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I’ve stayed away from the recent round of Crunchy Sock Twitter’s discontentment with Russell Wilson’s very public display of affection for his wife, Ciara. Because I’ve written about it before. A few times, actually.




And what more can really be said about people so invested in Ciara’s unhappiness—and the perpetual unhappiness of other black women who happen to have children with men they are no longer in relationships with (which is really what this is all about)—that they’d see a man wishing his wife a happy birthday and invent fault lines in that relationship’s core?



But I’m compelled to write about it today because of a word I’ve seen lobbed in Wilson’s direction for the duration of his public relationship with Ciara: “corny.”


In most contexts, corny just means uncool. And despite Russell Wilson’s many talents, he does seem to possess a certain aggressive earnestness that would make “corny” an accurate summation. Corny, however, isn’t a bad thing to be. Most people are corny. Shit, dads are so known for being corny that there’s an entire viral video series devoted to attempting to make people laugh with the corniest “dad jokes” possible.

Seventeen people on the internet think I have occasional moments of wit and humor, but I live in a home with a wife who thinks the funniest thing about me is that other people think I’m funny, and a soon-to-be-2-year-old daughter who thinks actual corn is less corny than I am. You, person reading this, are probably corny as fuck.

In some of the more vexing conversations about Russell Wilson, however, corny has been given a nastier connotation. He’s corny for marrying a woman who, apparently, doesn’t deserve love and affection. Even cornier for displaying said affection publicly. And is King Shit of Corny Mountain for treating his stepson with love and affection, too. He’s so “corny” that, according to the crunchy-sock herd, Ciara is destined to eventually cheat on or leave him. Because that’s what happens to corny niggas.

Here, instead of just being uncool, “corny” devolves into a synonym for “weak.” Of course, nothing that Wilson has done here qualifies as weak. But they believe he’s a weak man doing weak things and will eventually be left by his wife—a woman who they believe has no stomach for weakness because she has a child by someone who’s not, by their definitions of corny and weak, corny or weak. Basically, he’s not hood enough for her. Which implies that he’s not tough enough for her. Future, however, is hood and tough. And I’m sure the members of CST believe themselves to be tough, too.


The irony here is that Russell Wilson is a professional athlete. One who plays the hardest position in the country’s most violent sport and is one of the best at it. He is also a man who, because he’s not as tall as most of the men who play his position, is able to excel in part because he’s such an outstanding athlete. In a league filled with freaks of nature, Russell Wilson is one of the freakiest. He’s such a great athlete that he was also a Major League Baseball draft pick.

Basically, if you, man reading this, were to happen to get into a physical altercation with Russell Wilson, I would feel very bad for you. Because he would probably whoop your ass. And I’m only putting “probably” in as a qualifier in case some MMA fighter or Wladimir fucking Klitschko happens to be reading this. If you are not one of those people, this corny motherfucker—who makes a living outrunning and outsmarting and outflanking and out-toughing and out-endurancing 350-pound men attempting to rip his head off—would beat the shit of out you if he had a good-enough reason to.


And he would definitely whoop the asses of all of the crunchy-sock niggas sitting in barber’s chairs and behind their keyboards and using the library’s Wi-Fi to expound on how lame and weak and corny he is.

And Future? Shit. A fight between a drug-addicted hippie who happens to be from the trap and some professional athlete who’s probably literally on a dip machine curling a fucking Escalade right now is not a fair fight. Future vs. Russell Wilson is like a spider fighting a fucking raccoon. These dudes doubting and disparaging his toughness are like an alligator talking shit on a T. Rex’s arms.


Of course, none of this matters. Russell Wilson and Ciara will continue to make videos throwing frosted strawberries in each other’s mouths, and CST will continue to be mad that a woman they never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever had a shot at is being cared for and loved by a lame nigga. But it doesn’t hurt to remind people sometimes of what words mean. And by “of what words mean,” I mean “that Russell Wilson would beat the shit out of a Crunchy Sock Twitter nigga’s ass.”