http://www.colorfultimes.com/2010/07/sports/athletics/higher-ground/?ec3_listing=posts
by Paul Boakye
Jul 21st, 2010
It remains one of the most iconic photographs in sporting history.
Heads bowed, black-gloved fists raised aloft, on a sweltering hot
night in Mexico City, U.S. athletes Tommie Smith and John Carlos
propelled themselves into the history books.
The image still resonates with quiet dignity and a palpable rage that
is almost shocking to behold, especially in these politically
neutered times. We live in an age of bland sporting automata, steeped
in the language of PR, super-aware of their salaried roles as
ambassadors of Nike, Adidas and Reebok, and afraid of saying or doing
anything that might alienate their sponsors.
Contrast this with 1968, when sociologist Dr Harry Edwards declared
the 'revolt of the black athlete,' and added the voice of America's
black sportsmen to the civil rights movement. Dr Edwards was the
organiser of the Olympic Project for Human Rights (OPHR), and the
group's founding statement proclaimed that:
"We must no longer allow this country to use a few so called Negroes
to point out to the world how much progress she has made in solving
her racial problems when the oppression of Afro-Americans is greater
than it ever was. We must no longer allow the sports world to pat
itself on the back as a citadel of racial justice when the racial
injustices of the sports world are infamously legendary…any black
person who allows himself to be used in the above matter is a traitor
because he allows racist whites the luxury of resting assured that
those black people in the ghettos are there because that is where
they want to be. So we ask why should we run in Mexico only to crawl home?"
Smith and Carlos' distinguished, impassioned protest was to be the
defining moment of the OPHR, the '68 Olympics and for better or
worse of their lives. History will remember them as heroes and also
as martyrs. They made a stand for what they believed in and earned
immortality but they also paid a heavy for price for what they did
that night.
Tommie Smith was born in Clarksville, Texas in 1944, John Carlos a
year later, in Harlem. Both were raised in poverty Smith was one of
12 children, the son of a 'dirt farmer,' while Carlos lived in an
apartment behind his father's shoe store with his four brothers and
sisters. Like many young black men, sport seemed to offer them the
possibility of a better future, and their burgeoning athletic prowess
won them scholarships to San Jose State College. It soon became clear
that the two had the potential to become world-class athletes.
Smith went on to break records over 220 yards, 400 metres, and 440
yards, but his favoured distance was 200 metres, where his so-called
'Tommie-Jet Gear' allowed him to tap into a new burst of pace whilst
travelling at high speed, leaving opponents trailing in his wake.
However, in the Olympic trials, Carlos was to defeat Smith over 200
metres in a world record time, setting up the prospect of an American
one-two in the 1968 Games.
But Carlos and Smith had more on their minds than medals and records.
At San Jose State, they became friendly with Dr Harry Edwards, who
asked them, and all the other black athletes selected to represent
the United States in the Mexico Olympics, to boycott the games, in
order to bring the world's attention to the injustices facing black
America, and to expose how the U.S. used black athletes to project a
lie of racial harmony at home and abroad.
The late 60s were a time of change and struggle 1968 saw the
assassinations of Dr Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy; anti-war
protests coincided with the Tet Offensive in Vietnam, which saw the
U.S. lurching towards ignominy and defeat; only 10 days before the
games were due to begin, hundreds of students occupying the National
University in Mexico City were slaughtered by Mexican Security
forces. The atmosphere was ablaze with a revolutionary spirit that is
hard to imagine ever emerging again, especially in a U.S. that seems
to be docilely submitting to a right-wing hegemony left behind by
Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and Co, after an ever so brief fling with the
idea of change. While the proposed boycott did not occur, OPHR
members decided to compete in Mexico and protest individually.
Carlos, in particular, was by now a political firebrand who had been
in support of a full boycott. But, as he stated many years later:
"…not everyone was down with that plan. A lot of the athletes
thought that winning medals would supercede or protect them from
racism. But even if you won the medal it ain't going to save your
momma. It ain't going to save your sister or children. It might give
you 15 minutes of fame, but what about the rest of your life? I'm not
saying they didn't have the right to follow their dreams, but to me
the medal was nothing but the carrot on the stick"
However, he and Smith surely knew that their chance would come, as
they renewed their rivalry on the track and made swift progress
through to the 200m final, with Carlos establishing a new Olympic
record during the preliminary rounds. In the final, Smith drew his
least-favourite inside lane, and ran with a strained thigh muscle,
yet still came through to win the Gold medal in a then world record
time of 19.83 seconds, while Carlos finished in third to earn the
Bronze medal. Carlos controversially went on to claim that he slowed
down in the finishing straight in order to allow Smith to win as,
"the Gold medal meant more to him."
This was a comment typical of a relationship that was fractious at
best. The two were always colleagues rather than friends, as many
people have assumed. However, as they took to the podium, they were
in perfect harmony, coordinated in an eloquent, planned protest that
would send shockwaves around the sporting and political worlds, and
which would reverberate throughout the rest of their lives.
Stepping up to receive his Gold medal, Smith wore a single black
glove on his right hand which, when he raised it above his head, was
to symbolise black power in America. Around his neck he wore a black
scarf, representing black pride. Carlos wore a glove on his left hand
to symbolise unity in black America, and around his neck he wore a
beaded African necklace that he said was,"for those individuals that
were lynched, or killed that no one said a prayer for, that were hung
tarred. It was for those thrown off the side of the boats in the
middle passage." Both stood shoeless in black socks, to represent the
enduring, abject poverty of black America.
As the Stars and Stripes were raised high above the stadium in Mexico
City, and the bombastic strains of the Star Spangled Banner blared
out over the tannoy, Smith and Carlos raised their fists and lowered
their heads, disassociating themselves from the nationalistic
triumphalism of the moment and sending a message of rage and defiance
to the world. A thousand flash bulbs popped, history was made, and
the lives of John Carlos and Tommie Smith changed forever.
There is an interesting side-note in the creation of this eternal
image, in the shape of the silver medallist, Australian sprinter
Peter Norman. When studying the photograph, Norman seems to represent
a bland, white-bread counterpoint to the two black athletes. Their
outstretched arms seem to make them tower above him; they gaze
mournfully downwards as he stares, obediently, straight ahead,
cutting an almost gormless figure, seeming to personify all the
self-absorbed myopia of the white sporting world. However, Norman too
played a part in the protest. Opposed to his own country's pro-white
immigration policy, he grabbed an OPHR badge from the crowd, and wore
it on the podium in an act of solidarity with the two Americans.
The fallout from Smith and Carlos' protest was immediate and
devastating. The International Olympic Committee demanded that the
U.S Olympic Committee ban them from the games. The U.S. team refused,
but the IOC threatened to ban the entire American team, forcing the
USOC to climb down. Smith and Carlos were sent home in disgrace, to
face the wrath of a media who were both bewildered and outraged by
their gesture. As a 1967 U.S. News and World Report put it, athletics
was one arena, "where Negroes have struck it rich" that two black
athletes had chosen this forum to protest was perceived as uppity
ingratitude. The press showed no mercy. The athletes' bowed heads
were perceived as disrespectful towards the American flag, and the
clenched fists mistakenly interpreted as in support of the feared
Black Panthers. Yet, never afraid of contradicting themselves, other
media outlets described their "Nazi-like salute," with Chicago
columnist Brent Musburger dubbing them "black skinned
Storm-troopers." Time magazine ran a picture of the Olympic insignia,
replacing the motto "Faster, Higher, Stronger" with the words
"Angrier, Nastier, Uglier."
Carlos did little to placate a furious white America with his public
comments: "We're sort of show horses out there for the white people.
They give us peanuts, pat us on the back and say, 'Boy, you did fine'."
Smith and Carlos found themselves ostracised, struggling to find
work, and in receipt of regular death-threats. Smith was forced to
attend night-classes when he returned to college, and had to battle
to make ends meet: "A rock came through our front window into our
living room, where we had the crib…it seemed like everybody hated me.
I had no food. My baby was hungry. My wife had no dresses."
Smith was able to borrow enough money to complete his education, and
became a qualified teacher. He spent several years with the
Cincinatti Bengals American football team, later moving on to Santa
Monica College, where he remains as a social science and healthcare
teacher, and coaches athletics.
The outspoken Carlos found life even more difficult, being forced to
travel to find whatever work he could, spending time as a security
guard, a gardener, a caretaker. His situation became so dire that he
was forced to chop up his furniture for firewood to keep his family
warm. The stress of life as an out-cast was too much for his wife,
who committed suicide.
Years on, Smith and Carlos have been justly recognised as heroes,
being inducted into the African American Ethnic Hall of Fame in 2003.
But John Carlos still cannot rest: "I don't feel embraced; I feel
like a survivor, like I survived cancer." He is dismayed that his and
Smith's legacy seems to have been wasted by a generation of black
athletes who have reaped the financial rewards of sporting success,
but turned their back on their social and political obligations. He
believes there is still a battle to be fought, and is contemptuous of
those who believe that athletes should be seen and not heard:
"Those people should put all their millions of dollars together and
make a factory that builds athlete-robots. Athletes are human-beings.
We have feelings too. How can you ask someone to live in the world,
to exist in the world, and not have something to say about injustice?"
While Smith seems to have found some peace, Carlos' revolutionary
spirit cannot come to terms with today's insipid, apolitical,
hyper-commodified world of sport. He paid a terrible price for his
actions one hot night in Mexico City, but the image that was created
there will live forever as a beautiful symbol of defiance. Forty-two
years on it burns as fiercely as it ever did, still resonating with
all the possibilities of the human spirit. But, for John Carlos, the
fight goes on.
.
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