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Trickin' White Folks: Why the Hood Loves Ron Artest

Commentary, Kevin Weston,
Pacific News Service, Nov 23, 2004

Editor's Note: Black Americans hear echoes of an African trickster god
in the actions of Indian Pacers bad-boy Ron Artest and the racially
charged atmosphere of the NBA. 

OAKLAND, Calif.--Ron Artest, the Indiana Pacers forward suspended by
the NBA for a year after a fan-and-player melee in Detroit on Friday,
gets love in the hood because black people have a history of rooting
for the anti-superhero who butts up against the establishment -- tales
that go back past slavery to African lore.

Elegua is the trickster in the pantheon of the Yorba religion.
Kidnapped Africans brought Yorba to the Western Hemisphere and
continued to worship Orishas, or gods, like Elegua. While the religion
stayed largely intact in places like Haiti and Cuba, Africans brought
to America, where African ways and religions were more harshly
punished, had to mask the archetype of the trickster god while
adapting his legend to our North American experience. Elegua became
High John the Conqueror.

According to Julius Lester, author of the book "Black Folktales," High
John is a "Be man -- be here when hard times come, and be here when
hard times are gone."

High John, Julius writes, is a slave on a Mississippi plantation ruled
by "white folks so mean that the rattlesnakes wouldn't bite 'em.
'Fraid they poison themselves."

But John, because he is a Be man, "made up his mind to do as much
living and as little slaving as he could...."

"He used to break the hoes, accidentally of course. Set the massa
house on fire. Accidentally of course. He always had a hard time
getting to the fields on time..."

Then this African God in Mississippi would flip it. "Ol massa was
never sure whether John was doing it all on purpose, because some
years John would work hard and make a good crop. The next year,
though, it seemed that everything he touched got destroyed. But the
following year, he'd pick more cotton than anyone thought possible. So
the white folks were never sure what side John was on. And you better
believe that that was the way John wanted it."

Ron Artest is known as a head case in the NBA. Unpredictable.
Dangerous. At the same time, he's the league's most dominant defender,
a premiere rebounder and a better-than-average scorer. A week before
the Detroit brawl, where he jumped into the stands after being hit
with a beer, he was suspended two games for asking for time off to
promote an R&B group on his record label. 

For years he was known as a cheap-shot artist because of the hard
fouls he would deliver to opponents in the paint. Annually, Artest
would be among the league leaders in technical fouls. But
mysteriously, last year he cleaned up his act, wound up as an All-Star
and won Defensive Player of the Year. In large part due to Artest, the
Pacers were one of the favorites to win the NBA title this year. 
Then Artest burned his massa's field house -- the Conseco Field House,
where the Pacers play -- to the ground. (Or at least their
championship prospects this year.)

While he ruined his short-term prospects for making money in the NBA
(eventually some NBA squad will pay him to play; he's simply too good
to pass up), he's made his hood legend. Everyone and their momma is
talking about this, from the one-way streets to Wall Street. His #23
(after Jordan) blue and gold pinstriped jersey will be sold out
worldwide by the end of the week.

This has been a bad year for the NBA. Detroit Pistons coach Larry
Brown also coached the U.S. Olympic Team. That team of NBA stars was
hated at home and abroad. At home because it had no white players (the
euphemisms for white players are "roll players" or "pure shooters"),
and because it did have Allen Iverson, a perennial target for scorn in
the media (the corn rolls, the tats, the rap CD, the "I Don't Give a
F---" attitude). As well as a bunch of youngstas, including the two
high school-aged kids, Carmelo Anthony and Lebron "100 million dollar
man" James. Team USA got the Bronze. 

Kobe Bryant beating a charge of raping a white woman -- something that
just a generation ago would get a ni--a hung so quick so fast,
innocent or guilty -- didn't help, either.

It is widely felt in the Black community that these players get hated
on because of their fame and fortune, attitude, gender and skin color.
It is also widely felt among blacks that a lot of them bring the
negative attention onto themselves. (See Kobe and O.J.) I've watched
as the media and dominant culture has become less and less tolerant of
these coddled multi-millionaires. Much of the criticism stems from
perceived "lack of effort" or "selfish play," or "too much attitude"
and "too street/ghetto."

We've also seen these well paid, attractive and well conditioned
negroes self-destruct, blow their money, turn their backs on the
community, build hospitals and community centers, take care of legions
of their extended families, do gang prevention and anti-violence work,
get hooked on dope, sell dope -- whatever. They are the best and the
worst of who we are, living their public and private lives in front of
us. We root and boo. But it's with love.

The Black athletes who get love in mainstream America are molded after
Jackie Robinson, the pioneer Brooklyn Dodgers second basemen who broke
the color line in baseball over 50 years ago. Jackie got called so
many ni--as he probably thought it was his name. He was loved because
he took it.

Who knows what Artest was thinking as he punched his way out of his $6
million yearly salary. He wouldn't take the disrespect, and he's
paying for it. The upside is, he can focus on his independent record
company and his Destiny's Child-esque group Allure. Their single, "Uh
Oh" featuring Dance Hall reggae superstar Elephant Man, is aight. If
they happen to go platinum, Artest could make back much of his lost
salary. High John the Conqueror is watching this somewhere, smiling.
So am I.

PNS contributor Kevin Weston is a writer and editor-in-chief at YO!
Youth Outlook Multimedia (www.youthoutlook.org), a project of Pacific
News Service.

http://news.pacificnews.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=2705d9078454ca88b778ee01419c2e2e