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If you haven't heard by now, LeBron James has become one of the few men, and first Black male to grace the cover of Vogue magazine. In the cover shot, King James is posing with supermodel Gisele Bundchen clutching her waist and giving a scowl to the camera, baring his teeth. Some folks aren't happy about the cover, including ESPN.com columnist Jemele Hill who said the cover looks too stereotypical.
"Now, maybe the point was to show the contrast between brawn and beauty, masculinity versus femininity, strength versus grace," Hill wrote in her column. "But Vogue's quest to highlight the differences between superstar athletes and supermodels only successfully reinforces the animalistic stereotypes frequently associated with black athletes. A black athlete being reduced to a savage is, sadly, nothing new. But this cover gave you the double-bonus of having LeBron and Gisele strike poses that others in the blogosphere have noted draw a striking resemblance to the racially charged image of King Kong enveloping his very fair-skinned lady love interest."
Of course, Hill is referring to the poster of the classic King Kong film from the 1930's. Some fans have said that they didn't even think of the comparison until other people brought it up, others saw the correlation right away. Is this a bad look for LeBron and Black athletes in general? TAN at AOL Fanhouse doesn't think so.
Comments: (373)
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By: George B Vieto on 3/24/2008 3:06AM
Jemele Hill is making a big deal about nothing. LeBron is just having fun. But then again I try to find humor in things like this and some people raise a stink because it affects them.
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By: james on 3/23/2008 9:41PM
For #34 No need to get upset...unless you know I'm right. If calling me naive and stupid is your way of feeling better, then it just goes to show how closed minded you really are! Like I said, you have a problem with it, but Mr. James doesn't. You have to wonder who really is racist here.
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By: mark on 3/23/2008 10:50PM
i thought about it for a second and unless lebron is a animal this is foolish on our parts to buy into stereotypes of the blackrace being monkeys.
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By: AZ on 3/23/2008 11:18PM
For #38, I am hardly upset. But, you obviously are since you are the one calling people racists and using exclamation points in your dialogue. You're conveying your emotions with every post. "Unless you know I'm right"? Um, I think you're letting false confidence go straight to that empty head of yours. Perhaps you should focus your responses on the article written and not on my posts. I'm guessing this tit for tat you've started is the most action you've seen all day. Now, please go take a midol, your emotional rantings are becoming tiresome.
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By: YOUR TRULY on 3/24/2008 1:37AM
Its only small brain idiots that make something like this out of nothing but hey where would people be without the negative haters keeping them in the headlines.And by no way are we decendants of monkies but we do often beat are chest like some silverbacks.This is coming from yours truly akrons own Donte Johnson
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By: LJ on 3/25/2008 8:41AM
Fire the Vogue photographer, his choice was clearly intentional and he or she must have known it would be an offensive correlation. This cover is nothing to celebrate for Labron or any self respecting African American. Labron, you need a new PR manager as well!
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By: ProudSkinnyDime on 3/24/2008 6:18AM
12. A black woman will pick at, and complain about anything and everything when it comes to a white woman with a black male. Crabs in a barrel mentality.
JP at 6:52PM on Mar 22nd 2008
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This is not even about black women. It's about how whites think you look like an ape!!!
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By: ProudSkinnyDime on 3/24/2008 6:30AM
#35, calm down, you ape. We get it. You hate black women. Who cares!
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By: james on 3/24/2008 7:41AM
For #40 I get it. Your willing to argue "tit for tat" and say useless insults to try and prove yourself. To bad your not proving anything. I'm just saying if you find racism in everything you look at, maybe you should look at yourself. Thats all. No cheap insults. Unity in America starts with the individual.
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By: Darrick on 3/24/2008 10:19AM
Can somebody pahleeeze give me a break.I'm so sick and tired of people especially black folks primarily nit picking and scrutinizing everything a famous black mna or women does.White counterparts can do all of the above.they can pose on the covers of mags with us,they can play drug addicts,pushers,prositutes and murderer'sand get all the sorts of oscar's and accolade;s yet the second we do it our own people or so called moral code watch dogs are waiting in the wind ready to wave the finger declaring whats right and whats wrong as we are not intellegent enough to decipher fact from fiction entertainment or real life.It takes some one with nothing else to do in there lives to really conjure these things up.
Do you all remember the show The PJ's the same people attacked that saying it portrays blacks in a negative light now we're all sitting down gloating over Family Guy or the Simpson's.Since when do blacks have to have be held to such a holier than though standard.Whites portray real life and it's interpreted as a work of art or genious Black's do it and oh my goodness the NAACP magically appears out of no where ready to defend the common good or moral code of black folks.Give me a brek.It's mentatlity's like these that sold us into slavery or any other stupid ideology thats we hand down from generation to generation that keeps us damned up as a people.This is especially why I hate being around just one group of people particularly my own all it does is harbor ignorance and a manifestaion of the blame game.
Let that man or any other man,women person of color do their thing.I hope he gets a hundred more covers like that....Lebron do your thing man I ain't mad at cha.Because if it were Dirk Novitski or Peyton Manning on the cover with Rhianna or Gabrielle Union nothing would be said.Everytime we do something our own crab azz folks are waiting to pull us back down or drop what we are doing and then our counterparts pick it up and run with it.
Ask yourselves this you great watchdogs of Black American activity if there were a prime time black crime drama say like CSI or Law and Order that primarily focused on what went on in the hood as far as homicide,drugs,pedophile's(and yes the do exist)in the black communinity or your crack head uncle June Bug,and it got rave reviews would you let fly as another good show or would you attack it like say you did the Cosby's cimply because it portrayed blacks in a negative light or fake lifestyle...I swear it's folks like you that avoid like like the plague...wake up and come out of the stone age.
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