Rashard Mendenhall star running back for the Pittsburgh Steelers and Super-Bowl champion made some controversial comments about the spontaneous celebrations that insued after President Obama announced that Al-queda's top man Osama Bin Laden was killed by a shot to the head by a U.S. Navy SEAL.
His comments we're faith based, "Those who judge others, will also be judged themselves." "It's amazing how people HATE a man they have never even heard speak. We've only heard one side." Then there was the conspiratorial side, "We'll never know what happened. I just have a hardtime believing a plane could take a skyscraper down demolition style."
It's sad but serious. Rashard Mendenhall is not some kook on the corner of some seedy street of your local downtown predicting the end of the world on a piece of cardboard. He's not like the worshipers of the Westboro Baptist Church that protest the funerals of our dead U.S. soldiers, because of their belief we are too tolerant of homosexuals. We all know these people are kranks and they are extremely marginalized in our society. Mendenhall is a star running back that has the ear of millions of our youth. His jersey is worn by thousands of kids and in our culture today whether you like it or not, atheletes, actors, and entertainers, are held in high regard, they are idolized, set trends, and a lot of young people take what they say as gospel even if it's not in reference to their particular profession or expertise. Mendenhall insinuates that 9/11 was an inside job, Charlie Sheen is also a truther (someone who believes that 9/11 was an inside job), and he too has the ear of millions of children. His show "2 and a half men" features a boy going through puberty and Sheen's character basically plays a tame version of himself. The show is extremely perverted I have no proplem with it being on the air as long as it's after a certain hr. at night and not watched by children without parental supervision.
I was raised by my grandfather and grandmother and was taught to never idolize any man, a product of our Christianity and the concept of "Idolatry." At this point you're probably saying it's up to the parents to set their children straight about non-sense like this. That would bring us to the biggest problem America is facing today, the deconstruction of the nuclear family. The most recent statistics show that 40% of American children are born into a single parent households. The breakdown: White non-hispanic 28.6%, Hispanic 52.5%, and Black non-hispanic 72.3%, that should be shocking to you. So when a Rashard Mendenhall or a Charlie Sheen, Danny Glover, Sean Penn, Michael Moore, ect. say ignorant, factless, and irresponsible things like he did on twitter it takes hold with some of our young people, because there is less guidance in a single parent home as opposed to a two parent home. There is impiracle evidence that shows children raised in single parent homes are disadvanteged in almost every metric that means something: education, crime, drug abuse, and poverty a the major ones that come to mind. Please, if you are reading this and are a single parent I mean no disrespect and your fate is not sealed. There are many examples of successful adults who were raised by one parent, but there is no question that a child's success is enhanced with two parents in the home.
In one of his tweets Rashard says he doesn't have an ignorant bone in his body. His whole take on the matter is ignorant, but there is a difference between ignorance and stupidity. I'm not saying Mr. Mendenhall is stupid, he's just ignorant of the facts, which he could learn if he actually researched the matter. If he was stupid he would be incapable of learning the facts and come to an educated opinion. I don't think it's neccessary to go into all the facts that prove Bin Laden was a real human being that started a terrorist group called Al queda and directed many terrorist plots including the 4 planes that were hijacked on Sept. 11th, 2001 and driven into World Trade Center 1 and 2, the Pentagon, and a field in Pennsylvania, but if he wants to go to a great place to find out how two buildings collapse after being hit by huge commercial airliners filled with jet fuel then he needs to pick up a book, a whole book put out by Popular Mechanics devoted to debunking probably every conspiratorial aspect of that day brought up by people like Rashad Mendenhall. Popular Mechanics is not known as a political magazine it describes itself as a sevice magazine, covering a variety of information on home improvement, automotive needs, electronics, computers, telecommunications, DIY central, military, and gadgets. A staff of highly educated professionals in all specific fields and A-political.
He wonders how we can Hate a person we've never heard speak. This is not a serious statement, we have heard from Bin Laden since 1996, I personnally remember his first interview with a western journalist 20/20's Peter Arnett in 1997. In the interview he explains all of his complaints with the U.S. and speaks about his "Jihad" on the west claiming he can't be responsible for civilian deaths. In 1996 before the actual interview he wrote a lengthy fatwa entitled "Declaration of war against the americans occupying the land of the two holy places." It is sometimes called the "Ladenese Epistle," using his surname as part of the title. He wrote another "fatwa" in 1998 and has given interviews to Al-Jazeera and other major news agencies, put out over 20 videos railing on the U.S. and Israel, the man had a media division and advisor. We've heard from him in his own words on videotape, through his writings, and more importantly his attacks which started back in 1994. He's an anti-semite like Hitler, would Rashard be bothered by people hating Hitler or the rejoicing in his death? How about Stalin, Mussolini? The reaction to his death was natural and organic. This man killed over 3,000 innocent civilians some of which had to choose to jump to their death or burn to death. He sent young boys and women to be suicide bombers, also ordered his Taliban and Al Queda cohorts to use innocent muslim women and children as human shields, ordered beheadings of journalists and civilian contractors. He had flaunted his freedom from capture for 10 years, he was a polygomist, and a pedophile. He caused financial damage we still haven't recovered from, pushed the limits of our adherence to our constitution and civil liberties causing many of us to turn on each other. Forgive us for judging him Rashard, but I don't feel the man above is going to have to big a problem if we throw a few back, shout U.S.A. a the top of our lungs, and wouldn't mind taking a look at picture of his dead corpse. It's natural human behavior. Remember the ticker tape parades after WWII, how many Nazis, Italians, and Japanese did we kill during that war? We dropped two nuclear bombs on the Japanese saving their whole existence. Should we not have celebrated then? If you haven't noticed this isn't a conventional war, that kinda ended when Bin Laden issued his fatwa allowing the targeting of civilians. The rules have changed we fight an enemy with no uniform willing to videotape beheading of journalists like Daniel Pearl of the Wall St. Journal. There aren't going to be enemies signing surrender forms on the deck of a battleship or in a tent in the middle of the Iraqi desert, 1992 is the last conventional war we'll ever fight. So a little impromptu celebration, mostly in the cities it affected is completely appropiate.
Mendenhall's teammate Ryan Clarck basically said that Rashard can say whatever he wants to but he has to live with the consequences. This is exactly what many of us our saying. Freedom of speech is a pillar of American culture and law, but this type of irresponsible speech by people of his stature has to be met with the ultimate disdain and thoroughly discredited. Remember when Kanye West during a telethon for hurricane Katrina victims said, "George Bush hates black people," that's the same kind of idiocy that has to be challenged. His was even worse because nobody could immediately respond, West is another false idol that millions of kids look up to and he takes a moment that's meant to help victims of one of the worst natural disasters in our country's history, and make a ridiculous, baseless, inaccurate, and truly ugly statement about a man who at the time had more minorities on his staff than any President before him. Was this straightened out by the media...absolutely not. So a whole group of young people hear Kanye West call President Bush a racist and it sticks. I personally can't let these things go unchallenged or Rashard Mendenhall, nor should you. Always keep in mind who is making the statement, who it affects, and is it the truth.
His comments we're faith based, "Those who judge others, will also be judged themselves." "It's amazing how people HATE a man they have never even heard speak. We've only heard one side." Then there was the conspiratorial side, "We'll never know what happened. I just have a hardtime believing a plane could take a skyscraper down demolition style."
It's sad but serious. Rashard Mendenhall is not some kook on the corner of some seedy street of your local downtown predicting the end of the world on a piece of cardboard. He's not like the worshipers of the Westboro Baptist Church that protest the funerals of our dead U.S. soldiers, because of their belief we are too tolerant of homosexuals. We all know these people are kranks and they are extremely marginalized in our society. Mendenhall is a star running back that has the ear of millions of our youth. His jersey is worn by thousands of kids and in our culture today whether you like it or not, atheletes, actors, and entertainers, are held in high regard, they are idolized, set trends, and a lot of young people take what they say as gospel even if it's not in reference to their particular profession or expertise. Mendenhall insinuates that 9/11 was an inside job, Charlie Sheen is also a truther (someone who believes that 9/11 was an inside job), and he too has the ear of millions of children. His show "2 and a half men" features a boy going through puberty and Sheen's character basically plays a tame version of himself. The show is extremely perverted I have no proplem with it being on the air as long as it's after a certain hr. at night and not watched by children without parental supervision.
I was raised by my grandfather and grandmother and was taught to never idolize any man, a product of our Christianity and the concept of "Idolatry." At this point you're probably saying it's up to the parents to set their children straight about non-sense like this. That would bring us to the biggest problem America is facing today, the deconstruction of the nuclear family. The most recent statistics show that 40% of American children are born into a single parent households. The breakdown: White non-hispanic 28.6%, Hispanic 52.5%, and Black non-hispanic 72.3%, that should be shocking to you. So when a Rashard Mendenhall or a Charlie Sheen, Danny Glover, Sean Penn, Michael Moore, ect. say ignorant, factless, and irresponsible things like he did on twitter it takes hold with some of our young people, because there is less guidance in a single parent home as opposed to a two parent home. There is impiracle evidence that shows children raised in single parent homes are disadvanteged in almost every metric that means something: education, crime, drug abuse, and poverty a the major ones that come to mind. Please, if you are reading this and are a single parent I mean no disrespect and your fate is not sealed. There are many examples of successful adults who were raised by one parent, but there is no question that a child's success is enhanced with two parents in the home.
In one of his tweets Rashard says he doesn't have an ignorant bone in his body. His whole take on the matter is ignorant, but there is a difference between ignorance and stupidity. I'm not saying Mr. Mendenhall is stupid, he's just ignorant of the facts, which he could learn if he actually researched the matter. If he was stupid he would be incapable of learning the facts and come to an educated opinion. I don't think it's neccessary to go into all the facts that prove Bin Laden was a real human being that started a terrorist group called Al queda and directed many terrorist plots including the 4 planes that were hijacked on Sept. 11th, 2001 and driven into World Trade Center 1 and 2, the Pentagon, and a field in Pennsylvania, but if he wants to go to a great place to find out how two buildings collapse after being hit by huge commercial airliners filled with jet fuel then he needs to pick up a book, a whole book put out by Popular Mechanics devoted to debunking probably every conspiratorial aspect of that day brought up by people like Rashad Mendenhall. Popular Mechanics is not known as a political magazine it describes itself as a sevice magazine, covering a variety of information on home improvement, automotive needs, electronics, computers, telecommunications, DIY central, military, and gadgets. A staff of highly educated professionals in all specific fields and A-political.
He wonders how we can Hate a person we've never heard speak. This is not a serious statement, we have heard from Bin Laden since 1996, I personnally remember his first interview with a western journalist 20/20's Peter Arnett in 1997. In the interview he explains all of his complaints with the U.S. and speaks about his "Jihad" on the west claiming he can't be responsible for civilian deaths. In 1996 before the actual interview he wrote a lengthy fatwa entitled "Declaration of war against the americans occupying the land of the two holy places." It is sometimes called the "Ladenese Epistle," using his surname as part of the title. He wrote another "fatwa" in 1998 and has given interviews to Al-Jazeera and other major news agencies, put out over 20 videos railing on the U.S. and Israel, the man had a media division and advisor. We've heard from him in his own words on videotape, through his writings, and more importantly his attacks which started back in 1994. He's an anti-semite like Hitler, would Rashard be bothered by people hating Hitler or the rejoicing in his death? How about Stalin, Mussolini? The reaction to his death was natural and organic. This man killed over 3,000 innocent civilians some of which had to choose to jump to their death or burn to death. He sent young boys and women to be suicide bombers, also ordered his Taliban and Al Queda cohorts to use innocent muslim women and children as human shields, ordered beheadings of journalists and civilian contractors. He had flaunted his freedom from capture for 10 years, he was a polygomist, and a pedophile. He caused financial damage we still haven't recovered from, pushed the limits of our adherence to our constitution and civil liberties causing many of us to turn on each other. Forgive us for judging him Rashard, but I don't feel the man above is going to have to big a problem if we throw a few back, shout U.S.A. a the top of our lungs, and wouldn't mind taking a look at picture of his dead corpse. It's natural human behavior. Remember the ticker tape parades after WWII, how many Nazis, Italians, and Japanese did we kill during that war? We dropped two nuclear bombs on the Japanese saving their whole existence. Should we not have celebrated then? If you haven't noticed this isn't a conventional war, that kinda ended when Bin Laden issued his fatwa allowing the targeting of civilians. The rules have changed we fight an enemy with no uniform willing to videotape beheading of journalists like Daniel Pearl of the Wall St. Journal. There aren't going to be enemies signing surrender forms on the deck of a battleship or in a tent in the middle of the Iraqi desert, 1992 is the last conventional war we'll ever fight. So a little impromptu celebration, mostly in the cities it affected is completely appropiate.
Mendenhall's teammate Ryan Clarck basically said that Rashard can say whatever he wants to but he has to live with the consequences. This is exactly what many of us our saying. Freedom of speech is a pillar of American culture and law, but this type of irresponsible speech by people of his stature has to be met with the ultimate disdain and thoroughly discredited. Remember when Kanye West during a telethon for hurricane Katrina victims said, "George Bush hates black people," that's the same kind of idiocy that has to be challenged. His was even worse because nobody could immediately respond, West is another false idol that millions of kids look up to and he takes a moment that's meant to help victims of one of the worst natural disasters in our country's history, and make a ridiculous, baseless, inaccurate, and truly ugly statement about a man who at the time had more minorities on his staff than any President before him. Was this straightened out by the media...absolutely not. So a whole group of young people hear Kanye West call President Bush a racist and it sticks. I personally can't let these things go unchallenged or Rashard Mendenhall, nor should you. Always keep in mind who is making the statement, who it affects, and is it the truth.
