....WHEN IT COMES TO THE RACIST OR SEXIST MOTIVES OF THE WHITE FOLKS IN AUTHORITY
Serena lost a match everybody wanted her to win yesterday. But that's not really the point. The point is that there was an attempt to cheat this black woman --again.
A lot of people want to talk about how she was going to lose anyway. Then they want to imply that she wasn't cheated out of anything. Then they want to talk about her behavior. But you know what?
Serena's playing badly, appearing destined to lose
and
the attempt to cheat her
**are no more mutually exclusive than the ideas that**
OJ Simpson did it
and
white cops also tried to frame him
The thing that matters is not who won or lost but that two black women were cheated during the U.S Open -- and that a black woman's behavior in the face of what looked like an attempt to cheat and disrupt her is getting equal time in the news instead of the blatant unfairness of a referee.
I read an entire article at SLATE that discussed Serena's behavior when she's stood up for herself over the years, against racism more often than not -- and instead of identifying each "behavioral" incident as potentially racism, there's a general statement that Serena faced racism while playing tennis near the end, not attached to any specific incident. I'm thinking the racism the writer remembered to recognize at the end of article is only the n-word being lobbed from the stands -- which Serena has had to face in the past too.
But let's get back to THE CHURCH OF WHAT'S HAPPENING RIGHT NOW:
Chair umpire Carlos Ramos managed to rob not one but two players in the women’s U.S. Open final.
Nobody has ever seen anything like it: An umpire so wrecked a big occasion that both players, Naomi Osaka and Serena Williams alike, wound up distraught with tears streaming down their faces during the trophy presentation and an incensed crowd screamed boos at the court.
https://www.thestar.com/sports/tennis/opinion/2018/09/09/sexist-power-play-ruins-powerful-us-open-final.html
BACKGROUND:
First, Ramos enforced a tennis rule that is almost never enforced period, must less enforced during a U.S. Open. He accused Serena and her coach of trading hand signals. The coach later admitted he tried to but also stated -- backed up by Chris Evert-- that all coaches do it. (ESPN played a tape that seems to show Serena didn't see the gesture.)
Then, angry at herself for not playing well during the second match, Serena smashed her racket. That was worthy of a penalty.
Thirdly, Serena still angry over the referee basically calling her a cheat --same as repetitively drug testing her more than they do other white athletes accuses her of being a cheat-- Serena called the referee a "thief" for penalizing her for cheating. Ramos took the unprecedented step penalizing her for talking back and being sassy(?) by taking an entire game from her too.
All three of these calls --two of them "questionable" calls-- happened during the second match. So the third match never took place due to it haven being given to Naomi Osaka as part of Serena's punishment.
Ramos took what began as a minor infraction and turned it into one of the nastiest and most emotional controversies in the history of tennis,
Williams abused her racket, but Ramos did something far uglier:
He abused his authority.
Champions get heated — it’s their nature to burn. All good umpires in every sport understand that the heart of their job is to help temper the moment, to turn the dial down, not up...Male players have sworn and cursed at the top of their lungs, hurled and blasted their equipment into shards, and never been penalized as Williams was in the second set of the U.S. Open final.
https://www.thestar.com/sports/tennis/opinion/2018/09/09/sexist-power-play-ruins-powerful-us-open-final.html
Compare: Another male player has admitted he's said much worse without it costing him a match:
Compare: Last week a chair umpire got down from his chair to comfort a pale male player instead of penalizing him.
The career of Nick Kyrgios -- who has been criticized for his attitude and on-court behavior in the past — is under renewed scrutiny after the Australian tennis star received a "pep talk" from the umpire during his match against Pierre-Hugues Herbert at the US Open on Thursday.
After Kyrgios let two serves pass him by while he was a set and 3-0 down to the Frenchman and reportedly threatened to quit the match, umpire Mohamed Lahyani climbed down from his chair and said he wanted to "help" the 23-year-old Aussie.
"I want to help you," Lahyani could be heard telling Kyrgios from TV microphones, "I know this is not you."
https://edition.cnn.com/2018/08/31/tennis/nick-kyrgios-pierre-hugues-herbert-us-open-mohamed-lahyani-roger-federer/index.html
Compare: Ramos' own behavior with a brown-skinned, latino player.
Ramos has put up with worse from a man. At the French Open in 2017, Ramos leveled Rafael Nadal with a ticky-tacky penalty over a time delay, and Nadal told him he would see to it that Ramos never refereed one of his matches again.
https://deadspin.com/serena-williams-hit-with-17-000-fine-for-her-part-of-u-1828920901
Ramos is to blame for this debacle. And his motives need to be questioned.
White folks are entirely certain Ramos motives were purely sexist. But I'm not so sure. Serena is always black and female at the same time. And the "back talk" fits into the same anti-black female stereotype that got Sandra Bland put in jail.
Then again, it could be that Ramos motive was simply that he wanted to take somebody that's always winning down. Some people are like that. I remember the Dallas Cowboys being on a winning streak. I don't even watch sports and I remember that a bunch of folks just wanted them to lose -- they didn't care WHO won.
Again ultimately, the biggest thing Ramos stole was not a win from Serena.
Most people are telling me she was going to lose no matter what the way she started out. But that's still not the point. Carlos Ramos stole was a victorious moment from Naomi Osaka. He may also have stolen her assurance that she 100% deserves the trophy she won.
And maybe he stole an honest loss from Serena too. She's old by tennis standards. It will hurt many of us deeply if she doesn't go on from here -- and lose in an clean honest way when her body won't cooperate anymore.
Some people have cried foul because Serena dared to get angry when damn near anybody would have gotten angry in the same situation -- especially after the repeated attacks via drug testing and about her freaking BLACK PANTHER outfit being called "disrespectful" of all things
DEAR WHITE GIRLS OF TENNIS PLEASE SHOW ALL THE ASS YOU CAN
And it wouldn't surprise me if Carlos Ramos or his supporters insert her lack of being "respectful" into this conversation as well. Black folks not just submissively taking bullsh** is often called "disrespect" by the white supremacist who doesn't want to admit he or she is a white supremacist.
 |
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greensboro_sit-ins |
White expectations of peaceful acquiescence in the face of their repeated insults and assaults need to die today. What happened during the Civil Rights Movement, the peaceful responses in the face of violence, lying, and cheating wasn't owed to white folks then.
And it's certainly not going to happen again.
Even so, I wonder if Serena had known for sure that Osaka was going to win, if she would have spoken to people later. Maybe. Then again, she's too competitive to ever believe it's over until it's over. That's what makes her a champion.
And nothing Serena woulda, coulda, shoulda done changes the fact that Carlos Ramos made two bad calls and penalized Serena in a way he has not penalized others in the same situation.
Serena has had to fight for fairness from the white folks of tennis her entire career.
One example of many: In 2004, a line judge "mistakenly" ruled against Serena over and over again --when line mistakes are generally more random. The white gatekeepers of tennis decided to get line cameras to use in the future, but the possibly racist motives of the judge were never really discussed.
Serena's behavior was though --thoroughly by the white press.
In the end, I'm thinking Osaka, as a brown-skinned woman herself, will be better off for Serena's having spoken up against someone who may have penalized her for being black when he saw her coach making gestures then penalized her for being female (and black)while being willing to talk back to pale male authority.
A lot of white people think this is just about gender and sexism. And it might be. But the white folks of tennis have been coming for Serena all along. And there aren't too many black people in this country who haven't experienced a rule that's never enforced for white people suddenly being enforced when a black person does it.
There's a lot of focus on the chair ump's last penalty. But I say we should be looking at the first penalty because that set off everything that came after.
If the kind of gesture Serena's coach made is standard and never penalized when the coaches of white players do it, then it's the referee that should have been fined. And he should lose his job permanently as well if it's found that it his decision was race based.
I have no idea if his motive was race based. I'm saying nobody else knows whether it was or wasn't, we to know, and that this is worthy of investigation.
I have no idea if his motive was race based. I'm saying nobody else knows whether it was or wasn't, we to know, and that this is worthy of investigation.
Osaka refused to condemn Serena and claimed, somewhat improbably, she was not fully aware of the drama that unfolded as the row between Williams and umpire Ramos escalated.
"I don't know what happened on the court. So for me, I'm always going to remember the Serena that I love...It doesn't change anything for me. She was really nice to me at the net and on the podium. I don't really see what would change."
"...But then when I hugged her at the net, I felt like a little kid again."
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