ROC HARD PLACE AND A
No 'social justice'in Goodell's fooldardy deal with Jay-Z
W E HOLD this truth to be self-evident that, with our nation in decay from an abandonment of common sense and the unwillingness of media to tell plain, indisputable truths, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell stands out for his transparently pandering, badis-good leadership.
This week, the NFL, with its $42 million-per man at the wheel, committed another act of putting up while shutting up. It named Jay-Z and his entertainment/rep company Roc Nation to, as NFL.com wrote “enhance the NFL’s live game experiences and to amplify the league’s social justice efforts.” Jay-Z also will contribute to and supervise Super Bowl halftime acts.
Of course, having named the fabulously wealthy and popular rapper its “social justice” monitor, no one from the NFL — certainly not Goodell — would dare read the lyrics of the scores of numbers that have brought Jay-Z his fame, fortune and, now, NFL-assigned social justice muscle.
They can’t. Jay-Z’s work is anathema not just to social justice, but also to minimal common decency. In fact, his “artistry” profits from, promotes and perpetuates every negative, values-twisted stereotype of urban black male life.
His are seldom songs of caution, protest or hope. Quite the contrary. But you name it, Jay-Z has cashed in on it.
Jay-Z, more than most, has helped to re-resurrect the N-word in African-Americana, so much so that broken-spirited black urban teachers can’t prevent 11year-old black boys from calling one another n----s while calling 11-year-old black girls the worst of sexually vulgar terms.
Jay-Z, now assigned as the NFL’s face of social justice, has for years sexually objectified young women in the lowest of expressions. While episodes of domestic abuse among NFL players remain high, both the NFL and Jay-Z will have to ignore his commercial contributions to the boast-filled, self-entitled sexual use and abuse of women.
Jay-Z was among the first to establish requisite rappers’ rules: Fondness for assault weapons and ammo, expensive booze, more expensive jewelry, and even more expensive cars — all to appear as successfully attaining rappers’ schedules of self-indulgent values. Then there are the boasts, beefs and threats — as if there’s a shortage of shot-dead rappers.
But the NFL must know that its rank hypocrisy will be given another look-away pass by media frightened to be called racist for decrying the N-worded “social activism” of a Jay-Z.
In 2012, after President Obama declared his support for marriages between gays, Jay-Z made noise and news by endorsing Obama’s position on the grounds that no American should be oppressed because of their sexuality. Bully for him!
Of course, few news folks checked or they’d have found Jay-Z’s lyrics littered with profanities for homosexuals, even maricon, a Spanish slur for gays and puta, a Spanish slur for prostitute.
In his song “Ignorant S--t,” the NFL’s new minister of social justice raps this:
“This is that ignorant s--t you like; N---a f--k s--t ass bitch trick plus ice, c’mon …; N---a f--k maricon puta and drugs, c’mon.”
Go ahead, Roger, sing along! You hired him, so sing or read it out loud — and in public — in the name of the NFL’s pursuit of social justice.
As for Jay-Z “enhancing” Super Bowl halftimes, he’ll be stretched to make them more offensive.
Michael Jackson broke low ground in 1993, performing while grabbing his crotch. By 2004, that Justin TimberlakeJanet Jackson costume-yank to reveal a bare breast was supposed to be the end.
But in 2016, Mrs. Jay-Z, Beyonce, entertained the nation with a dance troupe that paid tribute to the murderous Black Panthers. That must’ve met with Goodell’s approval — or his intentional ignorance — as the NFL, buoyed by frightened, don’t-make-racial-waves news media, pretended it didn’t occur.
Goodell again fell silent after February’s Super Bowl in Atlanta, early in which he was seen on videotape paying solemn but orchestrated homage to Martin Luther King’s memory at King’s Ebenezer Baptist Church.
But at halftime, the NFL degraded King’s legacy with vulgar, N-wording rappers Big Boi and Travis Scott.
The NFL and CBS knew what was coming, thus three times preemptively bleeped Scott, leaving many among the more than 100 million viewers to ask why the NFL would invite such acts to begin with.
The embrace of Jay-Z by Goodell has the stench of a shakedown, a way for the NFL to pay for protection against legitimate, but selectively outraged protesters, fringe lunatics and race hustlers by purchasing the allegiance of a Jay-Z, in the name, of course, of social justice.
Regardless, now that Jay-Z’s the man for the NFL, its commissioner should be eager to share with the uninitiated fan base what Jay-Z raps for his fabulous living. No? Why not?