By Eugene RobinsonFriday, November 30, 2007; Page A23 (Washington Post)
Why do you suppose so many people were so quick to blame Sean Taylor for his own murder?
Relax, that’s a rhetorical question. There’s no need for self-exculpatory huffing and puffing, no need to point out that the verdict of suicide-by-bad-attitude — pronounced so often this week, and so coldly — was usually couched in broad hints or softened by the nebulous fog of the conditional mood. Everyone knew what was really being said, and everyone knew why.
Taylor instantly became not a person but a character, one whose purpose was to advance a narrative about young black men and their manifold failings. Taylor, a gifted defensive back for the Washington Redskins, had been in trouble with the law. Despite the millions he earned playing football, he never managed to escape the quicksand lure of the mean streets — parasitic friends, envious haters, a culture of casual violence. It was his decision to swim in this cesspool of dysfunction, the narrative said. And, like so many other young black men who have made the same wrong choice, he paid for it with his life.
At least that was the story before Wednesday, when Robert Parker, director of the Miami-Dade police, announced that investigators had “no reason” to believe Taylor was targeted by his killer or even knew the man who shot him. Police were operating on the theory that the crime was a botched burglary, Parker said, essentially a random act.
I realize that Parker may eventually be proved wrong. But what fascinates me is how eager people were to believe the worst about Taylor — how ready to stuff a young man’s death into a box labeled “pathology” and call it a day — in the absence of supporting evidence. Apparently, “innocent until proved guilty” doesn’t apply to young black men even when they’re the victims of violent crime.
The few facts we have tell a story that’s very different from the chosen narrative. Sean Taylor is hardly a typical product of those fabled “mean streets” — he grew up with his father, a suburban police chief, in a middle-class neighborhood. He did spend weekends with his mother in a tougher area and acquired some sketchy friends. But at the same time he was attending an exclusive private high school, where he met his girlfriend, Jackie Garcia, a niece of the actor Andy Garcia.
Taylor’s home, with its expansive yard and big swimming pool, is in an upper-middle-class suburb. There’s nothing remotely “mean” about the street.
Jackie Garcia hid under the covers with the couple’s 18-month-old daughter early Monday while Taylor faced the intruder who mortally wounded him. Andy Garcia released a statement Wednesday praising Taylor for his “heroic” sacrifice that saved Jackie’s life. Much has been made of the fact that Taylor grabbed a machete from under his bed before confronting the intruder. In New York or St. Louis or Seattle, if you saw a machete, you’d think: deadly weapon. But I spent years covering Latin America for The Post, so when I see a machete in a place like Miami I’m more likely to think: garden implement. Tropical vegetation is a lot easier to trim with a machete than with hedge clippers, and Taylor’s father said Sean used the blade in his yard. No, machetes are not usually kept under the bed. But if my house had been broken into recently — as Taylor’s was, barely a week before his slaying — I might have wanted the thing a little closer to hand.
My purpose here isn’t to make a hero out of Sean Taylor, though he may well have died a hero’s death. He made some serious mistakes in his life, and he didn’t always have the proper regard for authority and discipline. Nor am I trying to sell the “he was finally turning his life around” narrative, as if taking a few GPS readings were enough to show someone the way to responsible manhood.
Life isn’t so linear — and people aren’t so one-dimensional.
The next time you encounter a young black man like Sean Taylor — a man who can be headstrong and rebellious, who listens to rap music and sometimes wears his hair in a wild-man ‘fro that’s meant to intimidate, who scowls when we want him to smile and makes a bad mistake or two and doesn’t choose the friends we would want him to choose — know that there is possibility within him, and contradiction, and the capacity for love. Know that he’s more than a plot device.
Well said!
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November 30, 2007 @ 10:45 am
Its fucked up and all whenever somebody loses their life but niggas getting killed everyday. I don’t believe it was a random act because NOBODY IS MENTIONING THAT THEY TOOK ANYTHING. From what I hear, He was trying to change his life around since the birth of his daughter and some people prolly felt left out of the equation and decided to give him justice for it…..
But somehow some way, if it does turn out this way, we will find a way to blame whitey. But check this quote from this dumbass J.R. Smith….
—–Money man
Nuggets guard J.R. Smith is nicknamed “Youngrich.” It’s even written on his shoes.
So why the nickname?
“Because I’m young and I’m rich,” the New Jersey native said. “My homeboys gave it to me.”
Actually, Smith, 22, is not rich by NBA standards. He makes $2.13 million, less than half the league’s average salary. But he is trying to cash after the season as a restricted free agent. He turned down a Nuggets contract offer last month because it wasn’t lucrative enough.
But Smith can continue to think about money. On a segment called “This or That,” recently shown on the video board at a Nuggets home game, he was asked if he preferred “love” or “money.”
Smith’s answer was “money.”
“Because love can hurt you,” he said. “Money never hurts you ————-
This is the same dude that just got one of his homeboys killed in a car accident this past summer due to his reckless driving… then 2 months later, he is arrested for slapping some chick up in a club . Now when he decides to “turn his life around” like Taylor, is one of his “homeboys” gonna come back and hit him up for leaving him out of the will ?
Shit is pathetic.. niggas just have no regard for life just because theirs is so fucked up.
November 30, 2007 @ 11:03 am
I think what’s more a crime is the fact that writer eluded to when a black man is a victim of a murder, it seems like it’s his own doing.
So if Brett Farve was killed by someone after a week earlier a kitchen knife was left on his pillow, the alphabet boys wouldn’t be combing Mississippi right now?
We have yet to crack the Biggie or Pac cases but we can keep persistent on the missing white girl in Aruba. I’m never the one to throw race into the mix, but that shit’s foul.
And everytime we see something on him we talk about all the fucked up shit he did in the League and mention how he’s a leading Pro Bowl vote-getter as an afterthought.
What’s more saddening is that he’s another black man who never got to see his 25th brithday. I can’t wait to see them blame that shit on hip hop.
You know, if Barry Bonds dies tomorrow, we’ll forget how great a ballplayer he was, but remember he “might have” taken some drugs…fuckin media, yo.
Damn…that JR Smith shit bugs me, I was already irritated at the Sean Taylor situation…but this is why the media treats tragedy w/ our black men because of the way so many of them act when money’s involved….
November 30, 2007 @ 11:18 am
Within the last few generations, there has been this kind of open “adoration” and worship of paper. People are considered to be expendable, money is not. So while his comments are maddening, they are hardly uncommon or even unacceptable in our present culture.
November 30, 2007 @ 11:39 am
[...] Original post by SOHH Over It! [...]
November 30, 2007 @ 12:06 pm
Same story.
Different day.
But if police are about one thing, they’re about protecting their own. So niggaz better be on HIGH ALERT in miami.
Snitches will be talkin, and GOOD ON THEM.
Will niggaz ‘Do The Right Thing’ for once?
November 30, 2007 @ 1:12 pm
The media is in the business to make money. Especially in this day with the internet etc…
So of course they are gonna make a spin on any case to make it more attracting to the viewer. Its sad but thats the industry. The biggest media companies are usually the ones that do most of the irresponsible journalism because of their wide “fan base”. Fox is bases its reports more on opinion rather than facts because its HICK base share the same opinions on what they deem is important. That why missing blacks aren’t on their radar as much as the dumb shit that they rail against. I pay close attention to current events and I didn’t hear a peep about this missing black girl…
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22041988/
And I still haven’t heard a viable excuse or reason for shutting down BET NEWS. We can’t get upset at mainstream media when our own stations don’t even have outlets to get information to us.
But I’m supposed to march ???
December 3, 2007 @ 10:43 am
What’s more saddening is that he’s another black man who never got to see his 25th brithday. I can’t wait to see them blame that shit on hip hop.
————————————————————
They will eventually. They are gonna go through his cd collection and find his NWA, Wu Tang, Pac and Biggie Cds, and sure enough they are going to say that hip hop was the reason for his death. They are gonna say that even though he was rich he was living a “hip hop lifestyle”. The media HAS to find away to undermine the man character, other wise they would have to foucs on what’s really going on in the community. The lack of jobs and resources which in effect the reason for these young man to go out a rob people. (I’m not saying that’s an excuse, but I’m saying)
Good Morning!