Total fun: Attending an Oakland Raiders game!
The Raiders' last game of the season was on Christmas Eve this
year. "I really really really want to go see that game -- before they
sell out and become the Raiders of the Lost (Vegas) Ark instead." I told
a friend. "But I just can't afford a ticket." But I got on the BART
train to the Coliseum anyway.
Everyone on BART was all dressed up in silver and black. I pulled out my
sign. "Extra free ticket please?" Then a man sitting next to me
actually smiled, nodded his head, searched through his pockets, pulled
out a $130 ticket and handed it to me. Wow!!! Pure joy.
But wait. It gets even better. The game itself was amazing. Raiders
vs. Broncos. But far even better than that (and even better than the
Raiderettes' complex dance routine at half-time) was just hanging out in the stadium
and doing some heavy-duty crowd-watching. I've never done such serious
people-watching in my life.
The crowd was pure Oaktown at its best. And at Raiders' games here
in Oakland, Black and Brown men, women and children finally find
themselves in a majority for once in their lives, cheering for their
home team, big smiles on their faces too. Pure joy in their hearts as
well. 63,132 of them. I fit right in.
Best Christmas Eve ev-ah!
Plus the Raiders won too.
Maybe we could beg the team's owners to keep the Raiders in Oakland
where they belong? Money isn't everything, you know. Happiness also
counts a lot. Or am I just being naive?
PS:
"But aren't Black people also a majority in their own ghettos," some
historically-unaware grossly-insensitive person might ask. Seriously?
Of course Black people are also a majority in their ghettos. Sure.
Ghettos that they were originally forced into, herded into while
practically being tattooed with an IBM number, driven there against their will
by Jim Crow himself. Black people have made the most of their own bits
of land, but historically ghettos were designed as racial concentration
camps, segregation outposts and economic jails. America's greatest
shame since slavery. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8171378-the-warmth-of-other-suns
And as for Brown people? They are the very salt of the American
earth. They hold American society together with their ingenuity, humor
and hard work. Yet what kind of gratitude do they get in return? Being
called "Undocumented". "Illegal." And having their children viciously kidnapped. That's totally unfair. https://www.cbs.com/shows/madam-secretary/video/iSX903Bw8gQzdvMWlV3MBk_1ujdADSPI/madam-secretary-family-separation-part-1/
But at a Raiders game? They are all free. We are all free (except of course for the ticket prices). And isn't that what we all want? Freedom? And isn't that what America is actually supposed to be about?
And isn't
that what everyone else in the rest of the world wants too? Instead of
constantly being invaded by America's robot armies, constantly being
invaded by Jim Crow? Wouldn't just a little bit of Christian kindness
work better instead? America is supposed to be a "Christian" nation --
at least that's what we're told. Couldn't prove it by me. https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/01/04/yemen-where-no-one-hears-you-scream/
