FX's 'Clipped' brings Donald Sterling's (racist) rants back to the surface
Ignore the anti-Trump rants and Al Bundy character we know Ed O'Neill for. His acting skills are superb as the LA Clippers owner.
Ray J is always a good time during any interview. On his “unbreakable” glasses interview with Speedy, he was a good time. On The Breakfast Club, he’s a good time. But he outdid himself on Club Shay Shay with Shannon Sharpe.
However, the one thing that I remember most about that last interview wasn’t him freezing up about discussing his tape with Kim Kardashian. It was him changing the subject entirely and needing a thumbs up from attorneys to see if he could talk about selling his Donald Sterling apartments. He got a thumbs down, and that topic was promptly terminated. I rewound that part twice because Ray J is not one to be quiet.
I hadn’t thought about former LA Clippers player Donald Sterling in years. I wasn’t a sports fan to begin with, so I didn’t know much about the man until V. Stiviano’s recording released. Then, I wanted to go back to knowing nothing about him. But Ray J’s reaction to Shannon Sharpe’s repeated real estate questions made me want to finally sit down and watch Hulu’s “Clipped.”
After all these years, why would Ray J care what Donald Sterling thinks about anything at all?
When the recording first released in 2014
When I first heard the Donald Sterling tape (“Don't bring black people, and don't come”), I remember three things happening shortly after:
Bill Maher was suspiciously upset on HBO’s “Real Time” about privacy concerns during phone calls. (Between that and the purple pimp suit to create a “joke” about the legendary Barry White and former President Barack H. Obama, I was done with that guy. His defensiveness made it super clear that his phone conversations must be even more concerning than his talk show — or his “house n**ger” joke.)
I wondered why on Earth the LA Clippers humored the idea of winning a championship with Donald Sterling as the owner of the team. This was the same guy that said, “It's the world! You go to Israel, the blacks are just treated like dogs” and confirming they are lesser than — “100%, 50, 100%.” Then, he stood 10 toes down on confirming “I don't want to change the culture.” My take: Win a championship for any other owner on any other team — not him.
Everybody started digging up state laws on one-sided recordings and reminding each other (on social media) whether it was legal to record or not.
With all that said, the one thing I did agree with was how shifty it looked for someone to record a private phone call. No matter how you feel about the person, it’s a setup if you’re recording their one-on-one conversation and it’s not for journalism. Even reporters have to ask before they press record and know what’s off-record. Otherwise, the recording goal is clearly to “out” them.
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Plus, if your social circles is this awful and racist, why are you hanging out with them in the first place? I’d have thrown up the deuces minutes after the first comment. I don’t want those kinds of friends.
I wasn’t particularly on V. Stiviano’s (i.e. Maria Vanessa Perez) side with that. It’s not like she started marching for a Black Lives Matter-adjacent organization. (BLM was founded by Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors and Opal Tometi in 2013.) Nor was she standing up for some big cause later on — be it Black or Mexican (like her) or Jewish (in relation to her Holocaust comments). Her recording felt self-serving.