During a brief interview with Inc., Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban wanted to make a meaningful point about the need to help people overcome their personal prejudices and bigotry when in a working environment – people that work for him, in particular. The whole idea was to state that he would rather try to help the prejudiced people to not be that way than to simply avoid them and judge them for not knowing any better.
The examples he provided to make that point, however, were what many focused in on instead. “If I see a black kid in a hoodie and it’s late at night, I’m walking to the other side of the street. And if on that side of the street, there is a guy that has tattoos all over his face. White guy, bald head, tattoos everywhere, I’m walking back to the other side of the street,” Cuban said.
It’s not absolutely clear if he was saying these are the prejudices he personally has or if he was just using some of these thoughts as an example for those who do have such thoughts, but it’s safe to assume the latter based on what the entire video was about. The statements he made on twitter, part 1 in particular, further supports the idea that they were just random examples used to make a point:
P/1: In hindsight I should have used different examples. I didn’t consider the Trayvon Martin family, and I apologize to them for that.
— Mark Cuban (@mcuban) May 22, 2014
P/2: beyond apologizing to the Martin family, I stand by the words and substance of the interview. — Mark Cuban (@mcuban) May 22, 2014
P/3: I think that helping people improve their lives, helping people engage with people they may fear or may not understand, — Mark Cuban (@mcuban) May 22, 2014
P/4: and helping people realize that while we all may have our prejudices and bigotries
— Mark Cuban (@mcuban) May 22, 2014
P/5: we have to learn that it’s an issue that we have to control, that it’s part of my responsibility as an entrepreneur to try to solve it
— Mark Cuban (@mcuban) May 22, 2014
Some still don’t seem to understand why Cuban used those examples, though, and went at him hard. While it’s understandable that some generally don’t like an example that closely relates to what happened with Trayvon Martin, it’s still just an example showing such prejudices exist (what happened to Martin is actually proof that such prejudice is very much real). First, it was Bruce Bowen. Then came Jalen Rose:
Hey @markcuban, what’s wrong w/a black guy wearing a hoodie at night? #confused #stereotype
— Jalen Rose (@JalenRose) May 22, 2014
Only dreaded hood wearers in this country are Skinheads. #Cuban
— Jalen Rose (@JalenRose) May 22, 2014
Only folks in this country that were crossing the street because they were intimidated were blacks when they saw whites. #segregation
— Jalen Rose (@JalenRose) May 22, 2014
@JalenRose nothing wrong with anyone of any color in a Hoodie. What about the rest of the interview?
— Mark Cuban (@mcuban) May 22, 2014
. @JalenRose hey Jalen are you a good judge of character when you first meet someone?
— Mark Cuban (@mcuban) May 22, 2014
@mcuban I respect u. Terrible analogy sir. Appearance(how you wear your pants, hood, haircut etc) doesn’t make you a menace to society.
— Jalen Rose (@JalenRose) May 22, 2014
@JalenRose of course it doesn’t I never said it did.
— Mark Cuban (@mcuban) May 22, 2014
Unfortunately for Cuban, he was strongly misunderstood here and probably had to deal with some unnecessary stress. Basically, though, this is a carry-on kind of situation.
Tweet of the Day: NBA All-Rookie Team Announced, Player Reaction
James Park is the chief blogger of Sheridan Hoops. Follow him on twitter @SheridanBlog.