Martellus Bennett, Dallas Cowboys Tight End, Draws Ire for Stereotypical YouTube Video About "Black Olympics"

My late maternal grandmother always said, "if you have nothing good to say, it's better to just say nothing." This is so appropriate for Cowboys tight end Martellus Bennett, who just said he was "just having fun" when he filmed an offensive YouTube video about "Black Olympics." He also reportedly said that he doesn't expect the episode to warrant discipline from the Cowboys. I first learned about this offensive video when Kansas City Star columnist Jason Whitlock let loose on athlete and his brother, Michael, who is a rookie for the Seattle Seahawks. The two men competed eating fried chicken and watermelon and drinking Kool-Aid.

Bennett told the Michael Irvin radio show on Monday that he didn't intend to offend others, but doesn't think the video was racially insensitive. "I don't really think it's offensive," Bennett told Irvin. "It depends on your sense of humor and how you look at things. We were just having fun and it was very funny for me and my brothers, when I look at it I just can't stop laughing. If someone takes offense, I apologize. That wasn't my intention. It was just us having fun."

Bennett told Irvin he would not have a problem with a white person acting out something like the "Black Olympics." There's white comedians that do stuff like that all the time," he said. "I think it's funny to attack stereotypes. It's funny how people just put people in a certain light and say that's what all the people do of a certain race or particular person, so it's fun to attack those stereotypes." Source: USA Today

What you do in the privacy of your own home is your prerogative, but when it is put on YouTube, for example, then it becomes a real problem. The video was offensive and in poor taste. How can we ever expect to be taken seriously as a people when we go around perpetuating the same negative stereotypes that upset us to no end when a white person utters those same offensive words or caricatures us in that manner? Come on. Surely we can do better than this.

Martellus Bennett isn't the only one who should draw anger, his brother is just as complicit in this as he is. For the record, Martellus Bennett is no stranger to a YouTube controversy. The Cowboys already fined Bennett once for releasing a profanity-filled rap video on YouTube, but the fine was later reduced. It's amazing that the Cowboys could come out swinging against him with the profanity-laced video, but remain silent on the stereotypical and offensive video.

Rich Behm, 33, Dallas Cowboys Scouting Assistant, Permanently Paralyzed after Structure Collapses Due to Bad Weather, Three Others Hospitalized

The practice facility was supported by a steel
canopy structure. DallasCowboys.com

My thoughts and prayers go out to the family of Rich Behm, 33, a Dallas Cowboys scouting assistant, who was permanently paralyzed from the waist down after his spine was severed during the collapse of the team's "bubble" practice structure during a "microburst" spawned by inclement weather which moved through the state yesterday. He reportedly sustained a fracture to the thoracic spine (10^th thoracic vertebrae).

Behm was among the 12 people hurt in the accident, and was one of three Cowboys staffers who remained hospitalized. Also hospitalized were Joe DeCamillis, 43, the team's new special teams coach, sustained a fracture of one of his cervical vertebrae without paralysis, as well as assistant athletic trainer Greg Gaither, 35, who had surgery Saturday night to repair a fracture to the tibia and fibula in his right leg.

According to media reports, about 70 people, including 27 players attending a rookie minicamp, were in the structure when the storm hit. Wind in the area around that time was clocked at 64 mph. Officials from the National Weather Service said a "microburst" may have pushed the wind beyond 70 mph at the top of the structure that was built in 2003.

The no-frills building, which cost about $4 million, was pretty much a 100-yard football field with a few more yards of clearance all the way around. The roof was 80 feet high, the equivalent of an eight-story building. There may be some legal issues for Summit Structures LLC, which was involved in building the facility. According to media reports, a Pennsylvania court ruled in 2003 that the company was negligent in the design and construction of a membrane-covered building that collapsed in 2003 after a major snowstorm in Philadelphia. The building was constructed for the Philadelphia Regional Port Authority. I know this cannot fix the health of the injured, but if this company sold an inferior product, then they need to be held accountable.