African-Americans Go From Being No Good At Sports To Being Only Good At Sports

[Martinus]

African-Americans Go From Being No Good At Sports To Being Only Good At Sports

The late 1940s and '50s saw a role reversal unprecedented in the history of sport, as African-Americans—once thought incapable of physically competing against whites—began dominating playing fields to such an extent that their athletic skills soon came to be seen as their only contribution to society.

"Blacks have no chance against whites on the baseball diamond. They simply don't have what it takes to make the effort," Boston Red Sox owner Tom Yawkey told The Boston Globe in April 1947, echoing the nation's sentiments as Jackie Robinson made his major-league debut.

But two months into the season, Yawkey gave a follow-up interview in which he once more crystallized the thoughts of white America, saying, "Well, naturally, Robinson is out there running faster, jumping higher, and hitting the ball farther. Blacks are, if nothing else, more athletically gifted than whites. Sports is what they're good at."

This changing viewpoint was soon echoed by notable sports figures, politicians, typical American citizens, Ku Klux Klan members, and University of Kentucky basketball coach Adolph Rupp, who for years had refused to recruit black players because of their alleged unsuitability for athletics. After losing the 1966 NCAA Championship game to an all-black Texas Western team, however, Rupp said that the loss didn't surprise him.

"Blacks have a clear physical advantage over whites because their years of slavery made them genetically stronger and more athletic," Rupp said after the 72-65 defeat. "But they'll never be great doctors and lawyers. They don't have the mental capacity for something like that."

"I'll put it this way," Rupp added. "We'll never see a black head coach, team owner, or president of the United States."

At the time, certain controversial figures also claimed that blacks tended to display a certain talent for music, although most of them admitted that said music was only palatable when interpreted by white American or British artists.

The Onion is at its finest when it just displays a mirror to reality.

[HisMajestyBOB]

Funny, if you replace "African-American" with "Gay" and "white" with "hetero", you get the typical article Marty froths over.

[Josquius]

I recall reading a theory that the most inherently superior humans are New Guineans.
Wheras we white people have a few millenia of farming and sub-par folk breeding they've been stuck as hunter-gatherers in the jungle for all time and hence only the best survive.
So lets hope they don't get atomics.

I don't really get this onion article. Seems fairly like something that could have been written a few decades ago to me.

[Martinus]

The humour (at least for me) comes from the realisation how stupidly racist people were only a few decades ago and, by extension, that many ideas we hold today about race or sexuality or what have you will seem equally silly to people in 50 years or so.

[The Brain]

You think today's racism is intelligent?

[Eddie Teach]

Funny, if you replace "African-American" with "Gay" and "white" with "hetero", you get the typical article Marty froths over.

Gays dominate (women's) sports.

[Syt]

Funny, if you replace "African-American" with "Gay" and "white" with "hetero", you get the typical article Marty froths over.

Gays dominate (women's) sports.

In women's tennis, I always root against the heterosexual.

[Eddie Teach]

I root for the cuter one regardless of orientation.

[Valmy]

In women's tennis, I always root against the heterosexual.

You rooted against Steffi Graf?!  TRAITOR!

[Syt]

I guess no one except Seedy or Ed will recognize that movie quote.

[Valmy]

I guess no one except Seedy or Ed will recognize that movie quote.

[derspiess]

I guess no one except Seedy or Ed will recognize that movie quote.

I also know a little German

[Syt]

I guess no one except Seedy or Ed will recognize that movie quote.

I also know a little German

He's sitting right over there!

[Ed Anger]

I guess no one except Seedy or Ed will recognize that movie quote.

I never cared for Top Secret that much.

[The Larch]

I guess no one except Seedy or Ed will recognize that movie quote.

I never cared for Top Secret that much.

Blasphemy!