Rhetoric Race and Religion
by Edward J. Blum
R3 Contributor
Looks can kill, and looks can sell. Just ask two young men from Florida: Trayvon Martin and Tim Tebow. The media frenzies surrounding them put on display the power of looks and looking. When Barack Obama weighed in on the Martin case, he drew attention to physical appearance. “If Trayvon was my son,” the president intoned, “he’d look like Trayvon.” Presidential hopeful Rick Santorum spat in response. Obama was playing “the race card” and he wouldn’t have spoken out if Travyon looked “white.”
As some reporters went south, others moved from west to east following the Tebow mania train. As the newest New York Jet, Tebow left his mile high domain for the bright lights and big city.The New York Post immediately joined Tebow’s looks to Tebow’s lord. The Post not only referred to Tebow as “the heavenly hunk,” but also ran a photograph of him from GQ where he posed like Jesus on the cross, shirtless, “sweaty and steamy.”
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