Through Thick and Thin (Anthony Rizzo)

Take A Side

Anthony

One of the hardest things in life to do is to admit you're wrong. Especially when it comes to your beliefs and what you put your faith in. It's hard enough to even admit that the way you had been living is wrong. Let alone admit that what you've been doing, what you had been believing, is the opposite of who you wanted to be.

I'll admit, I had been tone deaf to the cries of the people less fortunate than me. Now, I know that I do a lot for pediatric cancer and their families when it comes to fighting off these horrible diseases. But that's only part of the fight that life gives us in a lifetime of troubles. It's not my place to have a say in what the black community goes through, I don't know the pain they know and I don't know the struggle they know either.

I do know that this nation is nothing without the black people who don't get any respect for the way they helped build this place. Yet they still compete as the worlds top athletes for this nation, they help make advancements in technology and medicine, they change the world we live in and still get treated as second class Americans. They fight to be seen as equal then get knocked down for wanting the bare minimum. We can love their music and their hair styles and their culture but we don't love them?

I guess I've never really thought about it because I've never been personally affected by racism. Guys like Dexter Fowler and Jason Heyward I talk to every day, but never about the struggles they go though as a black man in America.

Jazmyn challenged me to educate myself on the black lives matter movement. To see for myself, through my own eyes the reality of this situation and how to make it better.

So I decide to face time Jason and ask him some questions. He was a great leader and he had already spoken up about the BLM movement. He was educated and experienced in the subject and I know he would lay it to me hard. So I make sure he's okay with talking about these kind of things and when he assures me he is happy to talk with me I facetime him.

"Hey bud" he starts and I smile. "Thanks for reaching out to me. That means a lot" he claims.

"Of course. These are some trying times but I'm trying to be better" I insist.

"Love to hear it man. What kind of questions do you have" he wonders.

"How long has these kinds of situations been a thing" I wonder.

"Forever really. Since we were sold or stolen from our homes and shipped here then forced into slavery we've never been seen as equals. I mean, we got the laws to change but the people didn't. Yes we can drink from the same water fountains, but now we get stared down for doing so. We have the right to vote but we don't because we think our opinions don't really matter since that's what we've been told our whole lives. The sustain and hatred for the black community has always been there. From Emmit Till to George Floyd. From slavery to the projects. It's the same thing with a different face. It was the civil rights movement, now it's the black lives matter movement" he explains.

"Have you ever, you know, experienced racism" I question carefully.

He just sarcastically chuckles as he shakes his head. "From the day I was born I was ten steps behind everyone else. There's this thing called systematic racism where before I could even talk to defend myself I was assigned a target on my back. I had to grow up in a bad neighborhood, go to the bad schools. My education wasn't as good as it should have been, the group of friends I had weren't the best influences. From the start I was just another black kid up to no good.

Then I decided baseball was my way out of that system. I was gifted and I wanted to use these gifts for good. But being a black boy playing baseball was hard. I mean we celebrate Jackie Robinson for breaking the barrier, but that was just the start of the fight. I've been called the n word during a game, told that I don't belong in the league like we were in the 1960's again. I watched white men make money off of me then leave me to defend myself when I told them what was going on. I learned quickly that even with this kind of success I still will have to work twice as hard to see a ounce of credit.