Acting White: Straight Out Of Compton

You can take the Serena out of the Compton, but, after this weekend’s US Open semi-final melt-down, her old address is clearly still securely stored under favorites in the limo’s GPS, right in there with haughty addresses in S. Florida and S. California, for sure. I’m talking about her extremely liberal use of the f-word in a threatening manner to a lines woman, who foot-faulted her against Belgian Kim Clijsters, leading to a semi-final match-ending penalty.

Sure, she’s apologizing now and for real on the second go-round, but that’s probably only because of the e-word, endorsements. No company paying millions wants to be associated with a loose-cannon, ready to back up her physically threatening words, and forgetful of what it means to behave as a true champion.

In fairness, the lines woman should be exiled to Greenland. She compounded a wrong call, with a bad (bogus) call. Anyone who knows championship tennis knows that a foot-fault should never decide a game, a set, or a match. Everyone loses, both players, as well as the fans. It is unconscionable for a judge to insert themselves into the game this way. Nonetheless, it is even worse for any player, and certainly one of Serena’s caliber, to launch into such an expletive-laced tirade.

With all this said, let's step off the baseline for a minute for a point or two. The first is that Serena is known for comebacks, even at championship-point – she rarely gives up. So I believe her feelings of being ‘jacked’ (as they say in Compton) were real, even though most people watching thought it was past time to hoist a Belgian brew. No excuse, just the reality. Second, that lines woman posted the equivalent of Republican Joe Wilson’s “You Lie”, when she foot-faulted this future hall-of-famer, just when Serena’s got girlfriend Clijsters feeling over-confident.

So where did the lines woman get the ovaries to make that never-before-witnessed bad call, at the worse time. Perhaps, the same place that Wilson visited to rent the testicles to call President Obama a liar to his face, in front of Congress and the Senate, and the whole of America. Each was reflecting, whether they meant to or not, that in today’s Glenn Beck America, be you tennis champion or President, if you don’t look like my ideal, then prepare to get new, heretofore uncharted, mounds of disrespect broken over your 'uppity' ass. There, I said it. Deal with it.

James C. Collier

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