When you turn real oppression into LinkedIn content.
or, Emmanuel Acho's master class in saying nothing with confidence
A few weeks ago, I logged on to Instagram and I had multiple messages and they were all asking me the same thing: Did I see that Emmanuel Acho was coming to Dallas and I am going? Then, my phone began to light up with text messages and it was my friends asking me the same thing.
So, you may be wondering why the hell everyone is messaging me about this event? Do I have a celebrity crush? No, he would have to be an actual celebrity and attractive, lol. Did you want your book signed? Are you a big fan? Please, don’t piss me off.
If you are asking me any of these questions, then I know you are new here. (And by here I mean to any of my social media platforms.) My OGs know that I am a certified hater of this man. Well, what is worse than a hater? Because I am that! Kendrick has Drake, I have Emmanuel Acho.
If I hate this man so much, why would I attend his event? Great question. Because I wanted to be a fucking hater in person! The event was called Community Conversations so I had a question from the community that I wanted to ask! (Spoiler alert, he took no questions!) I’ve had questions I’ve wanted to ask this man since 2020—when he began his “Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Man” series. Like I said earlier: Kendrick has Drake, I have Acho.
So, let me start from the beginning…
*buckle up, it’s a long ride*
On May 25th in 2020, George Floyd was murdered by police officer Derek Chauvin. And although police brutality isn’t—unfortunately—something that is new in this country, there was something different about this murder. The difference: a seventeen year old young Black girl, Darnella Frazier, bravely recorded the fatal incident for 8 minutes and 46 seconds (it was later discovered via body cam footage that it was over 9 minutes this asshole had his knee on his neck). That video then circulated the internet and news outlets nationally and internationally.
I won’t use this post to talk about how:
Black women are always at the front lines—risking our own safety and lives—when it comes to protesting against police brutality but Black men don’t always show up for us
How Black death and Black mourning are often sensationalized and is used for public consumption at the expense of our privacy and mental health
No, I won’t go deeper into that; however, I wanted to briefly mention it.
So, five days after this horrific murder, he decided he needed to make a show for Youtube and within a few weeks, his inaugural episode of Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Man was live. To understand why this is so insane, you must remember Acho was a retired NFL player turned sports “analyst” —he was a man who never utilized his platform prior to 2020 to address racism in America. In the summer of 2020, we saw quite a few people popping up taking advantage of the raw pain that the Black community was feeling. All of a sudden white folks wanted to read and be taught and they wanted to “shop/buy Black.” We saw white authors who had written books about racism (e.g. White Fragility) had their books flying off the shelves. We saw white women putting together reading lists. White folks randomly apologizing to Black folks. It was fucking weird! But there was money to be made and a grifter gonna always grift.
So enters Acho, launching his digital series—that no one asked for— with lines like:
"In the midst of this chaos, so many of y’all—my white brothers and sisters—asking what can I do…”
He places sentimental Lifetime movie ass music behind him as he attempts to interweave quotes from MLK like “the riot is the voice of the unheard” while simultaneously saying he doesn’t believe in looting and that Black people are burning down their own homes and neighborhoods. All this language sounds vaguely similar to Fox news talking heads.
He continues and says a question his white friends ask a lot is “why can’t white people say the N word?” Honestly, the plug shoulda been pulled then because if you’re a Black man and you have white friends who are always asking why they can’t say the N word, you are a part of the problem.
And the thing that pissed me off the most is the question he gets “asked often” is: why don’t Black people don’t care about ‘Black on Black crime’”
And this man with a hairy forehead said “it’s not that we don’t care about Black on Black crime!” This man has positioned himself as a source for white folks to “learn” and he feeds right into their language because he doesn’t address how that phrase black on black crime is a made up term used by Fox & Friends to justify their refusal to acknowledge white supremacy and systemic racism.
He says a lot of other bullshit and he closes with asking people to submit questions.
This is just the first episode…
Don’t worry, I won’t go line by line for any of his other episodes; however, I will tell you that he sits down with the commissioner of the NFL and doesn’t ask the question that would be really uncomfortable: why is Colin Kaepernick black balled from the league. Chip and Joanna Gaines come on with their five children and they ask him “are you scared of white people.” He has an episode on interracial relationships where Lindsay Vonn & PK Subban come on and Lindsay states that Black women glare at her when she is out with PK—a Black man—to which Acho follows up with: how does that make you feel? Instead of asking does she understand the historical context? (and to be honest, Black women really don’t be worried about this shit when we are out and about). But this tracks since in his book he talks about one of the first examples of an interracial relationship is Thomas Jefferson & Sally Hemmings. One of his next guests wasCarl Lentz, former disgraced pastor of Hillsong NYC, who already had multiple allegations against him of sexual harassment, racism, and abusive behavior towards the church volunteers. This list goes on and on and not one of these conversations are actually uncomfortable for the white people in them because, as Van Lathan called him on a podcast, he is nothing more than an emotional butler for white folks.
A man who has never engaged in these types of conversations before the summer of 2020, has now become the arbiter of understanding and explaining the Black American experience to white people. And in a matter of five months, he lands a book deal with Oprah and once that book is released it becomes a “must read” by these companies who are trying to clean up their image.
I didn’t come out the gate wanting to be a hater, I promise; however, as his videos circulated widely and I had white people asking me if it was a good book I realized this man was dangerous. He was dangerous because he was utilizing language that all but cosigned white people’s prejudgments.
I remember tweeting, without tagging anyone, something like: I will be fine if I never hear Ice Cube of Emmanuel Acho speak again. (Y’all remember, Ice Cube was on that bullshit in 2020, too). And out of no where, Acho responded with laughing emojis.
All while his digital series is going on, he is on FS1 co-hosting Speak for Yourself with Marcellus Wiley. This is where he began to infuse is “sports analysis” with attempts at being deep. Those clips, coupled with Uncomfortable Conversations with Black Man, he was everywhere and white people were eating out of the palm of his hands. And I was sick.
I wish I could remember the first time I made a twitter thread regarding my thoughts but I do remember I finally took time to mention him. I am not a scaredy-cat. I remember mentioning him, calling out all the ways he missed the mark and how he should have a true uncomfortable conversation with a Black woman who is a scholar regarding these things he is claiming to know so much about. I remember tagging specific scholars and community activist as suggestions of who he could talk to. I listed books he should read if he wanted to continue to talk about these topics. I wanted him to get this right because so much was at stake—these weren’t just conversations they were instructions for how white people should interact with Black folks.
But also, I wanted to people to be aware that he actually rarely interacted with Black folks. I am a fellow Longhorn and friends with a number of people who were on campus with him at the same time and every last one of them have stated he was mainly surrounded by white folks. Not really engaging with the Black groups on campus. And when he popped up with his new series, everyone was confused.
The more viral he went, the worse he got. I already knew that there was a grift afoot; however, it became abundantly clear that he had taken the route to monetize Black people’s pain which made him no different from the other scammers of 2020. And that monetization came in the form of the book that Oprah cosigned (we won’t get into Oprah in this post). And because I am a gluten for punishment—and a researcher by training—I decided to read his book.
He says that the most he had been around Black people was when he got to college on the University of Texas at Austin’s football team because he grew up attending a predominantly white rich private school in Dallas. But, how is that possible when he grew up attending at Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship—where his father was on the staff—which is a church that is full of Black folks with a Black pastor. Not the book starting out with a lie. So to claim that you weren’t truly around Black folks until college is truly wild.
Because of this he deems himself “fluent in white and Black culture.”
Between this and interviews, he admits he learned about “Black culture” as an adult playing football. This is a layered issue because it is playing into the preconceived notion that the culture of Blackness is rooted in our athleticism.
But he proves that he truly believes this by pushing medical essentialism on air when he was a co-host of Speak for Yourself , citing a book, that is long been debunked, titled The Sports Gene by David Epstein. Clip below:
When someone in the comments calls him out on this take calling it a slippery slope, Acho responds by saying that that person needs to do their research and due diligence so they’re educated—which is fucking insane because he is the one that is grossly and dangerously uneducated. These type of beliefs are how white “scientist” rationalized why enslaved Black folks could be in the field working longer. It is these types of beliefs that have been interwoven into to medical tests measuring: lung capacity, kidney function, and pain measurement. There are whole doctors that believe that Black folks have higher pain tolerance meaning they don’t receive the proper care. The pathologizing Blackness is detrimental to the lives of Black folks but it is beneficial to white folks because it has kept money in their pockets.
His claim regarding more Black running backs and etc. has everything to do with the racist history of believing Black players were too stupid to be quarterbacks and were regulated to these positions. It is why Lamar Jackson refused to run the 40 at his NFL combine. But I have more thoughts in my twitter thread.
Moving on to more stupid shit from his book .
Below is an excerpt from his book:
“So what’s a game plan for reducing implicit biases?…spend time with people in different social, racial and ethnic groups…or even just sit down in one of those often empty bus or subway seats next to a black man and strike up a conversation”
I wish a white person would come sit next to me on a train and strike up a conversation with me because they are curious about my Black experience. What Acho is failing to realize—besides this being extremely weird—that this is placing the labor on Black people. It is treating Black folks like they need to perform for white folks yet again.
In an interview, he submits that “proximity breeds care, distance breeds fear” and this assertion—coupled with the above excerpt—implies that all someone has to do (and be) is close to Black folks and blackness to care. But I think he believes his proximity to whiteness means that they care about him and make him safe.
He also admits in his gimmick of a book that: “I’ll be the first to admit that systemic racism sounds like a conspiracy.” Anything said after that, even if it is addressing the ins and outs of systemic racism, is null in void. Why? Because that is exactly what a lot of white people think. My brain literally hurts trying to unpack this.
His book is full of foolishness like this and we would be here forever if I went through every raggedy point. But I’ll point out one of the folks he cited was Shaun King.
So, this is how I found myself on the 3rd row of a “community conversation” with Emmanuel Acho.
Every “Community Conversation” I have ever been to has a time for the audience to ask questions and I came with one prepared. But, surprising no one—and by no one I mean myself—he didn’t take questions.
The purpose of this conversation was to talk about how to have uncomfortable conversations; instead, it was his ego looking for a captive audience.
He’s previously stated that he didn’t expect to go viral and that it wasn’t about him but we learned in this talk that when he was trying to come up with a name for his show, he knew it should include the phrase “Uncomfortable Conversations” but it needed more. So one day walking into his house he looked into the mirror and said “wait, I’m a Black man” and thus Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Man” was created!
So if it wasn’t supposed to be about you… You see what I’m saying? He thought it he was created a place for meaningful dialogue instead it was a show rooted in self-importance.
Also, as this talk went on it became clear he sees his brother as the golden child (his words)— and everything he does now feels like a desperate sprint away from his brother’s shadow.
This was further proved when the moderator asked what keeps him up at night and states that it is the pursuit of his greatness. Will he ever become an EGOT? Will he write another bestseller? His answer centered himself, something he is extremely good at. His entire career seems to be stitched together with the insecurities that he should have worked through with a very good therapist. Like, be so for real. In a conversation that is supposed to be meaningful, you say your pursuit of greatness is what causes you to lose sleep. Not the fact that the issue you claim to care about, racism in America, is still running unchecked. But saying a self-serving and self centered answer allows you to stay seated at the table whiteness built—even if all you get to do is serve the food or provide the entertainment.
In this talk you repeated your incorrect definition of “ally” by saying it is when someone finds a need and fills it. And the crowd ate it up. Which you expected because the room was mainly full of your target audience: white people. Your definition of allyship is relieves white people from doing the heavy lifting of a true sacrifice. If allyship costs you nothing then it is just guilt management.
The talk was full of one-liners that will make great LinkedIn posts, instagram captions, and Facebook status.
True uncomfortable conversations about racism in America don’t earn you a seat at the table instead it shakes it—and if you’re extra spicy it flips it the fuck over. Pursuing your own greatness is individualistic and its counter to everything that the likes of MLK, Angela Davis, Langston Hughes, James Baldwin, and more stood for. If they were asked what kept them up at night, they wouldn’t be at the center of that answer.
If you were to ask me what kept me up at night, I would tell you it is the fact that Black women are dying at higher rates than their white counterparts during childbirth. And I would mean it, it wouldn’t be performative. My track record shows that.
Acho is one of the few Black men I have seen fail up like this but his success only exist because he has mastered the art of packaging Blackness into something so palatable that white folks can turn into a consumable product. Everything he says is a watered down cup of Gatorade quenching the thirst of white people who want to feel better about themselves for hanging a BLM flag.
Love this headline! I've been eagerly awaiting your thoughts since I saw your post that you were attending the event
omg i am GAGGED this is soo good. i was screaminggg thru the whole piece. i love how bold and honest you are. when you mentioned that he used SHAUN KING as a reference…🤣 oh Lawd. thank you for the laughs