Source: Roland S. Martin
When I starting going through mobbing at a job, my great aunt told me about the story of crabs in a barrel. She explained to me that the folks in current job didn’t want me to advance in a field they weren’t willing to put the work in, or didn’t have the skills, to get. As Dr. Melody T. McCloud, MD puts it, “When you do your thing, remember…you will have “haters”; but never let people get you off track. Sometimes even family members will become jealous and try to derail your efforts and destroy your spirit.” It happens when people believe there is not enough to go around. It can also happen when people plain just don’t want to share aka greed.
Entering into the present scenario is Angel Reese, hateful fans, Emmanuel Acho, and various other collegiate women basketball players. Each one of these people can be seen as crabs. Some crabs are trying to reach for top with the right potential; others the potential is questionable and still others are destined to be at the bottom pulling those with potential from the top. Not to be confusing, all of these individuals have power . . . some to a greater extent than others. However, power doesn’t stop the crab syndrome. In some cases, it seems to make the situation worse. Or, paraphrasing a Bishop TD Jakes’ sermon, money doesn’t equate to righteousness.
In the past, Black folks have been lynched, bitten by dogs, and forced into concentration, or internment, camps. They have seen segregated schools, restrooms, and restaurants. We have seen women denied the right to equal access to sports, jobs and pay. Now, we have Black men gunned down in the streets by police. Black women are still fighting for equal pay and to destroy stereotypes like the one Acho echoed. Today at times, we have to fight the fear of leaving our houses because we may not return due to a terrorist or gunman attack. Children, today, not only have to fight to learn but sometimes to stay alive in school. Being a minority or a woman can be hazardous to your health if stopped by the police due to police brutality (e.g., Eric Garner, etc) or sexual assault by police officers.
Now, we have one current professional athlete being verbally attacked, aka pulled down, by a former professional athlete. Crabs in a barrel. There was no valid reason Acho needed to refer to Reese as a villain. That is a stereotype perpetuated onto Black women when they choose not to assimilate but to strive for excellence in their own right as they see fit. Here’s a Black man pulling down a Black woman. But why? Who created this barrel that one crab had to pull down another crab which is a rising star?
Question the people who are pulling the strings. . . . The reason that sports have always been used as a drive for social change because that’s the only time they ever listen to us is when we sing, dancing, jumping, or running. If you, I think the NFL cares as much about social justice as Donald Trump cared about ASAP Rocky. ‘What I want is your silence, and your obedience, and your money. And I want you to break your bodies in service for my entertainment and then I want you to shut up.’ Silence is golden and so are deals that are made with men with ill intent.~DL Hughley
Source: Empressive
A barrel is a type of bucket. A bucket is a water-tight container that can be any shape from cone to square to cylinder. The key to something being a bucket, or barrel, is that it is meant to hold whatever it’s carrying without a way of escape unless a third party helps the whatever escape (i.e., hands used to tap whiskey from the barrel).
Now, think about the saying crabs in a barrel. We know the mentality is “If I can’t have it then neither can you.” It’s seen in real life with real crabs . . . one tries to escape but gets pulled down by another one in the barrel who then tries to escape itself. In everyday life, we see this type of mentality in rich and poor communities alike. Instead of individuals helping each other get out of the situation they are in, they find a way to pull the other person down and thereby seal their fate as well. But hardly anyone asks who created the barrel that traps these crabs, these individuals, in the first place. So, who is the cooper?
In the clip below, comedian, DL Hughley, makes an interesting suggestion that people need to start questioning the people who are pulling the strings. In other words, folks need to start questioning the cooper aka the person or people who made the barrel. So many times, people see the barrel–economic, gender, and/or social injustices, disadvantages, and inequities–but forget to look for what or who truly created those circumstances aka the barrel.
People need to remember the barrel was meant as a means of submission . . . a submission of silence, assimilation and reminder of one’s powerlessness. We have to hold the organizations and the societal influences that continue to perpetuate submission accountable. We have to rid the sports industry of those practices. If we want the sports industry–whether its via League play or administration, teams, or sports media, etc.—to be leaders for society, then we have to do better and be crabs pulling each other up and telling the coopers they’re taking an L.
Source: TV One TV