Kareem Abdul-Jabbar On Rachel Dolezal: ‘The Black Community Is Better Off Because Of Her Efforts’


Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, NBA basketball legend and now author and activist, defended Rachel Dolezal in an essay published in Time last Monday afternoon.

Abdul-Jabbar related Dolezal’s actions with the famous line “I am Spartacus” because of her passion for her work and her accomplishments. He even branded her as a “fierce and unrelenting champion for African-Americans politically and culturally.”

The former basketball player also dismissed Dolezal’s deeds as acts of fraud, though he acknowleded the facts against Dolezal as “pretty damning” with the family issues.

For Abdul-Jabbar, the battle for impartiality is far too significant to all citizens of the US to waste the talent of someone like Dolezal, who has done so much for the African-American community.

Dolezal has led a local chapter of NAACP, handled classes associated to African-American culture and was involved with a police oversight committee dedicated to monitoring law enforcement activities.

He also added, with a tinge of humor, to give Dolezal a “Bill Clinton Get Out of Jail Free card” so that she can continue doing what she is best at – “making America more American,” he further noted in Time.

Abdul-Jabbar started his piece with a confession that he himself was telling a lie to people about his height. He said he was only 5 feet and 8 inches tall, not 7’2? which he has claimed for many years.

He further added that he had repeated the pretence often enough that people believed he was indeed tall.

He concluded his essay with futher support for Dolezal. “The black community is better off because of her efforts”, he wrote in his op-ed published in Time.

Dolezal, who stepped down from her post as president of Spokane NAACP on Monday, appeared on Today to express her feelings about the blackface remarks.

She told Matt Lauer of Today that she identifies herself as black. She even used to draw herself with a black crayon and black curly hair since she was five years old.

Dolezal also disagrees with the term deceiving and with people calling her blackface.

“I have a huge issue with blackface,” Dolezal told Lauer. “This is not some freak ‘Birth of a Nation’ mockery blackface performance” she further added.

For Rachel Dolezal, what’s she been doing is on a sincere, associated level and that she had to go there with the experience and not just physical appearance.

[Main image via YouTube (1), (2)]

Share this article: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar On Rachel Dolezal: ‘The Black Community Is Better Off Because Of Her Efforts’
More from Inquisitr