A couple thoughts on this Riley Cooper thing...

[Black Diamond Vol]

I've seen it speculated everywhere today that he will likely never play again; that he is now a poison to any NFL roster, and that no team will risk bringing that into their organization.  So to answer Vinnie's question, yes, he IS getting the Paula Deen treatment.  And I can understand the reasoning behind that.  What he said was stupid beyond belief.  But does anyone else find it ironic that the Eagles' starting QB, as well as the defacto team spokesman on this matter, is Michael F'ing Vick?

To summarize: say something stupid while drunk, you will likely never work again.  But kill dozens of animals in the most cruel, inhumane way possible and all you have to do is sit out a couple years, and teams line up to give you a second chance and beg you to take their millions.  What.  The.  fizzle.

Second, and I've seen this in several comment sections today: "Rappers use the N word all the time, so what's wrong with a white guy using it?"  On the face of it, that is a ridiculous question.  OF COURSE the rappers are using that word in a different context, and to equate the two situations is just stupid.  That said, when Kanye and Jay-Z use that word over and over on their records, and market said records to millions of white suburban OG wannabes, don't act all shocked and appalled when it begins to pervade our society.  Remember, Riley Cooper may be a quasi-celebrity pro football player now, but a few years ago, he was probably just another one of those anonymous kids who pumped Yeezy and Jigga through his Beats headphones to hype himself up before games.

[Tnphil]

Agree 100%..well said.

[Creek Walker]

Second, and I've seen this in several comment sections today: "Rappers use the N word all the time, so what's wrong with a white guy using it?"  On the face of it, that is a ridiculous question.  OF COURSE the rappers are using that word in a different context, and to equate the two situations is just stupid.

But IS the context different? Do we know Cooper's mindset or his intention? I'm not so sure.

Frankly, I find the entire notion that someone should have their entire career ruined because they opened their mouth and something stupid once to be completely absurd. We have become the United States of the Offended and we're worse off for it. And you're right about the black rappers. As extreme and hurtful as a word may be, you cannot take a word and say this is off-limits in society to the point that even newscasters refer to it as "the N-word" and then have every hit hip-hop song full of its usage, regardless of the context.

[Black Diamond Vol]

But IS the context different? Do we know Cooper's mindset or his intention? I'm not so sure.

Frankly, I find the entire notion that someone should have their entire career ruined because they opened their mouth and something stupid once to be completely absurd. We have become the United States of the Offended and we're worse off for it. And you're right about the black rappers. As extreme and hurtful as a word may be, you cannot take a word and say this is off-limits in society to the point that even newscasters refer to it as "the N-word" and then have every hit hip-hop song full of its usage, regardless of the context.

Supposedly Cooper was going off on a black security guard, so it sounds like there was some intent there.  But even if there wasn't, intent doesn't really matter when a white person says that word.  Like it or not, there is 400 years of hate-filled context there that is missing when black guys use it on each other.  That still doesn't excuse their perpetuation of the term all across pop culture, or when black guys use it in the locker room right in front of their white teammates.  Right or wrong, if someone hears it enough, eventually they're going to feel comfortable using it themselves.

And while I agree with the notion that someone shouldn't have their career ruined by something like this, the reality is that Cooper is employed by an organization that is 75% black, and it is very unlikely that he can ever be fully accepted in any locker room again.  If he were a hockey player or a NASCAR driver, he could probably just sit out a short suspension and move on with his career.  But not as a football player.

Steven A Smith actually had a very good take on this today (shocker, I know). 

http://espn.go.com/video/clip?id=9528310

[Volznut]

The problem is his peers. What % of his teammates are black? The reason teams will shy away from him is that he will not be openly welcomed by teammates, and that can create team chemistry problems

[VinnieVOL]

I know I shouldn't be, but I can't help but still be surprised at how these things just grow exponentially as the media gets ahold of it.  I mean, this is all national sports media has talked about for days.  And I know the biggest reason I don't get it is because I'm white and grew up around mostly whites.  Still, just the fact that uttering one single word can torpedo your entire career, and in some ways your life, just blows my mind. 

[Creek Walker]

I know I shouldn't be, but I can't help but still be surprised at how these things just grow exponentially as the media gets ahold of it.  I mean, this is all national sports media has talked about for days. 

And that's the problem. Does anyone think that the entire league would just wake up and decide, "I don't want that dude on my team" or is it fostered by the wall-to-wall obsession by the pundits and the media? This is a word that was used for so long by one race of people who were bent on oppressing another race of people, but at the end of the day it's still that: a word. And we're all humans; we have an inclination to forgive and forget. Sure, there's a stigma attached to this particular word, but people fly off the handle and say stupid stuff that they later regret all the time. What makes this one incident different? The constant badgering by the pundits. It's no different from the Paula Deen situation, really. People read in the paper that Deen admits in a court deposition that she said something racist and they say, "Hmm...that was stupid." And then they forget. Except the pundits harp on it and harp on it and, before you know it, her sponsors are dropping her.

It is as though the folks who influence public opinion in this nation have decided that they're going to shame people who say things they don't like or don't agree with, and it isn't just on this issue though this is obviously the most notable one. Racism should not be tolerated in any form or fashion, in any race. But does taking individuals who say something stupid at an inopportune time and putting them on a pedestal solving the problem, or is it fostering the problem? I'm going to save it fosters more racism, because of the inevitable backlash.