Sports Pages #13

Sport can have a large influence on the culture of African Americans. Some African Americans come to rely on their athletic talents to get them an education. Black players can get into feeder and private schools they might not otherwise, due entirely to social and economic factors, have the opportunity to attend. For instance, I went to a private college prep high school in the suburbs of Chicago and there were a number of black student-athletes who took the bus from the inner city every day. They were probably recruited for their athletic talent and economic need.

The Blind Side is a movie which, to some extent, accurately portrays the experience many black professional athletes endure in their road to stardom. Many black players come from disadvantaged backgrounds, having little opportunity and less money. But it can just take one scout, just like in Hoop Dreams, to believe in a players talent and give them an opportunity to shine. But not all players are perfectly built for their position and enjoy good health and make it all the way. Hoop Dreams shows this reality--that injuries and family issues can and often do throw a wrench in a players hopes and dreams, and despite their hardest effort and insurmountable motivation they can't make it big.

While sport has allowed many African Americans to enjoy prosperity and recognition, it is likely that for the rest of black Americans, the 99.99995%, sport only furthers stereotypes and preserves the myth of race as biologically and significantly different. The prevalence of blacks in some sports and whites in other sports contributes the the false idea that there is some biological difference in athletic ability and intelligence, which is not entirely true (while genetics determines race, there is no single "race gene") This leads to people thinking that there is some inherent difference between races--that some should be valued for certain traits more than others, when the truth is that traits are largely randomly distributed among all races.