Mrs. King, in your CBS This Morning interview with Lisa Leslie about Kobe Bryant, you violated propriety and good common-sense journalism. Did you forget that his family was grieving and emotionally distressed? Asking for commentary about a youthful extra marital sexual encounter was way out of line. It was bad judgment to sneakily slap his wife and family by ambushing his legacy. Why can’t the paparazzi let the Bryants mourn in peace? Perhaps this is “fair game” for living powerful people facing down a jury of their peers, but how is this fair game for someone who has died? Kobe had his day in the courts and now he is unable to defend himself. Would you take the same liberties with Harvey Weinstein’s or Jeffrey Epstein’s legacy? Oprah’s superstar status can’t rescue you from this journalistic folly.
Snoop Dog is mad and tens of millions of fans are dismayed. Snoop is channeling and echoing the righteous outrage of the masses, not just the hip hop community, when he says LEAVE the HELL alone with KOBE, but many of us are dismayed at why SNOOP referenced Gayle with the B I T – H word in his Instagram post. If SNOOP had waited until the cool of the evening and lowered the temperature, the response would have been tempered and reasoned. Most of us know that you don’t deserve death threats, but you will probably create more resentment by explaining yourself into a cul de sac. Just issue an apology, or at a minimum, say that you regret the harm that you caused to Vanessa and Kobe’s family and legacy. Say that you didn’t feel the electricity in the air and that your intent was not to call pain.
I am not calling on Snoop Dogg to issue a forceful mea culpa for targeting you and your comments because Snoop will probably tell me to go and get blessed real good.
A rapper should not have license to spray misogynistic invectives into the public discourse because mass anger is one step from danger.
This dispute does not need to escalate and further divide us into polarizing camps. Let’s be firm with the opposition, flexible with friends and uncompromising with ourselves and how we practice our craft. We will be unable to lift ourselves up by unprincipled attacks on others.
Two people need to say more than I was misinterpreted, they need to say MY BAD…..
