However as Kevin Durant became the eventual winner by coming from behind after having 4 letters, I was proud of Durant and Durant was proud of his accomplishments. Then all of sudden, you could see Durant’s smile be wiped away as he was presented with his prize which was a toy horse that Ernie Johnson told him to hold up and show the crowd what he had won. Many people probably saw this gesture and found it funny perhaps even hilarious. However many of you laughed without understanding the deeper ramifications of this action and what message this was portraying. Also many of you didn’t even notice that while Ernie Johnson told Durant to hold up this toy horse to the crowd, Mr. Johnson laughed while saying it. At least I can say that one of Mr. Johnson’s co-commentators Kenny Smith, an African American said that giving Durant that toy horse was not funny whatsoever. In fact Smith said, "I know GEICO, the NBA and TNT have some money to give a real prize for this event."
While Kenny Smith and I agreed that this was not funny. We disagree to a degree on why it is not funny. Kenny and I agree that giving a toy horse is not funny but Kenny believes it isn’t funny because the sponsors of the event have funny to give a better prize. While having money to give a better prize is good and fine but that just makes giving the horse even more worst. In fact the fact that the sponsors have money to get a better prize makes my argument for why giving the toy horse was so disrespectful and not right.
Nonetheless the deeper picture that this gesture of having a grown man hold up a toy horse as if to be proud is a gesture that we as men can’t tolerate. As kids, boys didn’t play with dolls or horses that’s what little girls do. Therefore to have a grown man hold up a toy horse is like a disgrace to his manhood. Some of you might say I am looking too deep into this situation but if you looked at Durant’s demeanor by holding up that horse, you could tell that he was embarrassed and just was going along with the quote unquote joke like a good token boy. Some of you might say that this issue wouldn’t be a big issue to me if he wasn’t black but that’s just it, if it was a white man, I would have the same problem but because it happened to a black man makes it worse.
If you look at the situation even deeper, seeing a Caucasian like Ernie Johnson tell Kevin Durant, an African American to hold up the horse makes the situation even worse and brings back a sense of the master-slave mentality that still exists to a degree to this day. While the sport of basketball is dominated by African American ballplayers but the ownership, management and coaching positions don’t reflect that. So if you look at the situation of a toy horse being held up by an African American player and a Caucasian commentator telling that player to hold it up as the commentator snickers with each word, it is clear just how much our black players are truly thought of to a degree. Then if you don’t factor in race and you imagine it was white ball player and a black commentator than you can say that it goes to show you what we think of athletes particularly male basketball players with this gesture of a man holding up a toy horse.
Clearly either way you look at the matter, I did not find it funny whatsoever. I didn’t find it funny when I first saw it and I was like it was wrong but as I thought about it further, I became even more outraged. From talking to others who saw it, they found it to be funny and didn’t see the deeper underlying message that this action was sending. People we can’t ignore the fact that this is a grown man holding up a toy horse as if he is suppose to be proud of this prize. As a child, I could remember playing horse and being proud of winning because of the bragging rights I would have over whoever I beat. However if for any chance I knew I would win a toy horse or would have to take a picture holding up a toy horse, I can tell you now that I probably would have never played in a game of H.O.R.S.E. as a child. In fact I probably would have intentionally lost because there are certain things as a young boy that I was told and that a small component of being a man is doing manly things that depict you in a manly way.
With that said, seeing a grown man holding up a toy horse didn’t depict Durant in a manly way. In fact it made Durant look soft which is something any man doesn’t want to be portrayed as. The image of Durant holding a horse and not being around any little girl or being seen handing it to a girl doesn’t look well at all. While being a man isn’t just about image or isn’t about image at all to some but in today’s society, image is a little bit of everything no matter how we as people try to deny it. That’s why we as a people have to dig deeper into images such as this and what message it really is sending to our young man. In fact we have to stop laughing at things like this as if it is funny when in fact it isn’t funny at all.
Ask yourself how would you feel if that was your son holding up that toy horse? Just look at history people and look at the ways the slave master used to use tactics such as this one to degrade a man’s manhood. Just look at how non-born Americans (French, Irish, etc.) manhood was degraded once they arrived in America. Just look at history and how for years we as African Americans have been made fun of time and time again but we laughed. Just dig deeper at this image and look how in the eye of many there are no good male role models for our youth particularly in the inner cities so when our youth see this what would many of them think or what did they think. We as a people need to dig deeper into what signals these things send to us a people and what message was being sent by having a grown man regardless of color holding up a toy horse. Now factor in race and we as a people need to really ask ourselves, why do we stand for such things in our society.
I might be wrong for what I’m saying but the reality is that, we need to dig deeper into some things and we need to stop taking things at face value. Sometimes what’s on the surface is really not what it is. That’s why we as a people must dig deeper into things such as this and ask ourselves why? Why did this take place and what message does this really send? Why would the sponsors of this event think that it would be funny for a grown man to hold up a toy horse instead of a bronze trophy horse? Let’s stop always laughing and look at things a little deeper and maybe we as a people will find out just how we are being tricked, abused and misused.
DIGGING DEEPER
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