DuckIII wrote:GoBlue72391 wrote:WookieOnRitalin wrote:
Sports should not be political especially favorably political to one particular point of view. People want to watch the game. If a player wants to be political on his or her own time, that is her or her prerogative. They have social media. They use their money for speech.
Nothing wrong with what Phil said.
Human rights aren't political.
I will never cease to be frustrated with people being upset by equality messaging. Equality messaging is only “political messaging” because resistance to it is a political path to success. The fact that it is referred to as politics at all confirms the necessity of it.
I could understand if the leagues absolutely beat us over the head with it constantly during broadcasts if for no other reason than the desire to preserve escapism into a hobby or personal interest. At some point all messaging can be overdone and out of place. I get that.
But other than a brief window during the social justice wave, the messaging is extremely tame. An occasional uplifting message on a baseline paint job. Football helmets saying “be love” etc.
And really, if you get upset by words standing for equality and support for other human beings then you might want to talk to someone.
I think that sport is inherently political and a reflection of society, Jackie Robinson wasn't consciously making a political statement when he integrated the MLB, he just wanted to play pro ball at the highest level. but of course, it was a very political act regardless. What Kaepernick did, clearly not on the same level of Jackie's contributions, was initially a very brave act; until Kaepernick sold out to child-employing company Nike because he wanted to make a couple of bucks. There's some irony in Asian sweatshop employees stitching "black lives matter" on a $100 nike sweatshirt.
what the the nba is doing is not brave or helpful to society. the nba is virtue signaling. as an entity, it doesn't actually have any values besides producing maximum profit because its audience is predominantly liberal and it tries to market to them. the players themselves obviously have a large impact on this too, but I'll always be of the opinion that paternalistic millionaires and billionaires, regardless of their skin color, moralizing the public is doing the exact opposite of what it intends to do. now you have an entire generation of "left wing" young people who think in race science and have an apartheid mindset. the flipside is all the god and patriotism talk in the NFL.
there's something amusing about how "anti-racism" has become an entire industry where its proponents actually have no desire to see racism or bigotry beaten back because then they'd be out of a job. they couldn't get paid to lecture minimum wage Starbucks employees or sell $100 stained glass "BLM" signs to whites in Vermont.
the state of the culture is such that you'd think we're worse off in these arenas than we were in the 1950s. you'd think women are more oppressed and at a much greater risk of sexual assault and that they're little damsels that society needs to protect rather than treat them as equal beings. furthermore, I find it amusing how this word "equity" has replaced "equality" in social justice discourse. if you've spent time on a college campus lately, you'll spend 99% of your time learning about how you say things and the words you use is the most important thing in your work (I'm a graduate student and recently my class spent an hour discussing why black business owners on the South Side are racists for putting up "no loitering signs"...pick a different word, they say, but couldn't come to a reasonable conclusion. the Arab professor was baffled but realized he couldn't actually get the class back on track because somebody would report him to the administration.), yet nobody seems to care that the language of capitalism now permeates this discourse.
corporate-mandated "social justice" has the complete opposite effect of what its proponents claim it will do. it's making people more racist. many many young whites think it's cool and rebellious to be racist because "the man" says its wrong. these kids probably don't actually have any strong opinions on bigotry, but it's pretty much the only form of contrarianism left in this society. nothing is taboo anymore except for that.
I echo what fleet said, the individual actions of the players shouldn't be regulated, they should have the freedom to express their social views, and it appears to be a better environment for that (unless you're a conservative and share the values of half the country). but let's not pretend like these billionaire owners give a **** about anything except the bottom line.
Almost feel like we dodged that bullet, as nice as it would’ve been to keep them.
