still don’t like Kobe, and it doesn’t have anything to do with his performance. I respect his skills, but that’s it. “Love me or hate me, it’s one or the other. Always has been. Hate my game, my swagger. Hate my fadeaway, my hunger. Hate that I’m a veteran. A champion. Hate that. Hate it with all your heart. And hate that I’m loved, for the exact same reasons.” You forgot…hate my adultery, hate my ability to buy justice. man. I cant believe that you are still on that subject. He admitted to adultery. Consensual. Millions of people do this throughout the world. But I guess this is Kobe Bryant we are talking about…. So he is different. The trial proved the man was innocent of Rape. We have lived by the justice system years. Its the driving force of the United States. Sometimes the Justice system makes mistakes, but when is anything perfect. Bottomline is Kobe is NOT GUILTY. Everyone can make their own conclusions and Im fine with it. Hate my adultery. Im not buyin that. I know tons of family that have commited adultery but have become better individuals after learning from their mistakes. Kobe is Human. He aint a God. Humans make mistakes. Even Kobe Bryant. Give him some slack. This was off my blog at http://www.7milesdown.com/wp/?p=320#comments sometimes I get real irritated when people are so close minded like this.
Obviously its a weak argument people will someimes use against kobe, but as for dwelling it was still a rape charge that's like asking why people still dwell on OJ and his murder trial.
haha. The guy Im arguing with just posted about OJ! WTF! Hey, if you guys get a chance, please share your thoughts on my blog... I would like him to know Im not the only one who feels this way.
I hate Kobe Bryant off of the court, he's disgusting. How the hell do you cheat on your wife when she just had your baby girl? He gets no respect from me, whatsoever. On the court, I love Kobe...he's the best damn player in the league. Plain and simple. Why do people dwell on it? Because it's the fact he cheated on his wife after having their first child. You think the white chick was the only woman he slept with? If that's true, I'll never sleep with someone again. It's just the fact that he could be such an idiot like that.
Everyone has a fatal flaw, and for Kobe his was cheating on his wife. I think society in general focuses on the negative a lot more. Just look at the news, it's a constant reminder of how f'ed up everything is. "Ah, live fast, love hard, leave a beautiful corpse." "Not really. More live dull, think 'why bother' and leave a note saying goodbye." -Death, The High Cost of Living by Neil Gaiman Real basketball fans appreciate what Kobe does or doesn't do ON the court, he's one of the best players for this generation. Whether people want to embrace it or not is up to them. For people who don't and simply refuse to except him, they will just nitpick Kobe and find ways to knock him down whether it's what he does on or off the court.
I think part of the reason that he gets a lot of hate is that he was basically built up to be the perfect role model and spokesperson for the NBA. Whether or not it was fair to him doesn't really matter. He got his money out of it too. But the general public, and the media, are fickle. When he proved to be a different person than what was portrayed everybody turned on him. Its not necessarily fair, but its something thats happened to lots of athletes before him. I agree with TheBlackMamba too. When he's on the court, I have nothing but admiration for his skills. Kobe's an incredible basketball player. But, off the court, I can't respect a person like that. Even if it is a private matter, adultery simply disgust me. And people have the right to not fully believe in his innocence either. Celebrity trials, not to mention rape trials, are always ridiculously slanted against the victims. Anyone remember the Mike Tyson rape trial? Member of the black community publicly denounced the woman, because she had tarnished the image of a huge black athlete. While I can't say for certain that Kobe raped that woman, I doubt I'll ever be convinced with the verdict. I personally just try to focus on his basketball. But rape and adultery are serious issues that envoke emotions from lots of people. Kobe can't expect to be embraced like he once was.
What I didn't make clear, I was in class so I had to hurry up, is that Kobe's gaining my respect back, but he's far from being my favorite player off of the court.
Looks like Kwame is going to go through what Kobe did. http://abclocal.go.com/kabc/story?section=sports&id=4136876
If you don't like Kobe off the court then your logic is flawed. I bet any money every basketball player has skeletons in his closet including MJ. Just because his skeletons reached light doesn't make him worse than any other. To me it was no big deal. Kobe is a man, he had sex with a woman. Big deal to me....if it was really rape then I'd say otherwise but it was Consensual. I don't understand why you are only gonna look at the bad and not the good he does off the court.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Franchise4Ever:</div><div class="quote_post">If you don't like Kobe off the court then your logic is flawed. I bet any money every basketball player has skeletons in his closet including MJ. Just because his skeletons reached light doesn't make him worse than any other. To me it was no big deal. Kobe is a man, he had sex with a woman. Big deal to me....if it was really rape then I'd say otherwise but it was Consensual. I don't understand why you are only gonna look at the bad and not the good he does off the court.</div> Speaking of flawed logic, how is what you said any better? <u>"All NBA players probably have skeletons in their closet that we don't know about, so we shouldn't care about what Kobe did."</u> How does that even make sense? And how does it make it wrong to dislike him off the court? Nobody should expect people to embrace Kobe off the court after his rape trial. It's just reality. People don't like adultery. People despise rape. Those are emotional issues for a lot of people and they'll always overshadow what good he does afterwards. His trial, at least IMO, wasn't completely convincing. So the public has the right to be skeptical of his character and not like him. And its not like Kobe isn't making money off this either. That "hate me" image is his whole marketing campaign. Anyways, the point is that rape is a difficult issue for people to overlook, even if he is legally innocent. As long as they don't use that to judge Kobe on the court, it should be just accepted as freedom of opinion.
<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">"All NBA players probably have skeletons in their closet that we don't know about, so we shouldn't care about what Kobe did."</div> When did I say this? You have a tendency to put words in peoples mouth. To say you don't like Kobe off the court is flawed especially when plenty of other BBall players do some nasty stuff off the court. Tony Parker was caught speeding with an open bottle with his wife, A.I. was found with drugs in his car etc. To say you only dislike Kobe off the court is flawed. All these other basketball players do the same if not worse. He didn't rape that girl, end of story. If you think otherwise that is opinion but according to fact, he didn't rape her. <div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post"> People despise rape.</div> I despise rape as well but the fact remains that he DIDN'T rape her. <div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">People don't like adultery. </div> Only in our culture is adultery such a big deal. Eastern countries have different views such as Muslims able to have multiple wives. How do you commit adultery with multiple wives? Its all about cultural views IMO. <div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">That "hate me" image is his whole marketing campaign. </div> It wasn't always that. <div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post"> it should be just accepted as freedom of opinion.</div> Exactly its just that, but when you go around saying KOBE IS A RAPIST! He has no class, he is a jerk, etc. It just makes me mad. They haven't met him in person, they don't know the truth about him. For all you know he could be the nicest and most generous guy you know.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Franchise4Ever:</div><div class="quote_post">When did I say this? You have a tendency to put words in peoples mouth. To say you don't like Kobe off the court is flawed especially when plenty of other BBall players do some nasty stuff off the court. Tony Parker was caught speeding with an open bottle with his wife, A.I. was found with drugs in his car etc. To say you only dislike Kobe off the court is flawed. All these other basketball players do the same if not worse. He didn't rape that girl, end of story. If you think otherwise that is opinion but according to fact, he didn't rape her</div>. Well you said: <div class="quote_poster">Quoting Franchise4Ever:</div><div class="quote_post">If you don't like Kobe off the court then your logic is flawed. I bet any money every basketball player has skeletons in his closet including MJ. Just because his skeletons reached light doesn't make him worse than any other</div> So I guess I should paraphrase it more delicately: "Disliking Kobe off the court is illogical. Every basketball player has probably committed despicable acts. The only difference is that Kobe's were discovered and reported to the public." Is that right? Still don't agree with that approach. I don't want to make this the focal point of my response, but you can't say that a person has flawed logic for having an opinion on a person's character. And you missed the most important part of the post, IMO. <div class="quote_poster">Quoting Chutney:</div><div class="quote_post">His trial, at least IMO, wasn't completely convincing.</div> Now, I'm not saying Kobe's guilty, but I doubt that I'm not the only one that believes that rape trials are almost always slanted against the victim. Especially, when one side can hire a ridiculously expensive lawyer. Again, not saying he's guilty. And this is an inevitable side effect of our justice system. But, it is understandable for people to have doubts about his innocence. And nobody is singling him out. The complaint that the thread-starter had was that when people discuss Kobe off the court, they focus on the rape trial. I'm sure that if Iverson or Parker were brought up, they'd have similar complaints. <div class="quote_poster">Quoting Franchise4Ever:</div><div class="quote_post">Only in our culture is adultery such a big deal. Eastern countries have different views such as Muslims able to have multiple wives. How do you commit adultery with multiple wives? Its all about cultural views IMO.</div> That is so untrue. Outside of the ridiculously traditionalist countries like Saudi Arabia or U.A.E., polygamy is considered even worse in Eastern society. Just like people in North America have distorted the teachings of Christianity to support polygamy, so too have people in Islam. Adultery is universally considered a sin. Anyways, that really is irrelevant. I just wanted to clear up that misconception. <div class="quote_poster">Quoting Franchise4Ever:</div><div class="quote_post">It wasn't always that.</div> I know, and I'm sure Kobe wishes he could still be portrayed as that All-American role model. But before you consider him victimized because of the public's opinion, you have to realize that he's smartly taken advantage of the circumstances. <div class="quote_poster">Quoting Franchise4Ever:</div><div class="quote_post">Exactly its just that, but when you go around saying KOBE IS A RAPIST! He has no class, he is a jerk, etc. It just makes me mad. They haven't met him in person, they don't know the truth about him. For all you know he could be the nicest and most generous guy you know.</div> Or he could be the opposite. But, yes I totally agree with you. I'm not defending the "Kobe is a rapist! I hate him!" people. I just wanted to answer that guy that was wondering why Kobe's rape case is still an issue with people. We both seem to agree on a lot more than what we disagree on. Really, the only problem I had was when you said that it was illogical for people to think that way about Kobe. And the Muslim comments. Other than that, I think we both agree that people will always have a hard time getting over Kobe's rape trial when they're judging his character. And also, that it should in no way impact how people view him on the court.
Things like a sexual assault charge don’t just go away. Even though he was found innocent he is still guilty in the eyes of the media/haters for even being in that position. I will admit I was one of the biggest Kobe fans in the world before the rape allegation, hell I even considered him a role model, but since even though I have remained a fan I have looked at him in a different light. He is a great basketball player, and you have to respect him for that, but as far as looking up to him as a person I’m not so sure if he has gained that respect back yet.
