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Charles Barkley: Ignorance Personified

By N Oji Mzilikazi

18 July 2016

On the heels of four off-duty Minneapolis police officers working security at a WNBA’s Minnesota Lynx game leaving their posts on account of the players’ wearing pregame warm-up jerseys that carried the message of change, the names of Philando Castile and Alton Sterling who were shot to death by the police, and Black Lives Matter, ESPN sports journalist Bomani Jones delivered commentary that deserves not just acclamation, but being tweeted and retweeted.

Jones made the point: “You are not obligated to speak simply because you are good at doing something with a ball. That can lead you into some disastrous places.”

Time and time again, we’ve been exposed to personalities and celebrities pontificating on subjects and issues in which their understanding borders on the ignorant. But in their mind, and given a platform, they have Solomonic insights. When those persons are Black, their diarrhoea of the mouth becomes hurdles for people of African descent, as well as ammunition for those bent on sustaining inequalities; denying empowerment and social justice for the race…