Category Archives: race

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Boxing as karaoke: Mosley’s puffed up face shows you can go through the motions against Manny Pacquiao in a lacklustre fight and still end up looking like dog crap

Anyone who ordered the pay-per-view  fight last Saturday between Manny Pacquiao and Sugar SHAME Mosley (my new nickname for the loser) would be correct in demanding your money back.

At least if you were in Vegas, you could have won your money back betting the fight. For the rest of us, we were taken in by the promoters.

You wanted a fight? For the masses of Filipinos throughout the world watching via satellite, what we saw could only be described as a glorified sparring contest at best, a fraud at worst.

It was like karaoke boxing. Not really boxing, but it sort of looked and sounded like it. And everyone was drunk and had a good time anyway, right? Not exactly.

For our money we all deserved to see a real genuine battle between two men who actually punch at each other. We don’t watch boxing to see how sportsmanlike the boxers are in their etiquette.  We watch to see two brave opponents beat each other to the pulp. But in this title bout, no less, we had Pacquiao and Mosley practically hugging and winking at each other, love-tapping their gloves at the start and finish of each round.

Now I see why many people have turned to MMA. There’s no pussyfooting  there. And if there was, you could really tell.

In boxing, all the worse evasive things were on display in Saturday’s  championship fight. Mosley didn’t land many punches because he didn’t throw many. He was on the run most of the fight. The ring isn’t the place to do your roadwork.  

Even M.P., our hero, seemed to go at it in cruise control. When Pacquiao knocked down  Mosley in the 3rd round, one expected to see  Pacman  go for the kill. Instead, Pacquiao seemed to let Mosley continue the charade. M.P surely didn’t fight like his life depended on it. 

Pacquiao did seem to wake up when Mosley stepped on his foot then pushed him down.  Counted as a knockdown, the unfairness of it all seemed to inspire Pacquiao to step up the assault.  A matter of honor, I guess. But by then, he was so far ahead, there was just no point.

And that is the problem for both fighters. For Mosley, who should do everyone a favor and go off and retire, there was no point in this fight, other than to collect his massive pay day.

For Pacquiao,  it’s getting to be the same thing. There is no one left to fight except Floyd Mayweather, who continues to make unreasonable demands that make booking the “dream fight” more and more unlikely.

Mayweather may have wanted to look at how Pacquiao handled a seemingly stronger, larger opponent (as if he didn’t have ample evidence). But there was something about the aging Mosley that seemed to make many people doubt Pacquiao.  The pay-per-view seemed particularly biased toward Mosley, as if this would be the comeuppance for Pacquiao, the smaller man.

By the end, sportscaster James Brown, who is related by marriage to Filipina Loida Lewis, was apologizing for having bought into the Mosley hype. He should be. Another doubter of Filipino prowess fights the dust.

I imagine even Mayweather was looking at the fight as a barometer of how well he’d do against Pacquaio.  Mayweather had beaten Mosley recently, but not as easy as the Pacman did.

Seeing Mosley, his battered face puffed up and swollen,  say that he was surprised by Pacquiao’s power probably didn’t make Mayweather call his agent and say, “Let’s book this fight.”

I’ve always said Pacquiao should quit while he still has his head.  It’s no different now. He has so much to give to the world beyond yellow boxing gloves. Let’s hope he quits now.  

After Mosley, I don’t care to see any more. Readers will note that as an avid Pacquiao follower I was mum on this fight prior to Saturday. It just didn’t seem worth talking about.  Now the fight’s  real value emerges.

It could be Pacquiao’s last.

If it is, it wouldn’t surprise me.

Manny has nothing else to prove in the ring.

For the sport, he should quit now.

But for his accountant, his bank statement, and his entire entourage, the beat goes on.

blog, diversity, news, race

The Tyler Clementi/Rutgers suicide story:Hate crime or just an invasion of privacy?

How do you characterize the Tyler Clementi story. He’s the Rutgers student who killed himself last year days after his roommate put video of him romantically engaged with another male on the internet. 

Is it cyber-bullying? An invasion of privacy? Is it a hate crime?

Read my “Amok” column at www.aaldef.org/blog

blog, diversity, journalism, news, politics, race

Diversity’s recession-era failure: The numbers show Unity was cash cow for all, but black journalists wanted more

As a journalist who attended every Unity and believed in the mission, I was concerned about NABJ pulling out of Unity. And I admit to being surprised I didn’t hear outcry from others.

Maybe people don’t care anymore.

 In recession era diversity, where the buck matters more than the principle,it’s just not the same.

But a piece from the Poynter Institute sheds a little  light on why no one on the Unity board is all that broken up about the black journalists’ withdrawal.

Everyone made money.  

It’s just that NABJ wanted what it saw as its fair share.

According to the Poynter Institute story,  NABJ chose solvency over solidarity.  But it really wasn’t going broke. It wanted more money for extra programs and felt it should get more out of the Unity cash cow.

To me that’s a bit selfish when you’re talking about the kind of non-profit mission Unity was on.

Beyond that, Unity’s revenues were pretty healthy, about $6 million from the 2008 convention, mostly coming from registration (1.8 million), sponsorships ($2.5 million), and the career fair ($1.4 million).

Here’s the revenue split based on the Poynter story’s numbers:

The National Association of Hispanic Journalists (NAHJ),  $427,259.

The Asian American Journalists Association (AAJA ),$396,011.

The Native American Journalists Association (NAJA), $143,197.

NABJ felt that it deserved even more since it brought in 53 percent of paid registrants and 38 percent of the estimated 7,500 attendees. It amounted to $574,407.

With NABJ gone, the revenue split won’t be as robust. But the organizations working together still should make more than they would with individual conventions. That windfall has always helped to save all the journalism groups that have battled huge deficits in recent years.  

Given that,  what do you make of NABJ’s compromise ideas on redoing the revenue share? One of the proposals would actually hurt the smaller groups.

Doesn’t sound like NABJ was all that into solidarity from the beginning.

Still organizations are being very political.

“AAJA is disappointed that NABJ has withdrawn from Unity,” said AAJA President Doris Truong during a morning conference call today. “ But now we have to move forward. We wanted NABJ to stay in the alliance but we wish them well. We will never close the door to NABJ.”

So NABJ is gone, and all that’s left is a bigger share of a smaller pie for the journalism groups that remain.  Not the end of the world, but the end of something.

Unity was the biggest model for how real diversity could work in America.

When Unity fails to unite, that’s sad.

blog, diversity, journalism, news, politics, race

Negative Diversity: Shame on NABJ for pulling out of Unity, the coalition of journalists of color

I was still in shock when I first posted on the National Association of Black Journalists’ pull out of Unity and the 2012 convention in favor of doing their own thing.

Now we learn from the Maynard Institute’s Richard Prince that the discussion which began last December included some significant concessions to NABJ, including giving the organization veto power on the Unity board.

Not good enough it seems.

NABJ wanted more. But how can you have a real coaltion if one partner wants to be more equal than the other?

This sort of thing happens all the time. Frankly, it’s ‘s a damn shame that Delaware has the same two votes in the Senate as my residence state, California. But that’s fair. You don’t have California pulling out and starting its own country. The balance,of course, is the House. 

It is somewhat comforting to know that there was some attempt at Unity to recognize NABJ’s size among the other participants, and give it more power.  Veto power is one hell of a compromise.

But it wasn’t enought to keep the black journalists from deciding to go off and do their own thing.

Just business? Sure, but  the bigger effort is about the  fight for racial equity  here. That’s never been about dollars and cents. Unity was America’s role model.

Maybe this is recession-era diversity taking over, where it’s every group for itself. The greater good be damned.

If that’s the case, it’s a sad day for minorities in America. 

And a good day for the status quo oppressors wherever they exist.  NABJ’s actions are exactly what those oppressors want to see, and the minority journalists are doing the work for them.  

It’s self-inflicted divide and conquer.

And the minorities lose, again.