Speaker 1: You are listening and waiting on reparations a production of
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio, Yo Yo Yo. What's good people, I'm
Speaker 1: dope knife, I'm with Franca and you are listening to
Speaker 1: waiting on reparations? Are you doing? Oh, I'm good, I'm good. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I have a working, hard working smart trying to at
Speaker 1: least take a little dance breaks posting them on TikTok. Oh,
Speaker 1: where'd you've been. You've been doing the TikTok TikTok a
Speaker 1: little bit. It's been kind of fun. I don't know.
Speaker 1: It's just like it's been fun to do silly little
Speaker 1: like oh no, like a little mini plays in my
Speaker 1: kitchen when the baby sleep, taking a little breaks from
Speaker 1: work with just you know, I forgot I have dance moves.
Speaker 1: I am a good dancer. I am and so I've
Speaker 1: been doing a little dudle dance sixtoks. But like I was, ship,
Speaker 1: I gotta like that. I still I have a TikTok account.
Speaker 1: I've been like I've been flirting with the idea of
Speaker 1: like just posting up versus like like everything that a
Speaker 1: little bit too fun. It's just like I don't know why.
Speaker 1: It's like I think I just need to go ahead
Speaker 1: and do it. I think I've been getting too carried
Speaker 1: away about one of those round white light things and
Speaker 1: it's like it's a pain in the ask to set up.
Speaker 1: I'm like, man, no, no, I should be blurry as
Speaker 1: hill like it's not it's really not that so all
Speaker 1: like that. So well. I well, speaking of breaks, I
Speaker 1: took a little break this past weekend. I went on
Speaker 1: a little vac down to Florida just you know, hung
Speaker 1: out some people's and watched the Super Bowl. Did you
Speaker 1: get to see the Super Bowl? I literally so. One
Speaker 1: of my fellow commissioners shoutouts to Russell Edwards texted me
Speaker 1: in the just like out of the blue, he said, Fitty,
Speaker 1: and I was like, what is he talking about? Um?
Speaker 1: I assumed it was football related because I had had
Speaker 1: to get off Twitter that night because all everybody's time
Speaker 1: was football. It was like I don't I don't sport.
Speaker 1: I don't do it. But then he was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: you've missed the halftime show. It's like Kendrick and Dr Dre.
Speaker 1: And I was like, well, it was the first ever
Speaker 1: all hip hop headline super Bowl halftime show, so I
Speaker 1: saw it was pretty cool, you know, I mean it
Speaker 1: was like a bunch of legacies. It was all legacy acts.
Speaker 1: You know. You had Snoop, Dr Dre, Eminem, Mary J. Blige,
Speaker 1: like you said, the cameo by fifty and then we
Speaker 1: had Anderson Pack in the bags playing the drums. I
Speaker 1: was pretty cute. Was his little thing caught me. It
Speaker 1: was like, you know when he was doing um I
Speaker 1: and he was like and we hey, yeah, I want
Speaker 1: to kill us dad in the Street Bump show. I
Speaker 1: was like, what did you hear about the Okay? So
Speaker 1: there was some dust up before, right at least for
Speaker 1: as much, you know, as reliably as you could go
Speaker 1: on like Twitter stories and Twitter drama and stuff. But
Speaker 1: so the word was a couple of hours before the
Speaker 1: Super Bowl that and Eminem had planned to kneel and
Speaker 1: that the NFL had told him, you know, explicitly, you know,
Speaker 1: you can't do that. And then Dr Dre wanted to
Speaker 1: split the line, still not loving police and still Dre
Speaker 1: and the NFL told him that you couldn't do that,
Speaker 1: and both things happened. So that was so Kendrick was
Speaker 1: the one that kind of like bowed to that. I
Speaker 1: don't want to say he bowed but you know, I
Speaker 1: mean em and EV and DR to be honest with you,
Speaker 1: like that was like while because I had been I was,
Speaker 1: you know, reading ship on Twitter while the game was
Speaker 1: going on, so I was like letting everybody I was
Speaker 1: in the room with know about that whole thing. So
Speaker 1: when we were actually watching the halftime performance and Eminem Neil,
Speaker 1: that was like the biggest pop or reaction that anybody
Speaker 1: that the whole game got. You know, we were like
Speaker 1: the NFL later on declared that they knew that Eminem
Speaker 1: was gonna do it and stuff like that. I don't
Speaker 1: know about that. I'm just gonna imagine the Eminem just
Speaker 1: said fuck y'all or said I don't give a fucking yeah,
Speaker 1: that's cool. And you know, two things come to mind.
Speaker 1: For one, you know that at first it's like, well
Speaker 1: they had like cops feel in districts with people like
Speaker 1: two summers ago whatever, like to kneel these days has
Speaker 1: become such a watered down act. But when you also
Speaker 1: consider the context of within the NFL as well as
Speaker 1: like what Colin Kaepernick has gone on to do with
Speaker 1: like creating you know, Kaepernick Publishing, and now they're putting
Speaker 1: out all this like radical, you know, like black feminist
Speaker 1: and like abolitionist like writings and essays and stuff. It's like,
Speaker 1: you know, if you're drawing attention back to him in
Speaker 1: the context in which he was sort of radicalized and
Speaker 1: like marginalized politically at first, which then caused him to
Speaker 1: game this larger political platform. It's a pretty dope thing.
Speaker 1: I appreciate he did that. I appreciate eminem give a
Speaker 1: shine to the you know, like yeah, and I mean
Speaker 1: in this day and age, when you've got like massive
Speaker 1: media figures like given motherfucker's the green light to say
Speaker 1: the N word and ship, I'll take a superficial kneeling gesture.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm not mad at that. Let's not yeah
Speaker 1: at all. But speaking of the NFL, guess that's a
Speaker 1: good idea. It wasn't even planned in that look at
Speaker 1: that freestyle in the show, But that's a good transition
Speaker 1: because today what we're going to talk about is these
Speaker 1: uh class action lawsuit that's been taken against the NFL
Speaker 1: by the former Miami Dolphins head coach Brian Flores. So
Speaker 1: just to give you a little recap of it, So
Speaker 1: Black History Month kicked off this year with a lawsuit
Speaker 1: from Brian Flores. He was suing the NFL and three
Speaker 1: of his teams for alleged patterns of racist hiring practices
Speaker 1: by the league and racial discrimination. In this class action lawsuit,
Speaker 1: the teams involved where the Miami Dolphins, the Denver Broncos,
Speaker 1: and the New York Giants. Now there's just one active
Speaker 1: African American coach in the NFL going into next season,
Speaker 1: and that's Mike Tomlin of the Pittsburgh Steelers. UM. Six
Speaker 1: of the nine vacancies leading into this hiring cycle where
Speaker 1: all they all went to white men, and the two
Speaker 1: of the final three openings went to a first cast
Speaker 1: of candidates. So the Texans hired Levy Smith, who's a
Speaker 1: veteran coach any black man, and the Dolphins hired Mike McDaniel,
Speaker 1: who is multiracial. UM. But both of those hirings came
Speaker 1: after Flores issued his lawsuit. So we are I mean,
Speaker 1: just your before because you know I'm gonna get your thoughts.
Speaker 1: Oh no, let's hit the jump, because I got all right,
Speaker 1: we're gonna be We're gonna be back with that and
Speaker 1: more after the jump. But we're gonna try to for two.
Speaker 1: I'm not necessarily a sports ball sports person, but I
Speaker 1: do like basketball. Football is not really my thing. So
Speaker 1: for two football novices are going to try to see
Speaker 1: if we can dig into this topic or after the jump,
Speaker 1: all right, we are back. So if you're just joining us,
Speaker 1: re rhyin the goddamn podcast and find out what we're
Speaker 1: talking about. Mariah, So what are your initial thoughts on
Speaker 1: the situation before we get into some of these facts.
Speaker 1: So the the facts arising about this lawsuit and the
Speaker 1: change that it has already spurred brings me back to
Speaker 1: in my work kind of like um, contemplating the value
Speaker 1: of lawsuits generally, because there's a lot of things that
Speaker 1: the city attorneys like plead with us not to do.
Speaker 1: That sometimes we will do anyway, because even if we
Speaker 1: get suited, it raises an important issue. And even through
Speaker 1: threats of legal action, you can force people. On the
Speaker 1: other hand, you can through that's a legal action, you
Speaker 1: can get people to do all kinds of things. So,
Speaker 1: um thing about Yeah, like in the terrain of organizing
Speaker 1: all the tools we have at our disposal, getting folks elected,
Speaker 1: marching the streets, colony of the congressman, filing lawsuits. I
Speaker 1: think this this Um, this juncture here kind of underscores
Speaker 1: the importance of also like using the law against the system,
Speaker 1: where it's like, yeah, I mean, I don't know if
Speaker 1: he's gonna win this lawsuit, but already they hired like
Speaker 1: two black, you know, diverse um football coaches and so
Speaker 1: like there you go. Well, I mean even some of
Speaker 1: that might be a little I mean, we'll we'll get
Speaker 1: into you know, some of the history of of the
Speaker 1: NFL's coach hiring in a little bit. But even some
Speaker 1: of that might not even be adequate with not certainly
Speaker 1: not yes, yeah, not at all to say that whatsoever.
Speaker 1: But it's interesting what you can get them to do,
Speaker 1: like to start nudging them in the right direction. And
Speaker 1: like so like, um, for someone who like I mean
Speaker 1: you're out of all the people who I know in
Speaker 1: my life, you're like probably like one of the few
Speaker 1: people who I know personally that it's like, oh, this
Speaker 1: like Marie on some revolutionary ships, you know what I'm saying, Like,
Speaker 1: like she's actually out there like like doing the work
Speaker 1: and stuff. So for someone like you, who I consider
Speaker 1: her to be or or like more on the revolutionary tip,
Speaker 1: is there any sort of is there any sort of
Speaker 1: like paradox created by like using the system to fight
Speaker 1: the system. I mean, I think we have to. I mean,
Speaker 1: there's arguments on either side. He looked. There's a lot
Speaker 1: of people out here that are like, we have organized
Speaker 1: totally separate from the state. We gotta do mutual aid,
Speaker 1: we gotta like, you know, build up for the revolution
Speaker 1: whatever whatever. You got people in the middle that see that,
Speaker 1: you know, have a more militant vent or like, oh,
Speaker 1: let's march in the street and get our asked bet
Speaker 1: by the cop and you know, dota at it up.
Speaker 1: And then you got folks that like fully just focus
Speaker 1: on what you can do within the system, etcetera. And
Speaker 1: I've seen in my time a tendency among organizers to
Speaker 1: like be purists about their way of doing things. And
Speaker 1: I get it. You you know, you commit your heart
Speaker 1: to something because you think it's the right thing. But
Speaker 1: like I try and my work try to like not
Speaker 1: prescribe what is the best way to do it. I've seen,
Speaker 1: you know, I've advocated for getting people elected and then
Speaker 1: I've been elected and seen that like it is somewhat
Speaker 1: limiting and um, ETCeteras. I've seen organizations that are like
Speaker 1: trying to like do abolitionist work outside of like the state, Like, oh,
Speaker 1: we don't even wanted to fund the police. We're going
Speaker 1: to create our whole own like systems of safety and accountability.
Speaker 1: And then they won't like they can't get any money
Speaker 1: to do it because it's all it's all like state
Speaker 1: grants or whatever, and so they're hampered because they don't
Speaker 1: have any money. So I'm just all for a directory
Speaker 1: of tactics whatever, you know, just like I'm not gonna
Speaker 1: tell you what you should and shouldn't do. I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna be like, oh, following the lawsuit doesn't really changed it.
Speaker 1: Like you and our kids out here with your you know,
Speaker 1: super kitchen, Like do your change? Do you think like
Speaker 1: it's none of my business what y'all up to, Like
Speaker 1: the same sort of thing that we're just saying about
Speaker 1: Eminem and the kneeling. It's like at this point, like
Speaker 1: any gesture helps, you know, So right, if it's gonna
Speaker 1: like get someone to like google calling Kaepernick again like
Speaker 1: I was saying in the intro, and then they're like, oh,
Speaker 1: he started a publishing company and they stumble upon like
Speaker 1: essays by Derek Parnell or whatever, Like that's kind of cool.
Speaker 1: And I mean anybody anybody who wants to like point
Speaker 1: towards like another like lane of attacks that's different from
Speaker 1: a lawsuit. Then by all means you know what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: like point it out or go do it, you know,
Speaker 1: but like don't hate on anybody else's trategy. And there's
Speaker 1: already there's already precedent in you know, going back to
Speaker 1: once again where um basketball players started striking and like
Speaker 1: refusing to play right, and so there's a labor organizing
Speaker 1: tactic have been having been used in sports. Now we're
Speaker 1: trying out lawsuits like who knows, who knows what's next.
Speaker 1: I'm excited to see, like if people are really serious
Speaker 1: about this and they don't just sort of succumb to meager,
Speaker 1: succome to meager like like oh, you know headpaths as
Speaker 1: as you know, solutions and justice. I don't know, let's
Speaker 1: see you let's see what they try next. I don't know.
Speaker 1: So I'm sorry, I heard you all. Now you're doing okay.
Speaker 1: So per NFL dot Com, only five of the last
Speaker 1: thirty six head coaching openings gone to black men. This
Speaker 1: is an unacceptable quote unquote reality as said by the
Speaker 1: NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, who acknowledged that who acknowledged those
Speaker 1: four days after the league had said of Flores's claims
Speaker 1: were without merit. Now, Goodell was asked about the discrepancy
Speaker 1: between the two comments, and he said, it's a good question,
Speaker 1: which I've asked our office. He's a it's a good
Speaker 1: question which in our office, and we've talked about it.
Speaker 1: I think the initial reaction was regarding the legal claims
Speaker 1: themselves and not really what we would say the experience
Speaker 1: of what coach Flores was going through. And that's what
Speaker 1: and that's what the most colorful, flavorful word salad I've
Speaker 1: ever seen. And that's what and then he Goodal continues,
Speaker 1: and that's what I'm more interested in. I put the
Speaker 1: legal claims in the legal process to the side, and
Speaker 1: that will be handled by lawyers. To me, it's more
Speaker 1: important for us to lawyers. Goodell, who's for me, It's
Speaker 1: more important people you hired to sort of listen to
Speaker 1: Flora's and understand what he and other coaches are going through.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, just wanted to get the brazen contradiction. So
Speaker 1: let's and I mean, yeah, just just Florid, just before
Speaker 1: you let the commissioner have it. Let's just let's just
Speaker 1: go through some of the facts about the NFL right
Speaker 1: now in this particular issue. So the workforce, which by
Speaker 1: this you know what we're going to say, the players
Speaker 1: of the workforce. Obviously there's way more people that go
Speaker 1: into making a team a team, YadA, YadA. But of
Speaker 1: the players, the player workforce sev black. The assistant coaches
Speaker 1: who that is drawn from the players that's black. Then
Speaker 1: currently we have two black head coaches. I only say
Speaker 1: too black because the third guy is listed as multiracial
Speaker 1: and not as black. So we have two black head
Speaker 1: coaches and zero black owners and there are thirty two teams. Mariah.
Speaker 1: So look the fact you brought up an interesting point
Speaker 1: to start with the black player who work force, because um,
Speaker 1: I am curious because this is even this suit is
Speaker 1: even brought about by like the mid tier person, right,
Speaker 1: like a like a t like a what Brian Flores
Speaker 1: was a head coach. He was a head coach this
Speaker 1: past he was a head coach, right, So he's not
Speaker 1: a team owner. He's not like a shareholder or something.
Speaker 1: He's like kind of like a middle management from in
Speaker 1: the grand. In the grand, the coaches are management, but
Speaker 1: they're definitely in this for in terms of this discussion
Speaker 1: their labor, their labor right right. They don't run the internet,
Speaker 1: they don't own the team you have steaks in it
Speaker 1: or anything like that. I think this is very echoes
Speaker 1: in many ways what we see sometimes and like like
Speaker 1: larger labor organizing movements. Okay, take for example, what's going
Speaker 1: on with Starbucks right now, Like you know, the first
Speaker 1: Starbucks unionized in December, like ever since then, like a
Speaker 1: thousand workers at Starbucks across the country have filed for
Speaker 1: having union elections. It's like the what the the wild
Speaker 1: fiery is the spreading is like labor movement in recent history, right,
Speaker 1: But you think about the kinds of peoples that Starbucks
Speaker 1: wants to hire to manage their image is like very
Speaker 1: like forward thinking liberal kind of thing. They're hiring a
Speaker 1: lot of like college grads. They're calling on a lot
Speaker 1: of artists, a lot of people that you know, identify
Speaker 1: with like the Black Lives Matter movement. So these aren't
Speaker 1: the like I mean, this is not I'm not too
Speaker 1: like paying you know, a blanket picture of everything. I'm
Speaker 1: sure there's a lot of diversity in their workforce. But
Speaker 1: you know this, this isn't like the like the hood
Speaker 1: nigga's got out of jail that's going to work at
Speaker 1: the poultry plant. And like you know, the blue who
Speaker 1: who we typically associate with blue collar folks there's tend
Speaker 1: to be more educated, etcetera, etcetera. And so those are
Speaker 1: the folks that like will advocate for getting there's more
Speaker 1: so than the folks at the real about like the
Speaker 1: bottom bottom like that really needs like ship so that
Speaker 1: like I don't know what the role of the players
Speaker 1: is and all this especially and we're not even talking
Speaker 1: about the folks that you know, clean the clean, the clean,
Speaker 1: the clean, cheerleaders, cheerleaders, mopping the locker room floor. I
Speaker 1: think so those people are completely left out of the conversation.
Speaker 1: And someone who's like in the middle, like you know,
Speaker 1: like you know, has a sense of more has slightly
Speaker 1: more privileged than other folks is the one that's coming
Speaker 1: for their well. I think that's what makes conversations like
Speaker 1: this heart. I think that the reason why it's like
Speaker 1: hard for like these sort of like topics too kind
Speaker 1: of blow up as being a large labor issues because ultimately,
Speaker 1: you know, Brian floor has just got paid like three
Speaker 1: million dollars for the season, you know, I mean, ultimately
Speaker 1: we're talking about rich trying to get more are of
Speaker 1: theirs at the at the end of the day. So
Speaker 1: we have to take the conversation with that prism or
Speaker 1: that grain in salt or whatever that you know, it's
Speaker 1: rich people arguing about themselves, even though there is like
Speaker 1: a further you know, racial and economic divide that you
Speaker 1: can dig into it. But I want to be clear
Speaker 1: though that like true, like economic transformation of this country
Speaker 1: is going to require people like Brian Flores to see
Speaker 1: themselves as more like the black player workforce and the
Speaker 1: janitors mopping the locker room, to realize he's more like
Speaker 1: them than the people that really run ship well in
Speaker 1: his in his and I don't even know if this
Speaker 1: is a defense because you weren't attacking him, but something
Speaker 1: that aspect of football that you might not know if
Speaker 1: you don't like watch it or if you don't know
Speaker 1: like the inner workings of it. This is a huge
Speaker 1: sacrifice for him, Like he's most likely ever going to
Speaker 1: coach again, you know what I'm saying, That's what I'm
Speaker 1: talking about, Yes, we're gonna need people like that to
Speaker 1: be willing to sacrifice a little bit in order for
Speaker 1: even them get justice, but also the people below them,
Speaker 1: you know, so like a lot of people everyone thinks
Speaker 1: they're like, what's it like temporarily embarrassed billionaires or whatever,
Speaker 1: especially middle class folks who think they are like you know,
Speaker 1: or like even upper middle class folks who, let's say,
Speaker 1: like Brian Flores, who think they're closer to like Jeff
Speaker 1: Bezos than they are to homelessness. But if this is true,
Speaker 1: if he loses this lawsuit, can't ever coach again, Like
Speaker 1: his life could take a significant turn for the worst,
Speaker 1: and that he's actually closer to the folks at the
Speaker 1: bottom than he is someone like whoever, like the CEO
Speaker 1: of the NFL, I don't even know. That's the thing,
Speaker 1: Like he's he's doing this for future generations, Like he's
Speaker 1: not going to coach in the even if they win,
Speaker 1: even if he wins the lawsuit, he's never going to
Speaker 1: coach again, Like they're they're they're not, I mean, And
Speaker 1: and through this there's been there's been a lot of
Speaker 1: there's a lot of like there's aspect of the story
Speaker 1: that's very very much football Insider football ship that we're
Speaker 1: not a sports show, so it's like it's not really
Speaker 1: you know, I'm not really interested in covering up, but
Speaker 1: like you know, the aspects of like them asking him
Speaker 1: to throw games and to tank his team and things
Speaker 1: like that, that yeah, he's suing on those grounds. But
Speaker 1: if like this lawsuit is successful and it ends up
Speaker 1: being the end result is that there's more black coaches
Speaker 1: and there's more U coaches of color, that's all gonna
Speaker 1: be dope. But on his account, like that's what he's
Speaker 1: doing it for, because he's not going to be one
Speaker 1: of those coaches. The next thing I want to say
Speaker 1: is that having more black coaches is cool, but that's
Speaker 1: still management, that's still reinforcing the idea that like we
Speaker 1: need more black CEOs and like black business owners to
Speaker 1: like get free when like at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: like the people not on the floor are still going
Speaker 1: to be on food stamps or whatever. Like just I
Speaker 1: guess in the culture of American football though, is like
Speaker 1: black people and this is this is my general sense
Speaker 1: again as somebody who football is not my favorite sport,
Speaker 1: but like black people in football are very much considered
Speaker 1: like workhorses and like laborers. They're not really considered thinkers,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. So the aspects, the aspects
Speaker 1: of aspects of football that are like cerebral and require
Speaker 1: thinking and study and watching tape and stuff like that,
Speaker 1: these white billionaire owners don't trust black men in those positions,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm saying, like quarterbacks. You know, there was
Speaker 1: for the longest time there was a stigma about black
Speaker 1: black men camp quarterbacks. Black black still make good quarterbacks.
Speaker 1: That's kind of been shattered now. But even in shattering that,
Speaker 1: like a lot of those a lot of those stigma
Speaker 1: still persis us, you know what I'm saying. And I
Speaker 1: don't think that anything like this is really going to
Speaker 1: change until the ownership changes. But then again, like I said,
Speaker 1: it's like your that argument is an argument for you know,
Speaker 1: we need more black billionaires, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: I mean, if the ownership changes, you put more black
Speaker 1: people in charge, and they are more um understanding of
Speaker 1: the various kinds of like skill and labor and intelligence
Speaker 1: that people are putting into all of these positions. Even
Speaker 1: if you say, oh, like you know, the players aren't smart,
Speaker 1: they're just buff and and like strong or whatever. It's like, well,
Speaker 1: it takes a certain kind of like what you could
Speaker 1: call like bodily intelligence to know how to like do
Speaker 1: a little swivel pirouette around some dude when you're trying
Speaker 1: to tackle you, or like line like you know, line
Speaker 1: the football up and kick it straight through the like that.
Speaker 1: Those that's like very like complicated and underappreciated, like thinking
Speaker 1: that has to be done in order to do that,
Speaker 1: and so like they are very intelligent and someone who
Speaker 1: if you get a black coach in place, you might
Speaker 1: you might find somebody who like sees at and recognize
Speaker 1: it's like, you know, maybe we need more equity, etcetera.
Speaker 1: But it's just but it's not it's not something you
Speaker 1: can just assume. You know, I'm not all skin folks,
Speaker 1: kin folk, etcetera. So it's not something you just like
Speaker 1: as will get better. Is like an insult to injury
Speaker 1: in this whole thing. Whereas like you know what, what
Speaker 1: uh group of people actually do end up having positions
Speaker 1: as head coaches in the NFL, people whose fathers were
Speaker 1: coaches in the NFL. So they've got a bit of
Speaker 1: a nepotism issue going on within their ranks as well.
Speaker 1: That only exacerbates the racial issue. But let's get back
Speaker 1: into some of these facts. So, Fritz Pollard, I don't
Speaker 1: know if I'm pronouncing that right. Fritz Pollard. Yeah, Fritz
Speaker 1: Pollard broke the coaching color barrier back in ninete man.
Speaker 1: The early days was an interesting time for naming your children.
Speaker 1: I mean, my kid's name may stop Fritz Pollard. But
Speaker 1: it took. It took an additional sixty eight years before
Speaker 1: Art Shell became the second black man to lead a team. So,
Speaker 1: I don't know how many of you all out there
Speaker 1: are familiar with something called the Rooney Rule. Are you
Speaker 1: familiar with the Rooney rule at all? In terms of
Speaker 1: football r I have never heard of that game. Okay,
Speaker 1: So the Rooney rule was developed in two thousand three,
Speaker 1: two thousand two. So it is the National Football League
Speaker 1: policy that requires league teams to interview ethnic minority candidate
Speaker 1: for head coaching and senior football operation job. It is
Speaker 1: an example of affirmative action, even though there was no
Speaker 1: hiring quota or hiring preference given minorities. It's only an
Speaker 1: interviewing quota. It was created in two as it was
Speaker 1: created as a reaction to the two thousand two firings
Speaker 1: of head coach Tony Dungee of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Speaker 1: and Dennis Green of the Minnesota Vikings, but with black
Speaker 1: at the time when Dungee had a winning record and
Speaker 1: Green had just had his first losing season in ten years.
Speaker 1: Shortly afterwards, US civil rights attorney Cyrus Marie and Johnny
Speaker 1: Cochrane released a study showing black head coaches, despite winning
Speaker 1: at a higher percentage of games, were less likely to
Speaker 1: be hired and more likely to be fired than their
Speaker 1: white counterparts. Former NFL players Kelly Kellyn, will Wilson, and
Speaker 1: John Wotton. Oh Sorry, Former NFL players Kellen Winslow and
Speaker 1: John Wotton then put together an infinity group of minority scouts, coaches,
Speaker 1: and front office personnelity to advocate for rules creation. Its
Speaker 1: purpose was to ensure that minority coaches, especially African Americans,
Speaker 1: would be considered for high level coaching positions. Now dig this.
Speaker 1: At the time that the Rooney Rule was installed, there
Speaker 1: were four black head coaches in the NFL, and they
Speaker 1: aim that to be a problem that they created the
Speaker 1: Ruoney Rule. In two before this lawsuit, there was one
Speaker 1: head coach, one black head coach. Oh my god. So
Speaker 1: clearly this is operating brilliantly. So we've regressed the rule
Speaker 1: obviously didn't work. Thoughts on that love that for us? Well,
Speaker 1: I mean, first of all, I think it's really cool
Speaker 1: that they did have sort of like a collective organizing
Speaker 1: project of getting together the scouts, these front office personnel
Speaker 1: to make a demand, you know, to like ask them
Speaker 1: to make things better. But I mean, ultimately it does
Speaker 1: seem like it was a superficially measure. I don't mean,
Speaker 1: I don't I don't mean to cut you off, but
Speaker 1: there's some context I need to give you about black
Speaker 1: Brian Flowers his lawsuit all right, Okay, So one of
Speaker 1: the things that he's that he alleges in his lawsuit
Speaker 1: is that the Rooney rule is like a sham and
Speaker 1: it's a charade. Like they do. They do like the whole,
Speaker 1: you know, the whole, the whole, all the tricks, the
Speaker 1: smoking mirrors, and they do these interviews, but at the
Speaker 1: end of the day, they don't have any intention of
Speaker 1: hiring these black closers are the diverse coaches that they're seeing,
Speaker 1: so they're not even coming into the interview process with
Speaker 1: a fair shake. One of the things. One of the
Speaker 1: examples was, so, you know you've heard the famous coach
Speaker 1: Bill Belichick. You've heard that name. Okay, So, Brian Flores
Speaker 1: was an assistant coach, I believe, underneath Bill Belichick. So
Speaker 1: when uh, Brian Flores and another coach who also was
Speaker 1: an assistant under Bill Belichick, they were both vuying for
Speaker 1: the same job, and Bill Belichick hit up Brian Flores
Speaker 1: congratulating him for the job. Yeah, I thought he was
Speaker 1: texting the other dude. I did hear about like four
Speaker 1: or five days before it was announced that other dude
Speaker 1: got the job. Bro, what people trying to say, Oh,
Speaker 1: the coaches are smarter to so much strategy and the
Speaker 1: players are dumb, But like that's dumb, so so in
Speaker 1: other in other words, they knew they were going to
Speaker 1: give the job to the white guy, and they had
Speaker 1: already spread that, that word had already gone through to
Speaker 1: the people who needed to know, and they accidentally and
Speaker 1: and you know, I don't know how much involvement, but
Speaker 1: I'm not trying to pay Bill Bill Belichick is a
Speaker 1: bad guy or anything like that. But Bill Belichick accidentally
Speaker 1: hit up the black guy to be like, hey, congratulations
Speaker 1: on getting the job that he was getting ready to
Speaker 1: go interview for and it was already given to somebody
Speaker 1: else before he even did his interview, like behind the scenes,
Speaker 1: so he was about to go interview and they had
Speaker 1: already picked someone else. I mean, you know, the the
Speaker 1: I don't want to be the one to like, you know,
Speaker 1: be like, oh man, there needs to be more black owners.
Speaker 1: But at the end of the day, in this particular situation,
Speaker 1: with this particular problem, if we're you know, we're we're
Speaker 1: we've got to overlook We've got to overlook the you
Speaker 1: know a lot of other things to focus on this
Speaker 1: aspect of the airs and coaches and ownership and stuff
Speaker 1: like that. Like you said, there's a lot of people
Speaker 1: on the lower rung who aren't even being mentioned in
Speaker 1: this labor dispute. But but yeah, I mean I think
Speaker 1: that like it comes back to the fundamental question of
Speaker 1: like does representation equaliberation, because I think getting black coaches
Speaker 1: in there might give us the opportunity for them to
Speaker 1: like see the value of the lower folks see the
Speaker 1: value and the players see you know, how to be
Speaker 1: culturally responsive and implement some of that into their coaching,
Speaker 1: but they might get some black coaches in there that
Speaker 1: are like, Yo, I've got my bag, fuck y'all, and
Speaker 1: not do anything to help advance the conditions in the league.
Speaker 1: And so I mean, yes, it's better to have black owners,
Speaker 1: I guess, but that does not ensure that we are
Speaker 1: implementing fairer policies for everyone else involved. They could also
Speaker 1: just kind of reproduce the current situation that all of
Speaker 1: them are experiencing. When you're gonna like this next part,
Speaker 1: because leaders of the n double a c P, the
Speaker 1: National Coalition on Black Civic Participation, the National Action Network,
Speaker 1: and the now No African American Clergy Network have requested
Speaker 1: to meet with the league's commissioner, Roger Goodell, and the
Speaker 1: leaders have called on Goodell to replace the existing rule
Speaker 1: and for the league to examine the specific recruiting and
Speaker 1: hiring procedures when it comes to its executive and coaching positions.
Speaker 1: The group also called for meaningful consequences for teams that
Speaker 1: do not abide by the rules. Their statement says, however
Speaker 1: well intentioned, the effect the Rooney rule has been for
Speaker 1: team decision makers to regard interviewer interviews with candidates of
Speaker 1: color or interviews with candidates of color as an extraneous
Speaker 1: step rather than an integral part of the hiring process.
Speaker 1: I see this all the time in city contracts where
Speaker 1: we can't per state law, like tell them we can't
Speaker 1: buy state law. Tell them that, like they have to
Speaker 1: hire a certain number of minorities, are paying in a
Speaker 1: certain kind of wage, so we can ask them nicely
Speaker 1: to put in a good faith effort to do so.
Speaker 1: And so recently this cat called me up talking about how,
Speaker 1: you know, for this big arena project here, um we
Speaker 1: had we had like put in a contract and they
Speaker 1: needed to put in a good faith effort to hire
Speaker 1: minority contractors. And his friend they called him up like yo,
Speaker 1: I went to there like recruiting luncheon or something, and
Speaker 1: there was literally just a whole bunch of white people
Speaker 1: the only black person there, and like, I don't are
Speaker 1: they going to follow up with him? Like you know,
Speaker 1: really they just you know check the box of like,
Speaker 1: oh we tried, and there's no accountability. So I do think,
Speaker 1: you know, beefing up the Rooney rule by like saying
Speaker 1: they have to actually hire a certain amount of people
Speaker 1: like makes a lot more sense than just like asking
Speaker 1: them to put in a good faith effort when really
Speaker 1: it ends up being a superficial effort to recruit people
Speaker 1: for these positions and take you know, take them seriously
Speaker 1: as candidates. And I mean, and then the owners, Like
Speaker 1: I'd like that part about making them, you know, making
Speaker 1: some some penalties if they don't do it or if
Speaker 1: they violate ship. But it's like, what can what penalties
Speaker 1: can you do? I mean, there's only thirty three of
Speaker 1: these positions, these owner positions in the world, you know
Speaker 1: what I'm saying, Like, I mean, and we just got
Speaker 1: to consider like the NFL is like a money making
Speaker 1: cultural phenomenon of entity and ship like that. There's only
Speaker 1: thirty three, thirty two of these owner positions and every
Speaker 1: last person who has the position is a billionaire. So
Speaker 1: it's like, what are you you know, at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, they're gonna put their fucking boys in
Speaker 1: and if there's any rule that they have to break,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying, Like, short of one of
Speaker 1: these guys getting in like some serious like legal trouble
Speaker 1: that you know, you can't take the team away from
Speaker 1: them as their team. So and this is why we
Speaker 1: should take the teams away from them and COLLECTIVI the
Speaker 1: NFL sees the means of production. Let the owners be
Speaker 1: the workers, be the folks out there quarterback in and
Speaker 1: kicking and putting the thing through the thing and stop
Speaker 1: in the locker room. Just collective ownership and management, no more.
Speaker 1: Ray is um utopia would be great. Let's go get that.
Speaker 1: Brian Flors be the leader. We got a Al sharpon quote.
Speaker 1: So UM. The National Action Network, their founder Al Sharpton
Speaker 1: said the organization will be approaching states and municipalities to
Speaker 1: stop public funding and tax incentives to NFFL stadiums until
Speaker 1: the goals presented by the leaders are met. So well,
Speaker 1: we should do that anyway, I mean, like, why are
Speaker 1: we publicly funding like arenas that are making these billionaires
Speaker 1: billions of dollars. But in a nutshell, you know, it
Speaker 1: doesn't look good. And and shout out to Brian Flores
Speaker 1: for shining the spotlight almost especially in Black History Month.
Speaker 1: I can't help but think that that was done on purpose.
Speaker 1: Is um. Yeah, there's a lot of stud stud and bucking.
Speaker 1: Oh god, yeah, there's so much of that. The workhorse
Speaker 1: and like he's a you know, like you know, he's
Speaker 1: a bru. I mean, okay, it's it's not like slavery slavery,
Speaker 1: but like conservatives, hey, when you make the slavery in
Speaker 1: NFL comparisons, and let's be clear, look, yo, no one
Speaker 1: is making a literal comparison of chattel slavery in the NFL,
Speaker 1: so please, it's an analogy. It is an analogy. I'm
Speaker 1: not trying to say that it is actual slavery because
Speaker 1: these people are making millions, but like yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean that and and that's that's that's where you know,
Speaker 1: if you're getting paid, you're not a slavery. I mean,
Speaker 1: the comparisons are fair to make if they're there. I mean,
Speaker 1: I've I've heard I've seen some foot like pro football
Speaker 1: players and pro basketball players like talking, and the one
Speaker 1: dude was like, yo, man, the in the NFL, the
Speaker 1: relationship that the players have with the owner is kind
Speaker 1: of like some slavery ship. It's like it's the it's
Speaker 1: the most it's the furthest removed from the owner that
Speaker 1: you is in the NFL, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Where it's like really they're up there and you're down here.
Speaker 1: Catch the ball, nigger, run you know, it's like like
Speaker 1: you don't really interact with him at all, so he's
Speaker 1: like it really does end up kind of feeling like
Speaker 1: you're fucking buck out there on an auction block. And
Speaker 1: then you know whether it's coincidence or not. You look
Speaker 1: at the combines when they're testing out the new recruits
Speaker 1: and the people who are going to be drafted and
Speaker 1: ship like that. It does. Yeah, I know, the imagery
Speaker 1: is definitely slavy. I mean, can we can we can
Speaker 1: we at least say that? I mean, can we at
Speaker 1: least on that? Yeah, I mean I don't appreciate when
Speaker 1: like liberals trying to hyperpoleize issues, but like there is
Speaker 1: a certain way in which it reproduces the social structures
Speaker 1: of slavery, and that there's like physical labor that's like
Speaker 1: being like commodified to make somebody a billionaire. And then
Speaker 1: these folks get get out and then she'd like c
Speaker 1: t E and then like die earlier, like have mental
Speaker 1: illness later in their lives, so their body are just
Speaker 1: having the labor wrung out of them and then they're discarded. Oh,
Speaker 1: speaking of Peel, did you did you see the Jordan Peel?
Speaker 1: Do you see the trailer for his new joint. It's
Speaker 1: called Nope what no what it looks It's like it
Speaker 1: looks like Signs with Black People, which I'm I'm with it.
Speaker 1: I'm with it. Let's just yeah, let's make remake all
Speaker 1: the Grades with Black People. Needs to He needs to
Speaker 1: start with the titles though, like, oh, what, come on
Speaker 1: what You're gonna need to get some regular titles? Though,
Speaker 1: no more, no more us and Nope, you know I
Speaker 1: don't just get I don't like the one word titles.
Speaker 1: Signs is one word. I mean, like like, I don't
Speaker 1: like that title either. Come on, give me a title.
Speaker 1: I'm not I'm not making any m night exceptions. Canny
Speaker 1: man is candy man is two words. I like that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Kenny man is two words. It's at least two syllables.
Speaker 1: What you know what I'm saying? This is the hill
Speaker 1: you're gonna die on? Really anyway, that is what we
Speaker 1: got for the day. Um do you want to wrap? Yeah?
Speaker 1: All right, yo, Taylor Joel, I can't see through the glass.
Speaker 1: I don't know which one of y'all is, but somebody
Speaker 1: give me a beat please? Yeah? Uh waiting, no reparations, waiting,
Speaker 1: no reparations, lava. Frank can tell them the black of
Speaker 1: the bevery, the sweet at the quarterback, and but when
Speaker 1: it comes to the coaches, the blackness and sort of lacking.
Speaker 1: And it's sort of battling because there'll be a lot
Speaker 1: of athletes who could be the funding things that said
Speaker 1: they placed in the back seat all across the country.
Speaker 1: The workers organizing we're talking to taxis you at the
Speaker 1: end of having to come from feeling timely? Bryan flower As,
Speaker 1: get your shine, be get your Shane be hit up
Speaker 1: with the class action doing it for the culture. Like
Speaker 1: the last Bassip. The Rooney rule was cool, but it
Speaker 1: lacks traction. Only one black coach got a brother back then.
Speaker 1: You gotta keep fighting because it ain't over. Gonna put
Speaker 1: pressure on the stakeholders because they in the owner's box
Speaker 1: feeling like a slave owner and they're really scared of
Speaker 1: the revolution. Take ova Dope. Hey, I'm dope knife And
Speaker 1: you have been listening to Waiting on Reparations, mofo, have
Speaker 1: a good week. See you next time. Listen to Waiting
Speaker 1: on Reparations on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts
Speaker 1: or wherever you get your podcasts.