Speaker 1: I'm a homegirl that knows a little bit about everything
Speaker 1: and everybody.
Speaker 2: You don't know if you don't lie about that, right,
Speaker 2: Lauren came in. Hey, y'all, what's up.
Speaker 1: It's Laura la Rosa and this is another episode of
Speaker 1: the Latest with Laurena Rosa. This is your daily dig
Speaker 1: on all things pop culture, entertainment, news, and all the
Speaker 1: conversations that shake the room.
Speaker 2: Baby.
Speaker 1: So today we're going to get right on into the
Speaker 1: episode because there is a lot to talk about. Let's
Speaker 1: get on into the Latest. So we talked a lot
Speaker 1: on our last episode. If you did not get a
Speaker 1: chance to listen, go back and take a listen to
Speaker 1: the episode prior to this one about the National Association
Speaker 1: of Black Journalists, which is an organization it is the
Speaker 1: largest organization in support of black journalists in the US,
Speaker 1: and a shot that they threw stephen A. Smith's way.
Speaker 1: Let's take a listen to the NABJ giving stephen A.
Speaker 1: Smith the thumbs Down Award.
Speaker 3: A sick listen stephen A Smith, sports analysts and political commentator.
Speaker 3: Smith has established a recurring public pattern of disparaging commentary
Speaker 3: directed at prominent black women across politics, sports, and media.
Speaker 3: Such commentary reinforces harmful narratives, undermines the fair and respectful
Speaker 3: representation of Black women in public discourse, and stands in
Speaker 3: direct conflict with nabj's long standing commitment to accurate, responsible,
Speaker 3: and inclusive portrayals of black communities.
Speaker 2: Now in this.
Speaker 1: Award annually is a mock or a designer that is
Speaker 1: given by the National Association of Black Journalists or NABJ,
Speaker 1: to individuals or institutions whose reporting, commentary, or actions conflict
Speaker 1: with the group's missions and values. Their mission their values
Speaker 1: is all about uplifting black journalists, making it just easy
Speaker 1: for black journalists to be in spaces doing their jobs,
Speaker 1: telling their stories and being factual about it, and people
Speaker 1: being factual about them as they do it. Now, this
Speaker 1: award was first presented in nineteen eighty nine, has been
Speaker 1: given out dozens and dozens of times, but this year
Speaker 1: President of the NABJ, Aaron Haynes, decided to give it
Speaker 1: to Steven A. Smith, who was a member of the
Speaker 1: National Association of Black Journalists and has done a ton
Speaker 1: of work with them, and he did not.
Speaker 2: Take it lightly.
Speaker 1: So he has finally responded, let's take a listen to
Speaker 1: Stephen a smith on him just even finding out about
Speaker 1: this and trying to figure out why he was awarded this.
Speaker 4: What the hell does this thumbs down award have to
Speaker 4: do with journalism disparaging black women? How I've heard people
Speaker 4: bringing up Jasmine Crockett. Did I sit up there asking
Speaker 4: why would you curse out the president of the United
Speaker 4: States with the cameras rolling?
Speaker 2: How is that going to help you?
Speaker 4: Yes?
Speaker 2: I did. Why did I do that?
Speaker 4: Not only because she's in Texas and I know they
Speaker 4: were a little bit different in Texas, a bit more conservative,
Speaker 4: and I didn't think that would work with her constituency
Speaker 4: down there.
Speaker 3: How is that disparaging?
Speaker 5: Oh?
Speaker 4: Steven A goes after Michelle Obama. She's the one that
Speaker 4: compared first Take to a reality show, And I use
Speaker 4: that as an opportunity to say, this marvelous, wonderful woman,
Speaker 4: who's the greatest first lady in American history, who I
Speaker 4: have raised and praised and praised time and time and again.
Speaker 4: All I did was say, I don't like the fact
Speaker 4: that you said a vote for him, as in Donald Trump,
Speaker 4: would be a vote against us as women.
Speaker 2: All I said was, there's.
Speaker 4: A whole bunch of pro lifers out there. There's a
Speaker 4: whole bunch of people that care about the economy, on
Speaker 4: immigration or safety in the streets. They might not even
Speaker 4: be thinking about this issue. Now.
Speaker 1: I told you guys in my last episode that I personally,
Speaker 1: personally know of a lot of work that Steven A.
Speaker 1: Smith does in the black journalist space, the HBCU space.
Speaker 1: He mentions a bitterness on his show in his response
Speaker 1: as well too.
Speaker 2: Let's say listen in.
Speaker 4: Nineteen ninety four, I began my career at the Philadelphia
Speaker 4: Enquirer courtesy of Sondra Long, a longtime executive for the
Speaker 4: Philadelphia Enquirer, synonymous with the NABJ, whom I first met
Speaker 4: at the job speare of the NABJ. My career started
Speaker 4: because I was at the nab JAY job there and
Speaker 4: yet Saturday night, I saw the president of the organization,
Speaker 4: Aaron Haynes, go up on stage and give me a
Speaker 4: thumbs down award for disparaging.
Speaker 1: Black But again, just because the person is doing and donating,
Speaker 1: I don't think that is a reason for them to
Speaker 1: go without criticism and critique. I don't always agree with
Speaker 1: how Steve Nasmith does his job, but I do think
Speaker 1: that the points that he puts on the board, not
Speaker 1: just for his own career in himself, but what he
Speaker 1: does for other people should mean something, you know, I think,
Speaker 1: And I also think him apologizing when he gets it
Speaker 1: wrong should mean something as well.
Speaker 2: And he made a good point.
Speaker 1: They talk about, you know, the remarks that he had,
Speaker 1: you know, towards Serena Williams, which were out of pocket,
Speaker 1: and he did apologize for Let's take listen to those remarks.
Speaker 4: If I'm married and my wife is going to join
Speaker 4: troll and her ex, go back to his ass because
Speaker 4: you don't belong.
Speaker 2: With me, what'd you worried about?
Speaker 4: Infl stop it.
Speaker 2: You if you win Serena.
Speaker 1: If you win Serena Williams, you're gonna be a kept
Speaker 1: a man anyway.
Speaker 2: Don't start any apology.
Speaker 4: Not didn't utter a disrespectful word towards Serena Williams. So
Speaker 4: I don't know where the whole Serena protection protocol kicks in.
Speaker 4: I didn't say anything about her. I said, hey, listen,
Speaker 4: if I'm a man and I'm married, I certainly don't
Speaker 4: want my wife showing any kind of energy, positive, negative
Speaker 4: or otherwise to another dude. That happens to be her
Speaker 4: ex That'll make me think, what's she thinking about him?
Speaker 4: Why is she thinking about him so much? Why does
Speaker 4: she feel the need to exert any energy emotional or
Speaker 4: otherwise when it comes to that. That's where I was
Speaker 4: coming from. But it was more of a gender issue
Speaker 4: more so than anything else, in terms of men and
Speaker 4: how a lot of men feel. I'm not going to
Speaker 4: say most. I'm not going to say all because I
Speaker 4: don't know. I'm gonna tell you how I feel. What
Speaker 4: I expressed is exactly what I meant. I'm not apologizing
Speaker 4: for it. I'm not condoning it either.
Speaker 1: Did They also talk about Jasmine Crockett. We talked about
Speaker 1: that on our last episode, and the fact that he
Speaker 1: had talked about her in.
Speaker 2: A way to me that was just very Uh.
Speaker 1: It was respectability politics, like black people should talk like
Speaker 1: this and sound like this and do these certain things
Speaker 1: because if not, it'll never work for us in our
Speaker 1: perspective areas, which I don't believe. But they also had
Speaker 1: critiques of him, and you know different things that he
Speaker 1: said about Kamala Harris. Now he reveals something that we
Speaker 1: didn't know on this episode. He talks about how his
Speaker 1: critiques of Kamala Harris and being able to do so
Speaker 1: because she's a person in the political seat led to
Speaker 1: a very real in person conversation A sick listen Kamala Harris.
Speaker 4: But everybody wants to bring up the fact that I
Speaker 4: sat up there and I pointed out how she didn't
Speaker 4: even make it to Iowa in twenty twenty, which is fact,
Speaker 4: and that Democratic primary was bypassed in order to facilitate
Speaker 4: her being a Democratic nominee for the presidency of the
Speaker 4: United States of America. And then you have it in
Speaker 4: the palm of your hands and his support of millions
Speaker 4: upon millions of people, and you go on to view
Speaker 4: and Sonny Houston asked you a softball question with Sonny
Speaker 4: Houston acknowledge for the view, and you passed by saying
Speaker 4: I can't think of anything I would do differently when
Speaker 4: it was clearly a border crisis. Last time I checked NABJ,
Speaker 4: that ain't journalism, that ain't talking fast.
Speaker 1: I did reach out to NABJA president Aaron Haynes, who
Speaker 1: says that she will be coming on the show to
Speaker 1: have the conversation about her decision.
Speaker 2: Stephen A.
Speaker 1: Smith did reveal that he's never met Aaron Haynes, they
Speaker 1: don't personally have a relationship, even though he is very
Speaker 1: close with a lot of the board members.
Speaker 2: He also says that there were some board members.
Speaker 1: And people who were actively there that were disgusted by
Speaker 1: the fact that he was given this award, and he
Speaker 1: talks to just a bit about why he is he
Speaker 1: believes these attacks are coming his way.
Speaker 2: He says, it's politic.
Speaker 4: This ain't about disparaging women. This is about people who've
Speaker 4: politicized everything, looking for an excuse to come at me
Speaker 4: because you don't like what I have to say. I'm
Speaker 4: gonna put it out there. This is about a bunch
Speaker 4: of liberals, a bunch of Democrats coming for me, which
Speaker 4: is why I should be flattered, because you hear the footsteps,
Speaker 4: don't you. You know, at any given moment, I can
Speaker 4: decide to come at it. I can decide to run
Speaker 4: because with the stuff that I'm seeing, it wouldn't be
Speaker 4: hard to win. I do have some conservative use, and
Speaker 4: I understand as trifling as this president can be with
Speaker 4: his behavior and some of the policies he's tried to implement,
Speaker 4: I get the fear it's real. I understand it. I'm
Speaker 4: a black man, but that does not give a journalist
Speaker 4: organization the right to attack me that way.
Speaker 1: And again, I mean, look again, I think that you
Speaker 1: should be able to criticize people on the side of
Speaker 1: your table and across the table. But I do think
Speaker 1: that there is a regard that should be always thought
Speaker 1: about when speaking of blacklack women, especially because you and
Speaker 1: as a black woman, I just know how for us,
Speaker 1: it's like we already out here fighting the world, and
Speaker 1: black men I hear y'all when y'all say this, we
Speaker 1: fight the world every day when we walk outside of
Speaker 1: our house, when we come home, we want peace. Black
Speaker 1: women feel the same way. And home just isn't literally
Speaker 1: your actual home. It's when you come into your community,
Speaker 1: when you are indulging with your people, and it's not
Speaker 1: always just peace.
Speaker 2: Sometimes it's just reverence. Like I just know that you want.
Speaker 1: I just want to know that even if we disagree,
Speaker 1: you regard me in such a way that there's a
Speaker 1: boundary to where we go in conversation and our disagreement.
Speaker 2: And I look all skin folk.
Speaker 1: And kim folk at the same time, so I understand
Speaker 1: that sentiment as well. But I think with Stephen A. Smith,
Speaker 1: it's we should correct, not cancel. Has always been my
Speaker 1: sentiment when having a conversation about a Stephen A.
Speaker 2: Smith, And you.
Speaker 1: Know, I don't feel like that about everybody, but in
Speaker 1: his situation, again, I didn't like a lot of the
Speaker 1: comments he made, especially about Jasmincrack and I've said that
Speaker 1: other places. But at the same time, I think we
Speaker 1: can't get around what the path that he has forged. Now,
Speaker 1: I will say, I think you know him having these
Speaker 1: conversations about wanting to run for president. I felt like
Speaker 1: when he responded to Donald Trump, you know, calling his
Speaker 1: IQ low, his response was very soft and he had
Speaker 1: way more energy for a Jasmine Crockett or a Kamalo
Speaker 1: or Michelle Obama. When Michelle Obama talked about his show
Speaker 1: and called, you know the show he's on a reality TV.
Speaker 2: Show, the energy was just different.
Speaker 1: That's what I also think has gotten him to this
Speaker 1: point where Black people feel like there's a there's Stephen A. Smith,
Speaker 1: the man, the myth, the legend who does all these
Speaker 1: things for black people, black journalists, and then there's a
Speaker 1: caricature of Stephen A. Smith that right now is positioning
Speaker 1: himself for something and he's saying he's being attacked because
Speaker 1: of politics, whereas other people look at it like because
Speaker 1: of politics, that caricature is now coming out, and we
Speaker 1: don't like it, and we want to correct it, and
Speaker 1: we want to get as far away from it as
Speaker 1: we can. This is a conversation that I think is
Speaker 1: really interesting though, because again it's like, does the NABJ
Speaker 1: as an organization is just a good look for them
Speaker 1: to pick aside and not be neutral when coming at
Speaker 1: a journalist like Stephen A.
Speaker 2: Smith.
Speaker 1: Now Aaron Haynes, the president of the NABJ, She sat
Speaker 1: down with Roland Martin and she talked a bit about
Speaker 1: the decision and some of the things leading up to this.
Speaker 2: Let's take a.
Speaker 5: Listener look at what we named this year. I think
Speaker 5: we have to agree that there's a clear through line.
Speaker 5: We're looking at the forces that make it harder for
Speaker 5: black journalists to do their jobs and harder for black
Speaker 5: communities to be covered fairly and fully. Like that includes
Speaker 5: government officials that are exerting their pressure on the press,
Speaker 5: news organizations that are making decisions that we can diversity
Speaker 5: and coverage, media owners who are facing questions about the
Speaker 5: treatment of black journalists who we know are under attack
Speaker 5: by internal and external forces across this country, and also
Speaker 5: influencer commentators whose rhetoric can be inform harmful narratives about
Speaker 5: Black people, particularly black women.
Speaker 2: Now you know me.
Speaker 5: We've been on this board together for a year now,
Speaker 5: and I've been very clear that advocacy is central to
Speaker 5: my presidency, particularly advocacy around black women and our professions.
Speaker 1: Let me know what you guys think, like, I really
Speaker 1: want to know, get in the streets, get in the tweets.
Speaker 1: I was gonna say, do we even pick a side?
Speaker 1: But I don't think that it is that we pick
Speaker 1: a side. I think more so what conversations should be
Speaker 1: coming out of this How do we police or how
Speaker 1: do we set boundaries for the people that we know
Speaker 1: are important to us?
Speaker 2: And should we even have to do that. I'm Lorna Rosa.
Speaker 1: This is another episode of the Latest with Marna La Rosa,
Speaker 1: your DELI dig on all things pop culture, entertainment, news,
Speaker 1: and all of the conversations that shake the room. I
Speaker 1: tell you, guys, every episode, y'all could be anywhere within
Speaker 1: your body, but y'all choose to be right here with me,
Speaker 1: my little riders.
Speaker 2: I appreciate y'all, and I'll cut you in my next one.