Best Walkoff Video Ever...File under thirst

Race at the Movies: Color or Lack There of in Films

by Shaebaun "Suge" Benjamin

In 1916, D.W. Griffith made history and broke ground on the art of film making when he directed and released Birth of Nation. The film was a loose a interpretation of the Reconstruction Era that took place after the American Civil War in the southern U.S.

It took the time to carefully make fun of blacks and northern republicans will making the vile Ku Klux Klan seem like The Avengers.

Although freed slaves were featured as sex-crazed and violent towards whites, basically making them the antagonists of the film, the main villains were played by white actors in black face.

In 1963, the love story of Cleopatra and Mark Anthony was released featuring Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor. At the time it was the most expensive film ever made. Joseph L. Mankiewicz was the director.

The Egyption Cleopatra was played by the very much Caucasian Elizabeth Taylor.

On December 12, 2014 acclaimed director Ridley Scott will release Exodus: Gods & Kings which will tell the biblical tale of the Hebrews escape from Egypt and the Pharoah Ramses led by Moses.

Based on the trailer I can tell this will at least be a decent film that displays the plagues and the parting of the Red Sea.

Moses is played by the Welsh actor Christian Bale and Ramses is played by Joel Edgerton, an Australian actor.

Edgerton is fine actor whom you may know from The Great Gatsby and Warrior.

My problem with this is that in the 150 years of film making, we still have white actors playing the parts of people of color.

Perhaps in 1916 the idea of having an actual black man chase a white woman to her death might be too much for society to handle at the time.

And in 1963, it may have been too much to hire Diahann Carroll or Dorothy Dandrige to play Cleopatra when making a film with a then "unheard of" budget.

But here in 2014 there is no good explanation as to why an Egyptian character is being played by a white Australian actor with a spray tan.

There are plenty of Eastern African or Middle Eastern actors that may have made names for themselves while playing Ramses. As I said before this is no knock on Joel Edgerton, but this should have been an opportunity for ethnic actors to play a main role in what seems to be an epic film.

Race in film is still very much an issue, not as big of an issue in the past, but surely still an issue.

In early 2014, a reboot of the Fantastic Four films was announced to include Johnny Storm, the Human Torch, played by Michael B. Jordan. Storm is usually portrayed as white and will now be played by an African American. This was met with harsh criticism by staunch fans of the comic book. It also happened with Idris Elba playing Heimdall in both Thor films. But there is hardly any uproar when characters of color are played by whites.

No longer are African Americans constantly portrayed as domestic servants or submissive characters as in the early eras of film nor as pimps or drug dealers in the blaxploitation era.

A few years ago a film named The Help was released and met with plenty of critical acclaim. I was not too happy at the idea of a film about black maids in the 1960's and being able to overcome only with the help young white news reporter. As I saw the film, it was just as I had thought.

A joke made in Robert Townsend's Hollywood Shuffle stated that black actors would always have jobs as long as they continued to make "slave movies."

Another issue of race in film is the portrayal of romantic relationships between races.

Zoe Saldana is phenomenal actress. In most of her films she is involved romantically with white actors even when she plays aliens in films such as Avatar and Guardians of the Galaxy. As far as I can remember, the last film she was in opposite a black actor was Drumline with Nick Cannon in 2002.

It is very rare to see a major film with an black actor being romantic with a white actress.

In the film Hancock, a romance between Will Smith and Charlize Theron is only displayed by her telling him they were alien lovers for over 200 years but they never get intimate, kiss, or even hug. In an earlier film featuring Smith, the love interest in Hitch was meant to be played by a white actress but replaced by Hispanic actress Eva Mendes.

Even in the 1980's the portrayal of white actress and a black actor was an issue film makers had to work around. Originally Beverly Hills Cop was to star Sylvester Stallone as Axel Foley and included a romantic relationship with Jenny Summers. When Stallone left and was replaced by Eddie Murphy the pairing of the two was dropped, likely because the Jenny role was already cast with a white actress. The relationship only goes as far as Jenny sitting on the bed of Axel's hotel room as he tells her his plan of busting her boss for murdering their friend.

Yet, Rae Dawn Chong was the "go-to black girl" to pair with box office stars like Arnold Schwarzenegger throughout the decade.

We have gotten to the point where we have an African American president and interracial relationships aren't as much of an "oh, look at them" thing anymore.

We ought to give people the chance to play their own race on different forms media rather than hiring someone and saying "let's get him a tanning bed and makeup" and as much as there ought to be a few relationships with two people of different races in film and television.

Can we talk about this?

The Carmelo Cash Grab: The Two Sides of Free Agency

by Shaebaun "Suge" Benjamin

It is Mid-July and the NBA Offseason as we know it is probably over.

I don't expect the Timberwolves to end up trading Kevin Love before the season, so maybe there might be a minor trade or two before September.

From here you will probably see  minor veteran minimum signings and players cut or designated to the D-League.

So let's talk about what happened that got us here.

Lebron returned to Cleveland, a magnificent story. Miami felt that Chris Bosh was worth $118 million for some reason and they also feel signing Luol Deng for 2 years is a franchise changing move. I think Lebron leaving moved Pat Riley ten years forward into dementia. Lance Stephenson will be blowing air into people's faces in a Charlotte Hornets uniform. Pau Gasol is Chicago's Carmelo plan B.

Now let's talk about Melo.

Of course the feeling if you are not a New York Knick fan your feeling is that he took money over a championship. He signed a 5-year $124 million contract with a full no-trade clause and an opt out after year 4. Much more than the 4 years and $73 million Chicago had to offer.

That's a $51 million difference. I know some of you are saying $73 million is a lot of money regardless. Well $51 million regardless.

The only thing Chicago could guarantee was the "chance" at a title with that contract. That's like giving someone a lottery ticket with 25% chance at winning because we can assume with Chicago, Melo would at least make it to the Conference Finals. But there are a pack of teams out west that would still beat that Bulls squad in the NBA Finals.

Carmelo Anthony emphasized wanting to be able to contend this season and thereafter. He consulted with Phil Jackson, Knicks president, on the offseason moves he made. Jackson highlighted that the Knicks may not be able to contend for a title in 2014-15 but would be able to have plenty of flexibility in 2015 and 2016 to make moves to make them championship contenders. He also offered him that max contract.

The NBA these days is structured in a way that promotes "superteams", but with a salary cap at about $60 million you cannot pay multiple players maximum money. So the term "sacrifice" comes up a lot.

This is why as fans we talk about players being greedy and taking money over winning. For instance I was mightily upset when former New York Yankees second baseman Robinson Cano left for Seattle. The Yankees had offered 7 years $175 million and Seattle Mariners offered 10 years $240 million and he took the latter. I hate that he left, but $65 million is a lot to pass up.

The people that don't sacrifice are the one's who get the trophy handed to them when the players win it, the owners. You never hear of any sacrifices made by them.

In the courting of Melo, the plan for Chicago was to acquire him by sign & trade. The Bulls did not have the necessary cap space to sign him outright. The name that kept coming up was Carlos Boozer, who is on an expiring deal for $16.8 million. The Bulls attempted to trade him rather than use their amnesty provision, which would clear cap space by paying him his full salary and releasing him.

Jerry Reinsdorf who owns the Bulls as well as the Chicago White Sox, one could assume, simply did not want to pay someone to not play for him. It isn't far fetched. Reinsdorf with a few other baseball owners were found guilty of collusion by an arbitrator in the 1980's. Collusion is the act of having an agreement with other owners to not sign a certain player in order to decrease their salary demands.

So the Bulls strategy was for the Knicks to facilitate moving their star by taking an unwanted contract and maybe some draft picks, probably not much else besides that.

That's like someone taking your nice leather couch in exchange for their ugly, stained couch and some coupons for a recliner.

Point is championships are far from guaranteed, which is why only a small percentage of players have them. You can only put yourself in good position to do so. Jackson offer that to Melo as well as the money he deserved. Money, at least in all sports except football, is all guaranteed and going for top dollar should not be criticized as vehemently as it has.

We all know the ones that criticize would not do it themselves. If you were working at Macy's you wouldn't take a paycut for the better good of the company knowing the CEO would still be jet-setting his family to Aruba and Italy for vacations year in and year out.

The other thing about Carmelo Anthony is that he was not leaving a 20 win team but a 37 win team coming off a down year with absolutely no leadership from the front office to the last man on the bench. Some would say that he did not deserve a max contract because he missed all three All-NBA teams. The man averaged 28.1 and 8 rebounds, you can't hold the fact that Raymond Felton was his point guard against him.

Phil Jackson arrived with a plan and implanted a coach with the tools to do well. They will have enough cap space to go after one or maybe two impact players in next year's free agent class and their first round draft pick.

Somehow in the past 2 months the thirteen-time NBA champion convinced Melo to take the money and follow his blueprint.

Jerry Reinsdorf and the Bulls offered a former MVP who relies on his quickness with questionable knees and defensively effective team. I actually speculated that the Bulls were sitting on their amnesty in the case that Derrick Rose's legs would give out yet again.

In actuality, they used the amnesty on Boozer because they could not work out a sign & trade for Gasol, involving him.

Lebron James' contract with Cleveland is only for 2 years but he smartly did so. The maximum contract and salary cap is decided by the result of revenue the league makes, which is why there was a lockout in 2011. This issue was the amount of revenue the players would receive. In 2016, the NBA's television contracts are up. With the league being the second most watched in the country and the second most popular sport in the world those contracts will be worth a lot.

The owners are always in good position to make money. Whether it is through television money or the sale of their team. A truly ignorant man will sell his franchise and make more than any other owner in history all because he made some sensationally idiotic comments to a female companion.

So Lebron has done this not as threat to leave Cleveland but as a way to insure that as the best player in the league he is paid as such.

If the owners continue to collect money and improve their ring and trophy collection, so should the players.

Derek Jeter...

What Happens When Men Are Honest...

I thought I add this video as bit of social commentary 

Men & Their Damn Feelings

By Shaebaun "Suge" Benjamin

For every romantic relationship you have, you stand to lose 2 or 3 close friendships in that period of time.

Much is made about men and their emotions. Men should be macho and the devoid of feeling. Those who show emotion have ostracized and called "bitches" or "pussies". On black twitter we call that acting "light skinned". 

While browsing through my timeline on twitter, I find many men, several of them friends of mine gathered up in emotion complaining of problems with their women, problems finding women, sometimes an angry deposition to women in general.

A while back I jokingly went on a tirade with the help of my roommate to portray myself in a woeful state brought on by a woman. In reality at the time had been talking to 3 or 4 women at the time. Not really caught up with any of them. But I will give a quick rundown:

Girl 1

Me and my two friends as well as another student rented a house where of course we threw parties. At one such occasion this girl whom my best friend had relations with 2 years prior had brought a friend to our party. My friend made off with his old flame and I took the young lady to my room. I attempted to make out with her but she hesitated because she had a boyfriend in the army. After a while I cut my losses and bid her adieu. We texted a bit and I'd say hello every now and again because she worked the front desk at a common place on our campus. I made a massive contact list to send a group text to everyone alerting them of a party of ours. One night I stepped on a landmine. I sent the text at 8:00pm, she texted back at 9:00pm and the longest "argument" I'd ever had with a woman started. We "talked" from pregame to party, party to mid-party, all while I was entertaining guests. She went on and on for about 3 hours while "laying next to her boyfriend" and I got to the point that I figured "this girl wants to cheat on her boyfriend with me but, god, she's trying to convince herself that she shouldn't by trying to convince me she shouldn't and I'm getting a fucking headache from this". We never texted again and I tried to avoid her at all costs in public.

Girl 2

This one was a freshman and I was what you'd call a super senior, I was 22 at the time. I'm a big USC football fan and we were about to throw a party on a Saturday. A bunch of my roommate's teammates came to our house to pregame. I was upstairs watching the Trojans blow a game to Arizona State. You know, one of those 14-11 games. This girl shows up and starts wilding out all over the place, one of the girls Aziz Ansari calls a "whoo girl". Fuck her. She had a friend with her who was the polar opposite it terms of personality but equal in attractiveness. I couldn't stand any of those dudes so I stayed out of the kitchen except to grab a beer or a drink. I went down and grabbed a beer and looked at this cute little thing looking like a lost puppy. We talked for a little and got her number. We texted and ate together a few times. She was an athlete so I promised to come to some games (I never did, I had no car, so I car pooled with my friends to campus). She texted me out of the blue and asked if I was just talking to her for sex. This is the moment of truth, how you answer this question shows your mettle as a man. I feel that when a girl asked you that question you ought to answer with your heart. If it is "yes" say it. If it is "no" say it and mean. If you lie, you are setting yourself up to be a scumbag. I said "no" because honestly I had never thought of sleeping with her...since the first time we met. She took my word for it. Then one night at a party she got too drunk and so I begged my friend to take her to her teammate's place where I helped her by making sure she was hydrated and took her and her friend back to her dorm. She texts me the next day and shows her gratitude by telling me she only thought of me as a friend. 

Here's some insight into me; I don't believe in the friendzone or being friendzoned. Understand me ladies, I have more than enough female friends, meaning women whose company I enjoy in a completely platonic manner and no romantic feelings. As soon most women understand that, the sooner they will stop calling men immature for not talking to them after they rebuff their advances.

Girl 3

The bane of my existence. When a girl compares herself to another girl who's sheer mention haunts a university, you ought to get away. The other girl was an insufferable broad who sought drama like I seek a new burrito joint in the city (that's a lot). They said my girl resembled this girl. I didn't see it because I never found that girl attractive. Girl 3 was from the same area as my best friend so he knew her for a while. They buddied up on the fact that their exes were dating. Then an incident occurred, I can't go into detail, but it was not fun. My friend and her became enemies but her and I grew closer. We tweeted cute things to each other (if Timehop brings them up I might vomit on the spot). We texted. Fact of the matter proximity was a problem. I say that because there was another guy who lived in her dorm that was talking to her (and likely much more) while he was also talking to an ex of my best friend (they were all involved in the above incident). This guy had it out for me and my buddy. He would stare at us at parties, at school, in the cafeteria, everywhere. Either he wanted to do something, or felt we were going to do something. Girl 3 loved all of it. She appreciated the attention. She probably had to change her underwear every time she thought of us beating the shit out of each other. Truth be told, because of something stupid I did the year before, I would never do something impulsive because of woman. More on that later. Should I also mention that the other guy showed up to my house and says to me “-----------, you can have her dog, we shouldn’t be fighting over hoes”. I told her of this gentleman saying I could have her as if she was the last slice of pizza and he called her a hoe in the same sentence and she still went on to have a relationship with the guy. Suffice to say I walked away because those two were made for each other.

After all of this I remember something my much more intelligent older sister advised me to during my freshman year of college, I'm paraphrasing, "Don't wife these bitches, hit it and quit it, son", she has her masters she knows what she's talking about. In all seriousness, what she meant was that college is a tough environment as is with education, social life, partying, and keeping up with family that to add the headache of relationship could be too much.

Throughout life I feel there will be people that you get involved with that snatch a piece of you that you need and they don’t really want but they take it anyway. It’s happened to me in the 8^th grade with a young lady that has done very well for herself and yet again during the best year of my life so far.

That year I did very well in school because I took more writing and literature classes, so I played to my strengths. My intramural team won the championship, which to a non-athlete that likens himself to one is a great feat. My social life was awesome. I met lifelong friends and had very few enemies. I was actually truly happy.

Then, let’s call her Girl X, Girl X came into my life. She wasn’t particularly great looking, a 6.5 or a passable 7 on some days if the sun lit a certain way. Her friends hung out at our suite which was almost like a hotel a few times a week. For some faint reason I felt an attraction.

I had always been shy from kindergarten to even this day when it came to girls especially the ones I really liked.

I went away for Thanksgiving break and went out with my boys from back home and texted her from this bar through the urging of my friends after telling them how I felt.

She was never concerned about ruining our friendship or anything so I convinced her to give us a try or at least I thought I did.

She made half assed efforts to hangout and get to know each other. I find that much more agonizing than friendzoning. At least if I was friendzoned, as I said before, I would have got out of dodge, by promising to keep things platonic but never speak to her again.

Apparently she had eyes for a friend of mine, actually the first person I told I had feelings for her to, ironically. But, unfortunately for her he was already courting another girl and saw Girl X as a “friend”. Also my friend and I were going through some issues at the time, as a matter of fact our entire group had internal issues like the 1977 Yankees or something.

With all of this going on my head was all over the place. I didn’t eat much and wasn’t much fun to be around. I became a caveman. I was like the kids on South Park when Bebe got boobs.

Here’s the thing I regret, and I will finally admit it here, and apologize to my buddy again.

I was walking down some stairs at a party and he was walking up. I passed him and he passed me. He reached out to embrace me and shoved him off. He yelled up to “what’s your problem bro”. In reality that meant, why are you pushing me away I’m your friend. But, my dumbass, at the time took it as “Alright asshole, your girl likes me, get over it.” I hurled an open beer can at him and a bunch of dudes grabbed us and separated us.

The next day, I played it off saying it was about the conflict in our group and not the girl. To be honest until recently I believed that myself. But, it was about her.

It’s been a while but I still see her and questions pop up in my head.

“Why did I want her?”

“Do I still want her?”

“If I she texted me out of the blue and said she realized she wanted me, how would I feel?”

I could have lost a good friend I had good times with that day. Fortunately I didn’t but our relationship is definitely different since the “beer throwing” incident.

So when you talk about men and their feelings, here are mine and their reasons. Share yours, instead of whining randomly on social networks leaving you open to ridicule. Since I was open about my experiences drop some of yours “anonymously” in the comments so we know why you feel that way.

Oh, and here’s the 2012 Intramural Championship Team,