Exclusive: Whitlock Responds to All-Star Columns Controversy

whitlock has always been someone that i enjoyed reading, while tossing in one or two columns a month that were just blow my mind crazy. if he only has one or two a month in this day and age, then hell, that is fine by me.

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The thing that concerns me is that he's basically saying that the AOL article was written with no factual evidence whatsoever. It's just reporting on reporting....kind of like how I announce on announcing.

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I disagree that Whitlock's KC Star article had anymore merit than the AOL article. He set his premise within the first two paragraphs of the newspaper article. I'm establishing myself and this event as a "hood" get together; as if that should taint the event: Says Whitlock, "All-Star Weekend is the new millennium’s “Freaknik,” a once-popular, now-canceled annual street party". When Atlanta’s Freaknik died of self-inflicted wounds — looting and violence — in 1999, the NBA’s midseason exhibition rose in popularity for black people looking for an annual excuse to party on a large scale".

Nobody can speak to what Jason Whitlock is doing outside a devout, non race-hating (of any race especially one's own race)African American without an inferiority complex. Black men and women do not need an excuse to party on a large scale;and are not thugs when we do so. Imagine the insult to the esteemed NBA players, their families,friends, locals, and financially inferior TV participant such as this Black American (thank God I can afford DirecTV). Perhaps Whitlock has a different concept of non-subservient Black American life. I wonder for what did the White players go to Vegas Mr. Whitlock?
As regards FreakNik, Mr. Whitlock's comments are self-serving and untrue. I live in Georgia, and drove from work home daily through the congestion and frustration caused SOLELY by the Atlanta police and street closings dictated by wealthy, Buckhead residents, with no regard for anyone except Buckhead residents. I may have caused an outburst myself from sheer frustration trying to manipulate my way through street closings to get home (average 2.5 hours just to manipulate street closings through downtown Atlanta to the X-way).

And yes I live in a suburb of Atlanta...it's economically more feasible (utilities, taxes, etc.)

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Message from an old (68) black man.
DON'T BACK OFF MR. WHITLOCK!!!

Jason, the majority of our population (all races included) seems to be steeped in a politically incorrect Idiocracy (This is not a plug for the Movie). I have already written a response elsewhere online coining my views on the subject (Black KKK). Your train of thought seems to be controversially correct. I only disagreed with the caption (Black KKK). I suggested Black Idiocracy because the white KKK did not bully, oppress, intimidate and murder other whites unless they were sympathetic to the Black Cause. Their main targets were Black People. Today's thugmo maniac deeply repressed undercover-cowardly black Idiocratics have the same targets and, I know there might be some disagreement, I have to put their level of humanity about 20 steps below the much despised KKK. This is not a sudden happening. Black people always do things to themselves that they wouldn't even dream of doing to white people. Let them try their thug act in one of the ritzier casinos in Vegas and they will find out the meaning of REAL MAFIA.

greywolf

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I just want to second the previous commenters statement about Freaknik. It's just more proof that Whitlock is not writing from a factual basis.

I am also from Atlanta and even partied with the other Freaknikers. Freaknik did not fail because of violence. Freaknik failed because of local Atlanta politics. Atlanta was and still is poor at handling large social events. The residents in the rich neigborhoods don't want them, but they bring in a ton on money for everyone. So the govt. just does nothing. The reason Freaknik failed is the same reason that NBA All Star and the Superbowl failed. A lack of coordination by the city. Hell, a learning annex convention CRIPPLED traffic here just a few weeks agao just because there was no local coordination.

So, Whitlock needs to stop invoking Freaknik. He doesn't know anything about Atlanta.

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I don't know about the way he phrased it...that's not really for me to judge...but his assessment of the behavior and attitude of the OVERWHELMING MAJORITY of people running around at the events and venues associated with the All-Star Game was dead on. I was there and it was a bit ridiculous. Large groups or clusters of people "rolling around" just looking to bump into someone or something. It was like a modern version of "The Warriors" to make it through some club without getting beef from someone. I have taken special consideration not to describe the "groups" because I don't know that it is relevent. Just know that Vegas + NBA All-Star Attendees do not mix well.

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After reading Bill Simmons' article on the "Hip-Hop Woodstock" and hearing about Mr. Whitlock's statements on sports talk radio, I felt the urge to see what sports writers were saying about NBA All-Star Weekend. And, for the most part, I have to agree with the majority here. In the past Vegas has never been a place where people feared to walk the strip, but it was All-Star weekend. So Vegas is not to blame, but rather the crowd that followed the event. The reports of last weekend only justify David Stern's attempts to regulate the image of the NBA over the last few years following the Artest brawl. The image of the NBA is in jeopardy. It can no longer ride on the coattails of the Bird/Magic/Jordan era. Did you ever hear stories of those superstars getting into brawls, shooting up nightclubs, or putting more emphasis on their ghetto rap albumn than their million dollar basketball career? No. They were class acts that projected a classy image for the NBA. Those days are gone.

As for those who bring up the failure of Freaknik and blame soley the city of Atlanta - i'm sorry but you're being trite. Yes, the police and politics may be a factor, but troublemakers will only cause the trouble that they are allowed to get away with. Yes, there may have been a failure in communication, but Atlanta, and the citizens their and in the suburbs, have the right and the duty to say something about it. Some point to the Super Bowl, others to the Olympics, but how many city and state elections have passed, and how many times have those citizens done something to reverse this image. My take is if you're still crying about it, then you didn't do your job. Events similar to Freaknik have succeeded in the south. Look at Essence Fest and the Bayou Classic in New Orleans (pre-Katrina). But what's different about those events and things like the NBA All-Star weekend is the image. The NBA says it is ok for their players and league to endorse gansta behavior. Essence is about the music, about the heritage - a word I believe many young African Americans twist and spin into negative racism. Thank you Mr. Whitlock for bringing this issue to light.

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M. Guidry-
what you fail to understand, even though you write it your own post, is the word "image." These other "black fests" have a better "image" than does Freaknik, but not a better or worse reality - and that is an important distinction. Also, the problem with Whitlock beyond failing to have any clue of the subtexts that surround the issues weakly attempts to tackle, is that he presented two distinct personal views of the All-Star weekend, one in the KC Star and an opposite view for AOL. Additionally he lies in one of the pieces - which one only he knows - about his attending, or not, the on-court festivities both Saturday and Sunday nights.

In the Star column he was busy at Jamie Foxx's show which ran from 9:15 to midnight. In the AOL piece he seemed to have watched all the on-court events. In the Star piece he wrote that he implied that not only did he not attend the game itself, but was unaware of anything that had to do with the playing of the game, while, in his AOL column, he denigrates the game that he "saw."

So we have a short-sighted (purposely?) black writer with only a superficial understanding of black history and culture and how it has been affected by the dominant Western culture attempting to dominate opinion about an event either he loved or hated - depending on the perspective he wanted to convey to a particular audience.

This serious breach of journalistic ethics is reprehensible. Whitlock deserves to be pilloried for his actions - and more.

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As an Atlanta resident who was caught in Freaknik more than once, and was afraid for my life at one point, I can tell you all that the City was not responsible for that disaster, the Freaknikers were. No regard for others was shown by the freaknik crowd, as I saw open drug use, sex, threats of violence and violence with stuck in traffic for three hours. Women were accosted, urinated on and who knows what else. Vandalism and property destuction were rampant.

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A Las Vegas franchise would go 82-0...or 0-82.

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