Angel Reese's haters are embarrassingly wrong, writes SFGATE columnist Rod Benson.
"So this is for the girls that look like me, that’s gonna speak up for what they believe in. It's unapologetically you. And that's what I did it for tonight. It was bigger than me tonight. It was bigger than me."
In other words: The same actions that made Clark a hero made Reese a villain. What this is really about is all the people who, knowingly or not, bend the rules for the people who look like them, but tighten those same rules for the rest of us. In sports, so-called unwritten rules are usually designed to keep Black and brown athletes out. From my earliest days as an athlete, the words “classy,” “good form” and “sportsmanlike” were drummed into my ears. As a young basketball and volleyball player I was policed for the length of my shorts, my hair, my socks, my attitude and my celebrations, asking why the entire time.
A double standard in sports is nothing new. When Tiger Woods and Serena Williams took over their lily-white sports, they created a new market for pearls manufactured to be clutched. But that’s golf and tennis, notoriously classist and racist sports. Who the hell wants to watch staid, classy basketball?
Or a better question: Who decided there was a right way to win? I never agreed to that. When I was at Torrey Pines High School in Del Mar, California, they all agreed that each game should begin with Creedence Clearwater Revival and end with a handshake, and in between they might break your teeth. On my all-Black AAU team, each game started with “Move Bitch,” ended with us clowning one another sometimes to tears, and in between was the fun part.
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