Stephen A Smith Spent a Career Pandering to Black Women. It Was Never Enough | Jason Whitlock Harmony

Jason Whitlock (0:01)

A. Smith has spent a career pandering to black women.

It was never enough. The flagrant and funny sit down with Cari Champion and Jemele Hill was not an interview. It was a tribunal. Two black women on the bench, one black man in the dock. He is richer, louder, and far more accomplished than either of them. And he is still the one answering for his life.

Loyalty, sensitivity, politics, who he called and who he didn't. The black woman corrects. The black man defends. That is the arrangement. They opened the room with a confession dressed up as coverage.

Stephen A. Smith (0:42)

It's that fire. Grab your Bible.

Jemele Hill (0:46)

I just think that we should establish some baselines right off the bat. Like I hope that this conversation allows us to see maybe each other's perspectives. What we believe is our truth. I know you have your truth and I believe I have my truth. I'm sure you have yours and I don't necessarily know if they all are in agreement. But I want to make sure that we absolutely say how we feel and you say how you feel.

I also believe that we're just not going to agree on some things. And I'm okay with that. And I'm completely... Are you okay with that?

Cari Champion (1:16)

Yeah, and I think you are too.

Jason Whitlock (1:19)

Did you hear that? That was a contract being put in front of A. Smith. Everybody gets to feel honest while nobody has to be accurate. Your truth, my truth, everybody's truth. That is the perfect set up for three people who need a myth to survive for the next two and a half hours. I am no fan of A. He is a fraudulent character with a fictional background. 17 straight three pointers, a scholarship on the spot, a six inch screw in the knee, a Winston Salem career that dissolves the moment you open a box score.

I expose those lies. Champion and Hill know them. They cannot say them. Naming the Lies brings Jason Whitlock into the room.

A made sure of that before the real heat even started. Take a listen.

Stephen A. Smith (2:09)

Most people who request me, if I have this in my schedule, I say yes. Now, if there's certain people, one in particular who can never get me on the show.

Jemele Hill (2:16)

Yeah, I know who that person is.

Jason Whitlock (2:20)

Yeah, he doesn't even need to say the name. They already know it. So the three of them can sit in a circle, swear by truth, and protect a resume none of them believes. Because the one man who burned the resume is the one man banned from the table.

The dishonesty is not a glitch, it is the price of admission. That price reveals the real story. America's corporate hierarchy has been arranged to favor black women over black men. The patriarchy is dead for American black men. He answers to her. She holds the moral leverage. She judges. He explains.

A survived that culture by feeding it, making space, offering courtesy, taking the meeting after the public shots. Courtesy is what a subordinate offers a superior. Subordinates are always the last to know they are on trial.

Jemele Hill (3:18)

Watch.

Stephen A. Smith (3:19)

The issue that I've had with both of you is that I'm here with you for the first time, and it was like, wait a minute, it's online?

Jemele Hill (3:28)

You got it, doc.

Stephen A. Smith (3:29)

I'm saying it's online. It's like, wait a minute.

I didn't tell you don't feel that way. I didn't tell you don't express it. But that's one of the biggest issues that I have with people in the industry that talk about other people we've worked with. I'm saying, man, you got to do you. You got to say what you got to say. That's how you feel. You feel. So I shouldn't find out for the first time when everybody else is finding out.

Jason Whitlock (3:57)

That is not a peer relationship. That is a man discovering his performance review on the Internet. Silence becomes evidence. Private disagreement becomes public indictment. He is guilty for feelings he was never told he caused. Then the ledger of courtesy gets rewritten in real time.

Take a listen.

Cari Champion (4:19)

And this is what Cari was talking about, about silence being support.

It's not that I expected you to be silent. But during that entire time, A, you never called me. You never reached out. You didn't say anything. You say, hey, sis, you good? I didn't have that expectation of you, to be honest. So like, I'm not going to say like, oh, I felt away because you didn't, I didn't feel any way. It was all good.