Cam Newton gets black fatigue after Grambling brawl

A massive brawl broke out at halftime between the players of Grambling State and Bethune-Cookman this past weekend — which resulted in over two dozen players being suspended.

Grambling State and Bethune-Cookman are both historically black colleges and universities that ex-NFL star Cam Newton explained on “4th&1 Podcast with Cam Newton” are now “set back” by the students’ and the coaches’ actions.

“We are already at a deficit with visibility, and we literally just had a civil war over a football game. What?” Newton began.

“No matter if you in the MEAC, the SWAC, the SIAC, the OVC, if you’re a representation of blackness and black culture, you should look at this and say to yourself, ‘This set us back,’” he continued.

Immediately following the brawl, Grambling State head coach Mickey Joseph said the school wasn’t going to tolerate “disrespect,” and the school is “going to meet disrespect with disrespect.” While he later apologized, Newton still wasn’t having it.

“It set us back. Just imagine if you had College Game Day and a melee broke out in halftime versus LSU in Alabama. Certain things just will not happen,” he said.

“I don’t care what somebody else did. It’s what you did in retaliation to that,” he added.

BlazeTV host Jason Whitlock believes Newton’s response is real “progress.”

“One of the things I have to acknowledge about all of these athletes moving into the media space, they’re now acting or moving towards acting like media members. And that means they find themselves having to criticize people who allegedly look like them or share their skin color,” Whitlock says.

“And so when it was just us journalists out here doing it, if you were white and you called out Mickey Joseph and this foolishness, oh, you’re being racist. If you were black, you’re an Uncle Tom and a coon, and the athletes used to feel this way and say these types of things,” he continues.

“Now that they’re in the media … they’re looking out like, ‘Hold on, man, there are people that allegedly look like me or share my skin complexion who are doing foolish things that have to be called out,’” he says, adding, “Hats off to Cam Newton for calling it out.”

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