The only thing more American than a reality TV star becoming president, despite having exactly zero political or military experience beforehand, is, of course, racism.
To that end, Sabrina Little-Brown of Irvine, Calif., experienced this unfortunate, reoccurring phenomenon on Friday when her son Makai, who plays for Portola High School’s basketball team, found himself on the receiving end of the following racist taunts while playing against Laguna Hills High School:
“Where is his slave owner?”
“Who let him out of his chains?”
“He’s a monkey!”
“Chain him up!”
In a video uploaded to Instagram on Wednesday, Little-Brown chronicled the abhorrent behavior her son received from a student in the stands and also revealed that her husband, Terrell, subsequently got into with members of the Laguna Hills coaching staff.
“On Friday night my son played at Laguna Hills High School,” she wrote on Instagram. “He was subjected to verbal abuse & aggressive behavior by the Laguna Hills Head Coach, David Yates. As a result of this verbal abuse my normally calm & level headed husband yelled at the coach to tell him not to address our son. Subsequently, the assistant coach told my husband to ‘meet him outside in the parking lot after the game’ and of course my husband responded. His verbal response resulted in him being escorted out of the game.”
She continued, “On Saturday morning before practice my son was watching game film as he always does. He came into my room STUNNED. What he heard directed 100% to him is contained in this video, but these disgusting, racist insults continued throughout the entire game footage. Needless to say, our family is up in arms. Laguna Hills Boys Basketball fosters a culture of aggression, unsportsmanlike conduct and RACISM! And this has to be brought to the light and stopped. Please help us in our fight for justice, reform, education and stern disciplinary actions against the coaching staff, administrators and student(s) by sharing this video.”
In response to the disgusting taunts that her son endured, CBSLA reports that Little-Brown and her husband attended an Irvine City Council meeting on Tuesday to express their outrage at what transpired and demand action.
“I was enraged, hurt,” Little-Brown told CBSLA. “To know that a child has that much ignorance, hatred, and disdain for someone they do not even know is absolutely hurtful.”
It’s also absolutely American, but I digress.
Of additional note, apparently this type of repugnant behavior is par for the course when students of color attend games at Laguna Hills—as evidenced by two cheerleaders being on the receiving of “nigger” and anti-Asian racial slurs during previous games.
“We’re trying to get the message out that it isn’t just solely about this one kid,” Little-Brown told CBSLA.
So does this story have a happy ending?
Per the Orange County Register, the student in question received “immediate, and appropriate consequences” that include undisclosed “discipline.” So take from that what you will. And for those wondering about Laguna Hills head coach David Yates, he’s declined to comment on the matter but is still very much gainfully employed “and is expected to finish out the season.”
As a Los Angeles resident, it’s common knowledge that our next-door neighbor, Orange County, is racist as hell—notoriously so. So it doesn’t surprise me at all that this even happened. I just hate that as a Black child in America, disturbing incidents such as these seem more like a rite of passage than an unlikely occurrence.