While In Malaysia for a bilateral meeting between U.S. and Malasian officials on Sunday, April 27, President Obama was forced to briefly take time away from the task at hand to address the growing controversy around L.A. Clippers owner Donald Sterling and his racist comments.
Donald Sterling and V. Stiviano
"When ignorant folks want to advertise their ignorance, you don't really have to do anything, you just let them talk. That's what happened here," Obama said. "I have confidence that the NBA commissioner, Adam Silver, a good man, will address this. Obviously the NBA is a leauge that's beloved by fans all across the country. It's got a lot of African American players. It's steeped in African American culture. And I suspect that the NBA is going to be deeply concerned in resolving this."
The President goes to to talk about the problems of racial discrimination that still exist in the U.S. in 2014.
"I will make one more larger comment about this," he continued. "The United States continues to wrestle with the legacy of race and slavery and segregation, that's still there, the vestiges of discrimination. We've made enormous strides, but you're going to continue to see this percolate up every so often," he added. "And I think that we just have to be clear and steady in denouncing it, teaching our children differently, but also remaining hopeful that part of why statements like this stand out some much is because there has been this shift in how we view ourselves."
The Los Angeles Chapter of the NAACP had been planning to give Sterling the Lifetime Achievement Award at a May 15 banquet. That may change now that audio has leaked of him telling hid girlfriend V. Stiviano not to bring African American's, includingMagic Johnson, to Clippers games and not to put their photos on her Instagram.
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