Dear White Clemson Fan. — Dante Stewart
When white Clemson fans get tired of Black lives.
www.dantecstewart.com
Dear White Clemson Fan.
As a former Clemson student athlete, the comments I see made on something as simple as a Black Lives Matter sticker on the helmets are atrocious, and not to mention, incredibly racist. It's so interesting that so many of you want Black bodies to perform well for you—as one white Clemson fan recently put it, Saturday is my time—but when it comes to those Black bodies standing in solidarity with other Black bodies, then somehow it's a distraction.
For some reason many of you don't have a problem with young Black athletes using their platforms for Military appreciation game or Breast Cancer Awareness Month. I'm trying to put my finger on what the problem is. Hmmm. It is not the platforms you don’t like. I think I can assume many of you praised Tim Tebow who kneeled in prayer or Jonathan Isaac who didn't kneel when others did. But you don't like them using their platforms, that they earned, to fight for Black lives as a way of telling our story, remembering our lynched, and holding both America, its people and our university accountable. Our bodies forcing you to see the ways in which our Black bodies have been forgotten, marginalized, abused, and oppressed, both on and off the field. In the classroom and in the community.
It's one thing to be ignorant, it's another thing to be arrogant, and it's quite another thing to be both at the same time.
We have loved both a country and people who have not loved us back. In case you didn't know, there are many Black alumni, Black taxpayers, and Black donors who too have made both America and Clemson what white people imagined as “great”. So that means it also belong to us, who are fighting for our lives, our children, and students who look just like us. We Black people have constantly given room to honor your white fallen of America (whom we are apart of), your white dead in 9/11 (whom we are apart of), as well as your white people who are struggling with Breast Cancer (whom we are apart of). We have helped shine light on your struggles, rightfully so, even at the expense of people remembering us. We have stood in solidarity with you publicly to give them room in hopes that room could be given to us as your fellow American and fellow Christian. You know #NeverForget….unless we’re talking about slavery, Jim Crow, white supremacy, or any other topic about Black lives that don't center white people or make white people comfortable.
It just may not be the game-day platform that you have a problem with but what they are using it for: to stand in solidarity with Black lives, to tell the truth about our country, your place in it, and to work for a more democratic future that believes Black lives are worthy of equality, freedom, and justice. “It is certain, in any case,” the essayist James Baldwin wrote, “that ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have.” Baldwin is right. He speaks of what many Black bodies are experiencing of the white Clemson fan today.
The question is: If indeed game-day belongs to everyone, which I believe, did you even for a second think that "everyone" includes us Black people? What about Clemson University? Our ancestors bodies are buried right next to the field our Black bodies perform so well on. It is ours as well. What about this country? Our bodies have paid the ultimate price. This country, America, it too is ours. You can't say you love us and be okay with what our history has meant to us. You can’t be okay with what continues to happen to people who look like us. You can’t just be okay with us running plays right on the field at Clemson but don’t believe us when we tell the truth on the field of America. Yet, far too many of you are okay with the way things are, far too many of you are okay with apathy, far too many of you are okay with a narrow idea of who "everyone" is, who “we the people” are, and who the Tiger Paw belongs to. But then again, such forgetfulness, such apathy, such hostility, makes you American, very American.
Americans, particularly white Americans, have always had a problem with Black bodies being free bodies. It is Black people who have had to fight for our bodies to be loved and remembered. Quick history lesson: the Black body in America, especially on the sports stage, has always been political. From the beginnings of Jack Johnson’s sturdy Black body taking the white world by storm in the boxing ring, Muhammed Ali refusing to fight in what he called the white man’s war, or even one of our own beloved defensive backs, Marion Reeves, who turned the white Tiger Paw black by becoming the first Black athlete to play on the field in 1971. Meaning wherever we went, we have always been a mirror for you to see both the worst and the best of America. We have been met with insults, beatings, blaming, policy to keep us out, punishments, and all the more, yet we still show up because this country and these sports are ours as well.
So I suggest, the white Clemson fan going on their loud-and-racist-and-dumb rant, sit this one out, enjoy the tailgate, beer, and sing with us, "God bless the America that will love Black people and display the worth of Black life." Where the blue hills yawns its greatness, Black bodies are there, alive, beautiful, and saying with a loud voice: Black Lives Matter! Screaming loud for all who can’t breathe, run, sleep in their beds with loved ones, pray, march, drive, walk, play with toys, save the day, and just simply live. Whatever change has been made, both at Clemson and in America, it is not because both have been so good, but that we refused to shut up and just play ball.
Our Black bodies that run fast, jump high, and give many of you white Clemson fans stories to talk about with your families and friends, are the same Black bodies that matter when we tell the truth of America and what needs to change.
Black Lives Matter! Go Tigers!