Kareem Abdul-Jabbar joined George Stephanopoulos on ABC's This Week to discuss Donald Sterling's racist rant. Instead of just attacking the NBA for allowing a man with his history of racial intolerance to own an NBA franchise for so long, he brought up a much bigger issue. If white America doesn't admit the obvious then racism will flourish.
STEPHANOPOULOS: And do you think the league can force him out?
ABDUL-JABBAR: I think they have the legal leverage to do that. Have to see, you don't know for sure, but the way things are going now I think that they have a very good chance of keeping him away from the game.
STEPHANOPOULOS: What about the underlying issues that Ryan brought up in his piece, did you bring up in your piece, the kind of idea that the league for a long time turned a blind eye to his actions and that the country is still struggling with lingering racism.
ABDUL-JABBAR: Well, this is a problem. I did a little bit of research, more whites believe in ghosts than believe in racism. That's why we don't have -- that why we have shows like Ghostbusters and don't have shows like Racistbuster. You know, it's something that's still part of our culture and people hold on to some of these ideas and practices just out of habit and saying that well that's the way it always was. But things have to change.
Racistbuster, now that would be grand. I've written extensively on this topic as it pertains to Republicans. We will always have a problem in America dealing with racism until conservatives start engaging in that discussion honestly instead of constantly claiming that there is no racism in America, or say silly things like racism is dead.
Bolling: ...it's getting tiring. We have a black president, we have black senators, we have black heads of captains of business, companies. We have black entertainment channels. Is there racism? I don't think there's racism. The only people perpetuating racism are people like this gentleman from the NAACP, are the Al Sharptons of the world. Let's move on. Let's move on.
Racism is a live and well.
