Friday, May 14, 2004

Why y'all gotta be hatin'?

I may have mentioned once or twice on this here website that I hail originally from southern Califorina, and more specifically from Long Beach (home and/or birthplace of Snoop, Cameron Diaz, J.T. Snow, and the kid who played Wesley on "Mr. Belvedere"). We in the LBC straddle Orange County to the south, but deep deep down our spirit is entirely Los Angeles County.

It's remarkable that in a metro area as large and disparately populated as LA that we can band together for anything. We can't agree on politics, OJ, or even what language to speak. (I heard somewhere that the most watched news in LA is on Telemundo.) We can, however, agree on the Lakers. Shit do we love our Lakers. After they won their second title in two years, you couldn't cross the street without being almost run over by a white Ford Bronco sporting one (or two) of those Lakers flags that you stick in the crack of your window. The 405 shoulders were covered in wayward Lakers flags. Every third 12-year old boy was wearing a Kobe jersey. People of all demographic categories rushed home afer work to catch the Lakers playoff games. It was magical. I thought the whole world was with us.

Then I moved to Berkeley for college. Turns out that the rest of America hates the Lakers and everything they stand for. They hate Kobe, they hate Shaq, they hate Phil, and they'd probably hate Chick Hearn if he weren't already worm food. Why all the hate, especially from the Bay Area? To quote my county-mate Reginald, can't we all just get along?

I have a few theories as to why all this hate drifts into my beloved county.

The Lakers have good players and are good as a result. People resent frachises that have enough cash to buy an MVP. All the money in the world can't buy a championship on its own, though. The LA Kings had gads of cash and Wayne Gretzky years and they never got a Cup. The Giants have Barry Bonds and they've also come up empty. The Lakers are more deep in talent than nay-sayers are willing to admit.

Famous people go to Lakers games. Sacramentians are bitterly jealous that there's no one in northern California good-looking enough to be put on TV. I can't help it if all you yokels are ugly. I also can't help it if Jack Nicholson apparantly has nothing better to do 45 nights a year.

Los Angeles is a soul-less mass of soul-less soul-lessness. So very true in many respects. Much of our image is fabricated. And most of us from LA know at least one girl who got plastic surgery from her parents as a high school graduation gift. And everyone drives and SUV. And there are too many Republicans. And the air is filthy....Hey, come to think of it, maybe I hate LA, too.

Kobe Bryant likes to rape people. Can't argue with that one.

Kazaam. There is no excuse for Kazaam.

In conclusion, only a few common lambasts against the Lakers are valid. Especially Kazaam.

In conclusion part two, shout outs to the San Jose Sharks for making a series out of a would-be blow out. I predict Flames in six.

posted by Rebecca C. Brown at 4:01 PM

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