Tiger Woods, the "Cablinasian" that almost everyone in America but himself considers Black, refuses to make reference to race "except when he’s getting paid tons of cash by the second" and the script calls for it. Pretending to neutrality, he actually "sides with those who say, ‘Race is no big deal so let’s just get past it.’" The young golfing great compares unfavorably with Jackie Robinson, Muhammad Ali, Jim Brown and other super-athletes who put their fame at the service of the oppressed. "We want him to stand up and stop acting like he was put together by Buick, with Buick parts, and stop acting like being black and a minority in this country has nothing to do with him."

 

A recent headline read, "Tiger stays neutral on Golf Channel, Golf Week controversy." I want to call Tiger Woods a coward, but that would be inaccurate. A more accurate description would be that he is a narrow, cold, calculating businessman who, according to Fortune magazine, made $100 million in 2007 in endorsements alone.

 

Most are already familiar with the Golf Channel’s Kelly Telighman joke about the only way to stop Tiger Woods is to, "lynch him in a back alley" and the subsequent decision by Golf Week to run a picture of a noose on its front cover to bring attention to the inside article about Telighmans’ gaffe. And most people know that Tiger just shrugged it off saying, "it was unfortunate."

 

No, Tiger: what’s unfortunate, is that you passed on a chance to set the record straight. Like it or not, he could have brought some understanding to the controversy. What most folks wanted from Tiger – or at least what I wanted – was for him to say, "Listen, any reference to lynching or nooses is offensive to my people, it’s a reminder of times when my people were victimized for no other reason than being black." What we wanted him to do is point out that his friend’s slip of the tongue would be as wrong as joking that Jewish golfer Corey Pavin be gassed, or that a female golfer be raped, or that the Japanese golfer Isao Aoki be jap-slapped, or interned, or nuked. We wanted Tiger to say it wasn’t funny and it minimizes something that was indeed very tragic

 

To our grave disappointment, that didn’t happen and likely will never happen, despite our hopes and dreams. And even despite efforts by white writers to shame him. Apparently, Tiger can’t be shamed.

 

Ironically, young Mr. Woods keeps trying to run away from race, but it has old Tiger by the tail. He keeps telling folks that he is a member of the "human race." But everybody in America sees him as a black man.

 

When Tiger first appeared on the scene – because he was a record setting black man – he told Oprah Winfrey in 1997 that he was "Cablinasian." According to Tiger this was a combination of Caucasian, black, Indian and Asian. He was rebuffed at the time by former US Secretary of Defense Colin Powell, who is light skinned as well. "In America, when you look like me, you’re black," Powell explained.

 

After Tiger’s history making win at the 1997 Masters Fuzzy Zoeller said, "tell that ‘little boy’ not to serve fried chicken and collard greens next year…or whatever the hell it is ‘they’ serve." To our collective chagrin, good old Tiger just took it on the chin and grinned.

 

In 2002, when the NAACP asked him to boycott the MCI Heritage Classic in South Carolina, in support of the boycott of the state because of its refusal to remove the Confederate battle flag over the State Capitol, Tiger had a very telling response. In fact, Tiger never directly responded to the NAACP request, but gave an answer in Sports Illustrated. In the April 3 edition of that year Tiger explained his position: "I’m a golfer. That’s their deal, not mine."

 

Funny thing though, when money was involved he was black. Early in Tiger’s career, in 1996, he recorded Nike commercials – earning $40 million as brand spokesperson – in which he didn’t shy away from his blackness. Tiger looked into the camera with his black self and said, "There are still courses in the United States that I am not allowed to play because of the color of my skin."

 

However, except when he’s getting paid tons of cash by the second, Tiger remains silent – which I suppose is good business savvy. He is the quintessential self-marketer, an excellent PR man, a businessperson par excellence. He knows, like his best friend Michael Jordan,  that General Motors, Nike, Rolex, American Express, Apple and Gatorade aren’t likely to continue to paying the big bucks to a black man with an opinion. Living in $54 million dollar mansion, owning your own yacht and private plane – all this comes at a cost. Tiger has show that he’s more than willing to pay.

 

Someone once said of Tiger that, "he keeps his mouth shut and his bank account open."

 

And make no mistake, Tiger is not neutral. His silence says he has taken a side. He sides with those who say, "Race is no big deal so let’s just get past it." And no, Tiger is certainly not neutral when it comes to siding with big business.  He knows controversy is bad for business.

 

However, despite his best efforts to distance himself from black people, "he [Tiger] has become a role model for many African Americans, who see him as one of them even as Woods tries to distance himself from the trouble world many blacks cannot escape," writes noted journalist DeWayne Wickman.

 

But wait, you say: Tiger is a good guy, he does lots of charity work for the kids with his golf clinics and his Tiger Woods Learning Center. But charity work is simply good public relations. It’s why all major corporations have a charitable foundation. The real design is to make it appear that they are something they are not.

 

Someone tried to compare Woods to Jackie Robinson. Wrong! Robinson took stands. He spoke out for others, often in situations in which he wasn’t going to personally benefit. After retiring from baseball, he took companies to task for failure to hire black workers and actively participated in the Civil Rights movement. He even boycotted Dodger old-timer games because of the lack of black front office personnel in baseball.

 

Robinson had a sense of what was really important in life. He was once quoted as saying, "If I had a choice between being in the [baseball] Hall of Fame and first class citizenship, I would choose first class citizenship for all my people."

 

Muhammad Ali is revered because he stood up for black folk and even for the embattled Vietnamese against whom this country was waging an illegal and murderous war. Football great Jim Brown, though widely discredited because of his mistreatment of women, was right nevertheless, when he said Woods should have spoken out. In his day, Brown could be counted on to take a stand.

 

So what do we want from Tiger? We want him to stand up and stop acting like he was put together by Buick, with Buick parts, and stop acting like being black and a minority in this country has nothing to do with him. We want him just once to look out for the other guy, because while he is only obligated to represent himself – and whoever is paying the big bucks – history smiles on those who reach out as well to help their fellow man.

 

Mel Reeves is an activist living in Miami. He can be contacted at [email protected] This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it. 

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