Wednesday, March 26, 2008

LeBron's Vogue Cover

Honestly, who has the time for this? Big news was being made of the fact that LeBron James was going to be the second male (I think) and first black male on the cover of Vogue. Now that the cover's been released, there's new controversy.



















The attention now centers around whether or not this is a controversial photograph. Is it depicting LeBron James as "King Kong clutching Fay Wray," thereby promoting black men as bestial? Or does it suggest there's a violent side to LeBron, and black men, regardless of whether or not you think he looks like King Kong? Maybe it's just an image that accurately depicts these two individuals; LeBron is powerful and HUGE while Gisele is a supermodel and, not suprisingly, beautiful. That's exactly what the photo shows, right?
I only mention this becuase I've already spoken to the issue of sensitivity and hyper-sensitivity in "Chelsea's Vitriol" and yes, it did occur to me that perhaps I was being too sensitive and critical about the whole thing. But now here I am wondering if I should be more offended by this Vogue cover. I feel "okay" with it. But should I? or should I be more sensitive?
For more on this, I found Jason Whitlock's article "Am I supposed to be mad about LeBron?" (and quoted it above). It didn't do much for me, but if you're interested, check out: http://msn.foxsports.com/nba/story/7955740/Am-I-supposed-to-be-mad-about-LeBron?MSNHPHCP&GT1=39002.

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