Boston's Reputation as a Racist Town

joe cool23

joe cool23

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(Ska feel free to move this if you want)
This thread is a spinoff of what was occuring in the NBA Offseason thread in regards to the stigma Boston has of being a racist place.

I figured this article would be a good kick starter to get the discussion going.

[h1]
[h1]Playing Through the Pain[/h1][h2][/h2]
By John Gonzalez |

Ask sports fans from across the country to describe Boston, and you’ll hear this: “City of Champions.
Click to expand...
[/h1]
 
NooEra hasn't seen it or experienced it, so it must not be true.
laugh.gif


But yea...Boston has had this rep for as long as I can remember. Most recently, the racism reared it's ugly head when Joel Ward scored a game 7 OT goal that ended the Bruins season. To be fair, every city has it's bigots. And it's not totally fair to group all of Boston's fans amongst the idiots who take things further than they should. But it's out there.

*Let me ask...is the racism stigma attached to places that pride themselves on being blue-collar and staying true to certain nationalities that have their roots deeply embedded their respective cities? 
 
Can't see the article but the whole Joel Ward mess was just the latest embarassment for Boston sports fans.

I DEFINTLEY feel some sort of way about it.
 
Yea, every city has it's ignorance.
Vancouver desecrated Lucic's family's church, and he is FROM Vancouver.

A few people use sport to mask their hatreds.
 
By this time its an overblown rep.  New England is a very white place overall.  The state governor though is black, they have has a huge upswing in immigration over the past twenty years that has brought lots of Caribbean and Hispanic resident to the city/state.  The stigma will forever be there but I think a black man can live quite comfortably in Boston nowadays. 

Besides from the fact that it's Boston, ya know?
 
During his three seasons in Boston, Celtics center Al Jefferson was willing to discuss the issue of racism, though he never quite understood what the big deal was. “People always ask me if it’s true, if Boston’s like that,
 
I saw another article while I was reading up on the subject that mentioned that Bill Russell is more revered nationwide than in Boston in comparison to other Boston figures. Can any New Englanders confirm or deny this?
 
Boston specifically? No - I've never seen it in my on and off time there, never have had friends say they've experienced it. Plus, I mean, Boston consists of Roxbury, Dorchester, Mattapan, JP - and they would be anything but racist parts of the city obviously.

Surrounding areas in Massachusetts, though? Probably so. And I'm willing to be 98% of any Bruins 'fans' that caused that uproar were from those parts. But you have idiots everywhere.
 
Way to long of a quote on the article by OP to start this thread.

Also not trying to hijack but out here in the west side Arizona is also known for being one of the most racist states in America.

Lakers color analyst Mychal Thompson told a story of when the Lakers were in Phoenix for a couple road playoff games a few years back that the hotel the Lakers were staying at that he was in the hotel lobby and asked to see some expensive cigars and that he got discriminated on where the employee would not even take the cigars out of the display case for him to even look at them.
 
Originally Posted by NooEra

During his three seasons in Boston, Celtics center Al Jefferson was willing to discuss the issue of racism, though he never quite understood what the big deal was. “People always ask me if it’s true, if Boston’s like that,
Click to expand...
 
If a black athlete leads a Boston team to a title, people from Boston will definitely take it.

Still, there is no doubt in my mind that if they could somehow pick between a prime Bill Russell or a prime Larry Bird leading them to a title in 2012-13, they would choose Bird in a heartbeat.
 
boston is a tough place to get players to come and play at because of:

a) media
b) it's not a crazy "fun" city like a miami or LA or NYC if you're young, loaded, and single.
c) it's cold

i'd put those three things at the top of list before racism in terms of what makes players not want to play here. racism IS everywhere. boston definitely maintains the reputation after the joel ward incident, but for an athlete living in or around the city of boston, it is nowhere near as bad as people make it out to seem.
 
There's no place in the world where there isn't racism, even in some of the most "progressive" areas. I live in the Bay Area where it's extremely diverse and accepting, but even here there are pockets of racists here and there. And it's not even racist white people (unless you're in Livermore, Pleasanton, and any of those cities that barely count as being part of the Bay); the most racist people here are Asian immigrants. I went with a Viet friend to a Viet barbershop, and the things he translated for me were
eek.gif
   
 
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