Paper Tiger?

Golf

Posted by Little SK, April 27, 2008 - 9:46 pm

You probably looked at the headline above and thought, wow is this D-bag going to wildly overreact to Tiger having knee surgery and not winning the Masters? Thankfully no. Tiger being ridiculously dominant at golf is actually the extent of my knowledge of the game (that, and Phil Mickelson has perky moobs). This post is going to be about Tiger off the course.

In the sports dead zone between the Super Bowl and March Madness, the most exciting presidential race in recent memory took center stage. Barack Obama shocked the world with his success on Super Tuesday and kept rolling throughout the month of February. As Obama-mania swept the country, I couldn’t help but notice the silence of another prominent biracial American. When the subject of race finally reared it’s ugly head (beginning with Hillary Clinton, who like Jake LaMotta refuses to go down, and her not-so-subtly racist ‘3 am’ ad, and culminating with the inflammatory comments of Obama’s pastor Reverend Wright) the recent history of Tiger and Barack became too closely tied to ignore.

On March 18, Obama responded to the Reverend Wright controversy by giving what most observers, including some conservatives, called the most important speech in modern political history. He didn’t try to pander or politic his way around the issue. He confronted it head-on with an honest, intelligent and realistic assessment of what race means in America and why it’s continually such a difficult problem to resolve. Obama didn’t offer any quick fixes, but he managed to leave us with the message that we can and must break from the patterns of the past while moving forward towards a future of working together.

In January, Kelly Tilghman of the Golf Channel used the word “lynch” to describe how the other golfers on the tour should deal with Tiger’s dominance. Tiger called the incident a non-issue and it was seemingly resolved amicably between himself and Tilghman. Ten days later the editor of Golfweek magazine, David Seanor, was fired for using a picture of a noose to illustrate the controversy.

Again, Tiger responded with basically silence. He just kept swinging his clubs and winning. Should he have taken this opportunity to reinforce to America that it’s not okay to say words like “lynch” and print pictures of nooses, regardless of the intent or context? Should he have used his considerable platform to educate Americans of all races about the power of words and symbols? For someone who once described to Charles Barkley that on his first day of kindergarten, he was tied to tree and had nigger spray painted on him, shouldn’t Tiger have insights about race in America to share with us? Does dismissing the lynch/noose controversy as a “media-driven” matter help America move past our ugly racial history?

Well, you might say, Tiger’s not a politician, he’s a golfer. Barack Obama wants to lead the entire free world, of course he has to respond publicly and forcefully. Tiger just has to play golf.

But Tiger isn’t just a golfer. His role as a corporate endorser means he can wield considerable influence. But is that influence enough to affect what we say and think about minorities? Can Tiger’s ability to sell Buicks and Nike gear and Gatorade affect as much change in how we live our lives as Obama’s work as a political leader?

Even if Obama wins in November, I don’t think the answer is as obvious as it seems.

Let me illustrate with a short anecdote: My buddy at work, Mike, has a 10 year old little brother at home. When Gatorade’s new off-field hydrator G2 (full disclosure: I work for Gatorade) first hit the shelves a few weeks before the Super Bowl, he took a couple of bottles home for his family. The little brother immediately declared G2 to be disgusting and unworthy of his pallet. During the Super Bowl, Gatorade capped off a huge promotional push with a couple of spots starring Derek Jeter (coincidentally also biracial) with cameos by Peyton Manning and Bill Parcells. The following Monday, Mike reported back that the same little brother had now requested more G2.

Can famous athletes, the vast majority of whom are black, turn that kind of influence into real political change? Should they? Or should they stick to MJ’s “Republicans buy sneakers too” mantra? (In fairness to his Airness, that comment was made in response to whether he would support Harvey Gantt, the Democrat running for Congress against North Carolina Senator and noted bigot Jesse Helms. Jordan later did contribute to Gantt’s campaign and has publicly endorsed Obama in this election). Is it our place to tell athletes what they should care and speak out about? Isn’t it their prerogative to keep their politics to themselves?

You won’t find a more forceful call for Tiger to become something more than a corporate pitchman than Alvin Lau’s poem on Def Poetry. (Goosebump warning…about 1:18 in…”Until the bruises on my back spelled college bound!”)

I first saw that performance over a year ago, and I can honestly say I still don’t know where I stand. Part of me thinks it’s a shame that most people want sports to be their distraction and nothing else. It’s slightly hypocritical that fans expect athletes to be role models and to be model citizens, but they would rather not have their heroes stand up for what they believe in.

Part of me wishes we had a Muhammad Ali or a John Carlos and Tommie Harris for our time. But another part of me sees it as pretty unfair to expect Tiger to use golf to change the world. Besides, just by being as successful as he is, hasn’t he already changed at least some perceptions?

There’s a lot of questions in this post, but unfortunately not a lot of answers. For now, maybe it’s enough to get the conversation started. Maybe.

Photo credit: ibenimages.com, Stopmikelupica.com

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