
Now, I have brought Imani to hear me speak before, and I can tell when she is paying attention and when she isn’t. This occasion, the entire time Swin Cash was speaking, Imani was locked in and engaged. She listened intensely as Swin explained how women were being subjected to crimes by the police just like men were, but that it wasn’t being publicized as much. Imani heard the names Sandra Bland, Rekia Boyd, and Korryn Gaines, who I had discussed with her before. But she also learned some new names, like Symone Marshall, Gynnya McMillen, Darnesha Harris, Yvette Smith, and Malissa Williams.
At one point, Swin was asked how they were able to get all of the WNBA players to participate, both Black and white, in contrast to the NFL, which at the time barely had any players—definitely no white ones—supporting Kaepernick. Swin talked about how important it was to do things together and how the WNBA at first tried to break their unity by imposing fines. She talked about how much stronger they were together and how sometimes women can have issues working with each other. She mentioned mean girls that exist in every school across America, which Imani definitely related to. And Swin stressed that their lives mattered, no matter what they have been told by society, no matter what they have been shown on TV or heard on the radio. The WNBA was able to prove that when women come together, they can do something special and show everyone that they do in fact matter. Imani wasn’t the only one hanging on her every word—every student in that audience, especially the females, were focused on everything Swin was saying. Hearing all of this from a woman made it even more powerful for them.
I was glad to be able to sit down with Swin Cash of the Detroit Shock to talk about these subjects.
Etan: Take me through how all of you came to the decision to collectively take the stand in the WNBA?
Swin Cash: It really came about as a result of everything that was going on in the country at the time. There were forty-eight hours that really had everyone in a state of shock. There were back-to-back murders of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, and there was the video on Facebook Live that actually showed Philando Castile being killed and another video showing the police kill Alton Sterling, and at the time I think people were really numb and didn’t know what to do. I know that Minnesota were working behind the scenes. I know their team really wanted to take a stance. I was actually on the executive committee of the union and we heard from other players, so everyone was wondering what they were going to do and it really was pretty much a forty-eight-hour turnaround where we had Minnesota who first publicly took a stand and two days after that we were in New York taking a stand and other teams were following suit . . . We understood that by making this stance, it wasn’t going to be favorable with everyone, but at the same time we were so committed and we collectively felt that we needed to use our platform in that way.
Etan: What was your reaction to the police saying they were not going to do security for WNBA games?
Cash: Yeah, the officers decided that they were not going to remain on their posts during the game and do their duty as to what they were hired to do and they walked out of the arena. So not only were they refusing to acknowledge that we had a constitutional right to voice our opinion, but they were abandoning their responsibility as policemen to protect the players and fans alike . . . Minnesota had a press conference first and they verbalized how they felt and where they stood on all of the issues and the shirts displayed that as well. In New York, we took a different approach; immediately following the two shootings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile you had the five Dallas police officers that lost their lives. So we had Black Lives Matter on the front of our shirts, but we also had #ForTheDallasFive out of respect for those officers, and there was a lot of debating and going back and forth. We really let every team decide what exactly it was that they wanted to stand for, because obviously the players in Dallas wanted to honor the Dallas Five but they still wanted to keep the focus on Black Lives Matter. It was . . . not a lot of sleeping, but a lot of conference calls talking to players from around the league and mobilizing in different markets.
Etan: WNBA president Lisa Borders fined the New York Liberty, Phoenix Mercury, and Indiana Fever five thousand dollars each and their players five hundred each, which was a very different way than the NBA handled a similar situation. But the fine didn’t deter you; it actually seemed like it motivated you to take the entire protest to another level.
Cash: Yeah, we had a new WNBA president and she was trying to figure out how she would discipline or enforce the rules, and at the end of the day . . . We knew going in, especially after exploring everything with our legal team, that they could legally fine us because of this direct violation of the rules, but because the WNBA didn’t fine Minnesota at the beginning, everyone was even more inclined to do it . . . And once you saw other teams joining the movement and it was spreading like wildfire across all the teams and the players, the league came down with a decision. We didn’t back away from it. We knew the decision was going to happen because we were advised that it would happen . . . Collectively, we all said we were not going to back down just because of their fine that we all knew was an attempt to squash our movement . . . So we continued. And the next phase of that was the media blackout where in the postgame interviews, we would make a statement, then we would only answer questions about what was happening in our society and about Black Lives Matter. That was explained to the media and they understood our position, and that was that.
Etan: So what led them to rescind the fines?
Cash: You’ll have to try to get a statement from the WNBA and ask them. After they saw that we weren’t going to back down . . . we received a call from our union informing us that they were in fact going to rescind the fine and that they really liked that we were having a dialogue and that they wanted to discuss with us where we go from here and offered their support. That leadership came straight from Lisa Borders, so I really give her credit . . . You don’t see people in that position admit that they were wrong and listen the way she did. So at that point . . . those conversations started happing right after the fines were rescinded.
Etan: I asked D Wade this same question, because after Miami Heat players wore I Can’t Breathe shirts they faced some of the same criticism. He said that it wasn’t about police, it was about bad police. Talk about that aspect of what Black Lives Matter actually means.
Cash: I definitely agree with Dwyane and we got the exact same pushback. Some of it was because some people were in fact uneducated and . . . believe everything they hear or are shown on television. And when you have people who go on television and use consistent negative descriptions of Black Lives Matter, and you make it seem like it’s something that it’s not, people will be more fearful of it and believe what they have been shown and told . . . Even in school they tell you if you don’t know the answers, go do the research, and people don’t do that today. Everybody has this microwave-popcorn society that says, “I don’t want to look it up, just give me the answer right now.” And of course we had so many females who had family that were police officers and we had people who served in the Marine Corps and the army and they understood perfectly that we weren’t saying that it’s all police or we weren’t antipolice, but that we needed to pay attention to what was happening . . . We had to make sure that all of our women understood where their positions were, how they felt, and to only speak to what you felt. We continually stressed that just because you say that Black Lives Matter doesn’t mean that all lives don’t matter, but Black lives have to matter in order for all lives to matter.
Etan: Yeah, one of the main criticisms I’ve seen is: “Shouldn’t all lives in fact matter, and not just the Black ones?”
Cash: I know for me personally, I always answer that in pointing out that, statistically, young Black men and women are being killed at an alarming rate by police officers—more than any other race—and looking at the justice system, receiving longer and harsher sentences for the same crimes as other races. We are getting profiled, we have family members who are constantly suffering. I could keep going and going. People think that just because I have a specific job or live in an affluent area that it somehow separates us from the struggle, but the reality is that if we are not training these officers, if we’re not making sure that everyone has a fair opportunity, we’re just basically being a part of the problem instead of trying to be part of the solution.
Etan: Why is that such a difficult concept for some people to grasp?
Cash: I think there are some people who want to live in their bubble, and when they are exposed to reality they push back because to them it is so unfathomable and they just don’t want to accept it as reality. Or they may care about it and hope that someday it changes, but it doesn’t affect their day-to-day, and when you’re living in a country now where people are talking about my job, my health care, they want to focus on other issues that are directly pertinent to them. “If I am not Black or brown, I don’t have to walk around every day with this type of struggle. My experiences aren’t the same, so basically it’s not my problem.” So it’s different for people of color because . . . this is our reality. They can change the channel when they get tired of hearing about all the racial issues or the issues with the police, but we can’t change any channel because we are living it every single day.
Etan: Talk about the power of solidarity.
Cash: First, you have to always keep in mind that whenever someone wants to accomplish something, the first order of business is to conquer and divide. You know what the enemy’s mind-set is and what they are going to try to do, so you have to know how to combat that. There is always strength in numbers, and there are going to be some people in your group who do not have as much strength as you . . . Right after the inauguration of Donald Trump, the very next day we had a women’s march, not just in different cities but across the world. I was talking to players from other countries overseas and they were just so proud to see men and women and children who came out to support . . .
The march got a response from the president of the United States because he saw us and he saw us together, unified, in full support of each other. So many times, the first step is to make them see you, then after they see you you can verbalize what you want to be done, but you have to get their attention first and there is strength in numbers. I was proud of the WNBA players because for a lot of people, they finally saw us. A lot of people didn’t want to acknowledge our game, our sport, or acknowledge us, because they didn’t see us . . . And let me make this point: we had people in our locker room who were Republicans, Democrats, all different races and nationalities and beliefs, we have a lot of players from overseas, so it’s not like we were all the same demographic or shared the same belief system. It simply came down to what’s right and what’s wrong.
Etan: How do you get white players to speak out?
Cash: It goes back to the locker room and a sisterhood . . . We understand the purpose of fighting for women’s rights, whether it’s fighting for equal pay or women’s health; we have been taught from a very young age to stand together and support each other. The reason why there were so many not only white players but international players who stood with us was because, one, they saw the suffering from their teammates—not heard about it or read about it—but visibly saw it firsthand, whether it’s seeing their teammates crying or seeing them angry or hurt and expressing themselves and explaining their frustration. And we had those dialogues with each other before we publicly made our statement . . . If we’re going to really form a sisterhood, we can’t tiptoe around issues that are deeply and emotionally affecting us to our core . . . We didn’t force anyone to join us at all; we made it known that this was what a majority of us would like to do, but it’s your choice. Either way, we are not going to judge you, but they all understood and all wanted to support, and we had players that really stood up. So I was really impressed by how together our women were and how we were willing to sacrifice for each other without hesitation.
Interview with Tamika Catchings
I can’t say enough about how impressed I was with what the WNBA players were able to accomplish together. Before the July 2016 game against the Dallas Wings, the team captains for the Minnesota Lynx spoke to the media. One of them, Maya Moore, said, “If we take this time to see that this is a human issue and speak out together, we can greatly decrease fear and create change. Tonight, we will be wearing shirts to honor and mourn the losses of precious American citizens and to plead for a change in all of us.”
Cheryl Reeve, the coach of the Minnesota Lynx (who happens to be white), tweeted, “To rebut BLM with ‘All Lives Matter’ implies that all lives are equally at risk, and they’re not. #BlackLivesMatter doesn’t mean your life isn’t important if you aren’t black—it means that Black lives, which are seen without value within White supremacy, are important.”
The New York Liberty had the entire team wearing T-shirts with the words #BlackLivesMatter and #Dallas5 on the front and a blank hashtag on the back. I interpreted the blank hashtag to symbolize the next unarmed Black man or woman to have their life snatched away by the police, the next one we unfortunately know is coming, though we don’t know the victim’s name. After the game, five players walked in formation into the media room to address the crowd of reporters waiting to hear an explanation. Swin Cash stated, “My husband is 6'6", 220 [pounds]. If my husband gets pulled over, when you look at him, does he make you scared? Is something going to happen to him? Those are things that go on in my head.”
When the WNBA initially threatened to fine the players, Los Angeles Sparks standout Nneka Ogwumike was immediately vocal: “Everyone has their own opinion. But for me, at the end of the day, it’s about the ethical nature of everything. The reason why we wanted to do this or why we wanted to come out and express ourselves, as a lot of other athletes do, is because of what’s going on in our world. And a majority of our league is African American.”
Reverend Al Sharpton said that his National Action Network would pay the fines, which he called “unacceptable.” But as Swin Cash discusses above, that ultimately proved to be unnecessary. League president Lisa Borders announced in a statement, “While we expect players to comply with league rules and uniform guidelines, we also understand their desire to use their platform to address important societal issues.”
Fever all-star Tamika Catchings, who was the president of the players union at that time, called the league’s decision to rescind the fines a “huge win overall.” I got a chance to meet with her to discuss what followed those initial protests.
Etan: During the playing of the national anthem on September 21, 2016, the entire Indiana Fever team knelt and locked arms against the Phoenix Mercury. Talk to me about what pushed you all to do this?
Tamika Catchings: It really started earlier in the season. Our team was watching everything that was going on and we all agreed that Black Lives Matter was really at the forefront after all of the police killings that were happening specifically to Black people. It really hurt our hearts seeing everything, we were really bothered as an entire team. And as a team we decided to use our platform to speak about it . . . So, we get to the playoffs, and talking to some of the members of the Phoenix team, and we told them that as a team, we were thinking about making this statement of kneeling during the national anthem.
And I posed it to our team that it’s either all or nothing and that if anybody felt uncomfortable, we don’t do it, and you know how it is with teams—you may get a response within twenty-four or forty-eight hours, and some may have different opinions or fears, but literally within ten, fifteen minutes max, everybody had said that this was definitely something that they wanted us to do together, and that includes our two Caucasian teammates.
Etan: What were the conversations like with those two white players?
Catchings: I think for them, being in the locker room, and hearing stories, and hearing us talking about how deeply we were affected by seeing people getting shot for no reason by the police, and beaten and brutalized by the police—it drew them into a deeper understanding. One of them just recently married an African American man, so for her it was like knowing what her husband has to go through, and gaining a better understanding of what everyday life is for him. And the other one, literally the conversation in the locker room opened her eyes to something she has never firsthand been exposed to. When you are drawn into a conversation and you don’t really have much say because you can’t speak from experience, but you also . . . know the difference between right and wrong, and you can visibly see your teammates hurting and literally in tears, you can’t help but be drawn into what they are hurting about.
Etan: What did it mean to have the support of your coach?
Catchings: It was awesome . . . When we walked to the huddle before the game, Coach knelt down and said, “I’m really proud of you guys. Not just that you guys are standing up for something you believe in, but that you are doing it together.” And even now when I think about it, I get some chills. You know, I think back to my dad, and I remember as a little girl sitting on my dad’s lap, and he has this big scar on his leg, and I remember asking him, “What happened?” He proceeded to talk about being a part of Martin Luther King’s marches, and he was a young kid with his dad taking him to the march, and . . . in all the chaos, they were running away and something happened and the police were arresting people, and my dad fell, and he has like a gash on the side of his leg where something was sticking out from a car and it punctured his leg . . . Now fast-forward forty years, and it’s your daughter fighting for the same things that he was fighting for with his dad, so it’s kind of putting things into perspective.
Etan: What was his conversation like with you after? I’m sure he had to be beaming with pride.
Catchings: Definitely . . . I remember him telling me how people were upset with them for protesting for their rights, and after we made our stance, I remember getting a call from the GM, and she was like, “The fans were terribly disappointed and we have had a couple of sponsors drop out because they don’t want to support us.” Then someone tweeted out my address, and was saying that they were going to form a massive protest in front of my house.
So, for a while, I had cops sitting in front of my house, posted twenty-four hours a day, and it just made me realize that there had to be some type of change in our world. For people to be so upset at us kneeling during the national anthem, and to be accused of being anti-American . . . Now, I’ve been an Olympian. I’ve represented my country, and me kneeling has nothing to do with the flag. I respect our military forces, our firefighters, our policemen, all the people who have fought for our country. But there are still some issues that need to be dealt with. We did a silent, peaceful protest. Which is what our military fought for us to have the right to be able to do . . . I’m not going to be deterred by them . . .
So, for example, one of the many things we have done since is we held a conversation here in Indianapolis—we had sixty-four youths that represented thirty different schools, we had twenty police officers, we had forty community leaders, and we discussed some of the issues that are happening in society. But more importantly, we discussed how we in our small group can bring about change here in Indianapolis. And we came up with solutions and plans in association with the police and the community activists and the youth. That’s where my mission goes. I’m not kneeling just to kneel. I’m kneeling to start change, but realizing that the change has to also start with me too.
Etan: How important was it for the world to see all of the white players kneeling together in support of the Black players? For me, it was very important—like your coach said, it was bigger than basketball.
Catchings: You just hit it on the head. It showed the united part: “While I may not have to go through exactly what you are going through, I understand the need to proclaim to the world as a white person that yes, Black lives do matter, and I want to be a part of this change and do my part as a white person . . . I am going to join my Black sisters and do my part to create change. When we are talking about the Black Lives Matter shirts and blackout media protests earlier in the season as a league, one of the things that kept coming up was: “Be the change, change needs to happen, change starts with us.” And it was awesome because when we were having this conversation . . . it was literally all of the players putting their voices in . . . So you saw all the teams who had many non-Black players, international players, and we did it together as a league. And when you have strong women who are all willing to stand for a cause that they believe in . . . we can’t be pushed over and we want to be a part of that change.
I look at myself, and as a young girl, I was trying to find my own identity. And trying to figure out where they fit in—that’s where our young girls are now . . . It’s important for young girls to be told that this can be you, and the power and self-confidence and self-assuredness that you see us possess, this can also be you. It’s inside of you, but you just have to be able to nurture it in the midst of a society that tells you the opposite and that your life doesn’t matter. Every opportunity where we can . . . shower them with love, and show them positive examples of what a true woman looks like, and how we carry ourselves, and what we represent in this world. We are the majority. There are more women in this world than there are men. And we have to constantly show them how beautiful and special they are.
Etan: Sometimes in the conversations about police brutality and Black Lives Matter and murders by the police, women are left out of the conversation. There also need to be more panels and other public forums directed at young women.
Catchings: We definitely should, and it is unfortunate, and now we go to a whole ’nother thing, because we talk about Black Lives Matter, and we talk about Black people, and being a minority, and always being put to the side, so now you get to a whole ’nother element within the Black community and within the world, where women are still looked at as second-class citizens. I feel like in every single thing, women are pushed to the side . . . You get to the topics of the killings and you hear, “Oh, well, she is probably at the wrong place at the wrong time,” or, “Her attitude wasn’t what it should have been,” which was an actual justification in the murders of both Sandra Bland and Korryn Gaines. Their attitude? That’s like, “She got raped because of the outfit that she was wearing.” So we as a society have to look at the misogyny that goes on in every single aspect, whether we are talking about the workforce, or professional sports, men and women being killed. That is a definite issue that needs to be brought to life.