Football legend OJ Simpson, the American ‘system of injustice’ and Karma!

I remember it like it was yesterday. The death of football legend OJ Simpson last week brought back images of his acquittal for the murder of his ‘White’ wife.

Then MCJ Editor-in-Chief Tom Mitchell and I were listening to the radio in the production room when the verdict in the Simpson murder case was handed down.

We both held our breath and as soon as the ‘not guilty’ verdict was announced, we let out a sigh of relief—or maybe joy.

No, that doesn’t really explain it. A slap to the United States’ system of tyranny?

Karma? Yeah, that summed it up better.

But the decision drew 100 million television viewers, 90% White and outraged!

To say the White people were angry would be an understatement, and to be honest, their anger brought ironic smiles to the faces of the Blacks.

(White America) knew how we feel when the rich come down, while Black people get the electric chair for looking at White women, even though they were in a coma in another state when the crime was committed.

We hid that feeling of excitement we had for OJ’s decision and treated the racial aspect as a defense method of treatment in the case.

A racist cop, a glove that didn’t fit, and a legal team that propelled a Black lawyer to national prominence. It was enough to appease the curious.

On the contrary, the White/Majority/Mainstream media stopped losing the mass of disbelief and anger that was similar to their reporting (if there was CNN in the 19th century) of Nat Turner’s release for his righteous slave rebellion.

Three days after the verdict was handed down, the proverbial ‘other shoe dropped’ when I appeared for the weekly taping of the ‘Sunday Insight on Charles Sykes’ television programme.

All eyes were on me in the ‘green room’ before it hit. Not only was I the only representative of the entire Black community—hmmm—but the only person in the room who saw OJ’s release through the anti-racist rebellion: ‘what goes on, happens!’

Charlie was shocked at my justification. He wasn’t mad, just confused. He and millions of White Milwaukeeans, Wisconsinites, and Americans were scratching their heads and wondering: ‘How and why was Black America cheering (in the minds of Whites) for a ‘NO’ decision?

I tried to explain before and during the recording. But as the only brotha on the weekly panel I’ve been the target of White people in Milwaukee for expressing a different point of view.

(In fact, I remember a time when two of our employees had gone to a nearby emergency room after one of them sprained an ankle on the same day of the trial.

What was caring, compassionate and prompt care from the ER staff, quickly turned into anger and ‘indifference’ as the words ‘innocent’ echoed throughout the facility.)

I remember several angry emails and hate letters following the show.

And an angry European called and asked me to meet in the south.

Nope. I knew better than to cross Milwaukee’s ‘Mason-Dixon’ line to meet an angry White dude. I only cross the ‘line’ when I go to the airport or to Chicago.

Decades later, my feelings are the same; I still laugh at how White America reacted to a black man (small b) killing a White woman (capital W) and disappearing because he had the ability to do what White people do and have done for over 200 years: hire the best. Defense team money can buy.

And that’s why White Americans reacted the way they did: a black celebrity (small b) crossing an invisible line…the line of privilege (‘white privilege, to be exact).

Today, it is expected. Back then, it was a common thing.

What’s even more amazing about this support for OJ (if you want to call it that), is that most of us in the Black community “NEVER CONSIDERED ‘JUICE’ TO BE BROTHA!”

Many called him ‘Tom,’ found in a fantasy world, rejecting a beautiful Black queen (his first wife) for a White woman.

If OJ Simpson, a football legend, killed his Black wife in a jealous rage, it would be buried on the fifth page of many American newspapers (nothing new in the eyes of Whites in general).

Instead, we remember the case decades later, fanning the flames of a ‘system of injustice.’

Goodbye OJ Too bad you couldn’t bury America’s ‘system of racial injustice’ with you.

Hotel