Ja Morant Is Wrong But America’s Fear Of Black Gun Owners Is More Telling

Ja Morant pulling out a gun on Instagram Live was reckless and he deserves to face consequences for those actions. Morant also must audit his circle of friends and eliminate people who are potentially detrimental to his career.

But that’s not the end of the story.

On May 14, the Memphis Grizzlies announced their superstar was suspended “from all team activities pending League review” after a second IG Live video with Morant dancing with a gun in a car surfaced.

Morant’s recent actions continue a league of problems for the 23-year-old star guard.

On March 15, Morant was suspended for eight games without pay for “conduct detrimental to the league” after an investigation of Morant in a live-streamed video at a Denver area nightclub determined he was “holding a firearm in an intoxicated state” and his conduct was “irresponsible, reckless and potentially very dangerous.”

The NBA’s official statement about the suspension concluded with Commissioner Adam Silver stating, “Ja has also made it clear to me that he has learned from this incident and that he understands his obligations and responsibility to the Memphis Grizzlies and the broader NBA community extend well beyond his play on the court.”

The league’s investigation did not conclude “the gun at issue belonged to Morant,” yet clearly Morant and his friends did not learn.

The most recent video came from the account of Devonte Pack, a reportedly long-time friend of Morant and co-owner of MBNO clothing brand.

Pack was reportedly barred from Grizzlies’ home games for a year after a January 29 incident during a game against the Indiana Pacers.

According to Damichael Cole of The Commercial Appeal in Memphis, after a verbal altercation with several Pacers players as he was seated courtside, Pack was escorted from the floor.

The Athletic reported “acquaintances of [Morant] aggressively confronted members of the Pacers traveling party near the team’s bus in the loading area of FedExForum” and “later someone in a slow-moving SUV — which Morant was riding in — trained a red laser on them.”

Morant has been seen in MBNO clothing, is from Sumter, South Carolina like Pack, and they both played on the same South Carolina Hornets AAU team.

Although Pack tweeted there was “false info” surrounding the investigation that led to him being barred, this is the second incident Pack has been involved in that potentially put his friend’s career in jeopardy.

If Morant does not make the decision to sever ties with Pack or any other people deemed to bring him in jeopardy of conduct detrimental to the league, that decision might be made for him.

At The Start

Morant, like his on-court acrobatics, came into 2023 flying financially high.

Last summer after winning the Most Improved Player award, Morant was rewarded with a 5-year, $194.3 million contract with a potential to increase to $231.4 million for becoming All NBA.

On Christmas Day 2022, Nike released the Nike Ja 1 announcing Morant as “Nike Basketball’s first Gen Z signature athlete’.”

“Morant sets an example for Gen Z athletes everywhere as a leader who creates the future of the sport through his creativity, authenticity and style,” wrote Nike.

There are hundreds of millions of dollars invested in Ja Morant. But his second gun-toting incident only two months after being suspended for doing it before is grounds for the NBA potentially suspending him much longer than 8 games without pay.

This past Wednesday, Nike made the first move and removed Ja’s Hunger 1 sneaker from the Nike and Finish Line apps.

If Ja Morant is a future face of basketball and a Gen Z signature athlete, the NBA and Nike will demand Morant clean up his image, which could include severing ties with Pack and MBNO clothing.

Support For Black Gun Owners?

This situation is deeper than business decisions.

It involves the image of a young Black man, brandishing a gun, and that’s where the story takes a turn.

As former NBA player and ESPN personality JJ Reddick reminded everyone in a rant about Morant, gun culture, and right-wing politician’s worship of guns, Ja Morant was not arrested for brandishing a weapon in either video.

Morant obviously needs a refresher on responsible gun possession, but what does responsible Black gun ownership look like in America? Is it even socially acceptable in America?

On July 1, 2021, Tennessee law went into effect to “permit a large majority of citizens to carry a loaded handgun on their person, openly or concealed, without having to possess a permit” according to the Memphis Police Department.

Memphis Police in a statement said after the law was passed: “There may now be more persons openly carrying a firearm. In turn, the public, already apprehensive of seeing armed individuals, may result in an increase in 911 calls to report the subject.”

Could someone driving next to Pack and Morant, apprehensive of seeing armed Black individuals have called the police on Morant? Could it have led to Morant’s death in the hands of police, as media personality and culture savant Bomani Jones posited on his podcast The Right Time?

Would it matter if Morant’s gun use was lawful and he was exercising his 2nd Amendment rights?

On July 6, 2016 African American Philando Castile was killed in front of his then four-year-old daughter by a St. Anthony, Minnesota police officer during a traffic stop after announcing he had a firearm in his vehicle which he was licensed to carry. Even though Castile’s family settled a wrongful death suit for $2.995 million and his girlfriend $800,000, the officer who shot him was acquitted by a jury of second-degree manslaughter and two counts of dangerous discharge of a firearm.

The National Rifle Association (NRA), the nation’s leading gun advocacy, firearm safety and competency group, went completely silent after Castile’s death and a year later after the officer’s acquittal called it “a terrible tragedy that could have been avoided.”

They did not elaborate why it could have been avoided nor did the organization speak in defense of Castile’s right to own a gun or the procedure to state he was a licensed carrier.

The NRA has been silent on support of Morant’s right to open carry in the state of Tennessee and has yet to use the incident as a teaching tool to inform its members on responsible gun usage.

However, after then-18-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse was acquitted of shooting three men and killing two of them with an AR-15 during Kenosha protests following the police shooting of African American Jacob Blake, the NRA tweeted a section of the 2nd Amendment.

Also absent in support of Morant are right-wing, gun-supporting politicians and media.

Conservative media personality Megyn Kelly declared the gun debate “over” after a May 6th mass shooting at an Allen, Texas mall claimed the lives of 9 people including a 3-year-old boy.

Mere days after a November 21st mass shooting at Oxford High School in Michigan, where a 15-year-old boy killed 4 people, Kentucky Republican Congressman Thomas Massie posted a holiday message of his family all holding assault weapons.

In response to Congressman Massie, Colorado Republican Congresswoman Lauren Boebert posted a holiday message with all four of her young boys holding guns.

John Kennedy, communications director for Massie, defended Massie’s decision saying it did not convey a dangerous message.

“Rep. Massie’s photo was so popular with his Kentucky constituents that the most commonly heard complaint we received was that this photo was not released as the actual Christmas card,” Kennedy said.

Pointing guns around the Christmas tree with your children is safe and popular?

Would it be celebrated the same if newly elected Black progressive mayor of Chicago Brandon Johnson and his family posed with guns on the 4th of July?

The answer is no.

Black Imagery And Fear

There is no socially acceptable image of Black gun ownership in America, legal or not.

In fact, there is such fear of Black criminality, not only do lawful Black gun owners announcing their legal carry get killed for having a gun, they are killed for holding items in their hand that are mistaken by police to be a gun.

In March 2020, Kansas City police killed Donnie Sanders after a police cruiser with no sirens or lights initially followed Donnie Sanders to his sister’s house after the cruiser allegedly noticed him speeding. After a brief interaction in which he was told to drop what was in his hand, mere seconds later he was shot, the officer thinking Sanders had a gun. It was a cellphone.

In December 2020, Columbus, Ohio police responding to a non-emergency call about a car turning on and off shot and killed Andre Hill as left his friend’s home with an illuminated cellphone with the officer claiming Hill had a firearm.

In 2018, Stephon Clarke was killed in his grandmother’s backyard with a 20-shot barrage after an extremely brief encounter with police claiming they “feared for their lives” thinking Clarke had a gun in his hand. Instead, police found a cellphone near his body.

In June 2011, Flint Farmer was killed by Chicago police responding to a domestic dispute. They too mistook the cellphone he was pulling out of his pocket for a gun.

It’s not just cellphones. In December, Casey Goodson Jr. was shot and killed by a Franklin County, Ohio deputy as he entered his home while holding Subway sandwiches.

And then there’s Amadou Diallo, killed by NYC police in 1999 with 19 shots after mistaking Diallo’s wallet for a gun.

The fear of Black criminality is so pervasive in society it has coincided with the NBA policing what players wear.

In October 2005, the NBA instituted a dress code after players like Allen Iverson and others repeatedly wore jerseys, flat-brimmed hats cocked to the side, durags, baggy clothes, sneakers, and gold chains to games.

“They’re targeting my generation – the hip-hop generation,” Allen Iverson claimed in an interview.

That same year, then Golden State Warriors guard Jason Richardson called the NBA commissioner David Stern’s dress code “kind of racist” and said it “targeted Blacks.”

Although Dwyane Wade and a future generation of players would go on to embrace the rule and shape it into their own unique brand of fashion, the league with the highest percentage of Black players was the first major sport to adopt a dress code.

The NBA’s dress code rule did not just spawn from clothes.

In April of this year, a documentary was just released covering the “Jailblazers Era,” a period roughly between 2001-05 when various members of the Portland Trailblazers experienced legal issues off the court.

And then there’s The Malice at the Palace. On November 19, 2004, the infamous NBA brawl broke out between Detroit Pistons and Indiana Pacers players and Pistons fans which led to arrests, lengthy suspensions, and a thug image of the NBA the league had to fix.

The Black Gen Z Generation

This brings us to Gen Z, the generation that has grown up on social media, likes, shares, retweets, and internet influencers like Mr. Beast becoming insanely wealthy from it.

Every new hit song is now attached to a Gen Z TikTok dance. There was a popular TikTok dance called the Gun Shot Challenge where participants jerked their bodies to pantomime being shot to the sounds of gunshots being played in a song.

Now your favorite Gen Z basketball player with colored locs is previewing the latest hot rap album on Instagram Live, acting out the lyrics to the songs.

Ja Morant is a Gen Z young rich Black man who cosplayed a song about gun violence in an era that repels any image of Black thuggery being displayed by NBA players, a league seen as a primarily Black league by fans.

NBA fans accept a Black league with a good image and marketable squeaky-clean stars like LeBron James and Steph Curry.

The bargain is NBA players have generally accepted obeying the league’s conditions of not being seen as a Black thug league.

Ja Morant broke the bargain by not keeping his gun-toting self out of public consumption.

But reaction feels like Ja Morant is not only being seen as irresponsible but stepping out of his place.

Regardless of whether there is a racialized component to Morant’s reaction and its imagery in contrast to right-wing politics, should gun ownership be celebrated by anyone in the first place?

According to the Gun Violence Archive, just this year alone there have been 200 mass showings in the United States, with the last three years each having over 600 mass shootings apiece.

America has a gun problem, but a politics problem trying to solve it.

According to a Gallup poll, 91% of Democrats want stricter gun laws, while only 24% of Republicans do.

The Massie and Boebert Christmas cards go well with Republicans because gun culture is their politics.

Those politics, or anyone else’s, don’t seem to include Ja Morant.