So drinking my coffee this morning and I ran across this article (linked below) where the Sacramento Kings play by play announcer was suspended for a tweet in response to an NBA player that asked him about Black Lives Matter.
His verbatim response was:
“Hey!!! How are you? Thought you forgot about me. Haven’t heard from you in years. ALL LIVES MATTER…EVERY SINGLE ONE!!!”
This man was instantly called a clown and closet racist because - I guess - every non black person on earth is supposed to know that saying “all lives matter” has somehow become a racist flashpoint or dog whistle.
That tweet reads INSTANTLY like a man responding to someone he knows and likes in a PUBLIC format… how could anyone read that and immediately label a man that has worked in the NBA for decades as a racist is beyond me.
I guess I must be racist too because i believe more in the HUMAN race and ALL LIVES more than a priority by skin color… THAT IMO is one of the many problems we have in this country and the world.
It is this kind of hyper sensitivity and instant labeling, along with a far right GOP (and our current “leader”) that is dividing our nation. How about we concentrate on the REAL racist issues like real law enforcement reform and getting KNOWN racists like Trump out of office instead of this witch hunting by the ultra progressives?
I consider myself a centrist with a tilt toward the left on most issues and find the core of the GOP as repulsive… but the ONLY outcome from a story like this is that anyone not at the far left of the political spectrum starts drifting toward the middle.
It does not help the cause of racism in my opinion.
The “All Lives Matter” slogan is something that arose in opposition to “Black Lives Matter.” It’s incredibly rare to see someone who’s put in the work for racial and social justice who spouts this slogan.
One analogy that gets used a lot is that if my house is on fire, I might call the fire department and ask them to save it. “My house is really important!” If they respond by saying, “ALL houses are really important” and want to argue with me about why I’m wrong to say MY house is important, instead of putting out the fucking fire at my house, I’m not going to be pleased with them.
Of course all lives matter. White lives are already treated in our country like they matter. Black lives? Not so much. Thus the slogan.
Now, was a week’s suspension an appropriate response? I dunno. I prefer dialogue to suspension for stuff like this. But I’m not the one making that call.
And ask yourself as a centrist: is this really the most important part of our situation right now, that it’s the one you decide to make a thread about? Instead of asking how the “far left” can win you back, maybe ask how you can support people in crisis right now.
Can you provide a cite that the people who suspended him are the “far left”? It seems unlikely to me that he was working for communists or socialists, or any other sort of far leftists.
Anyway, he’s an announcer and a public face for the Kings. It’s unbelievably tone deaf to say “All lives matter” while huge BLM protests are happening right now, and in the wake of an incident where it was clear that black lives don’t matter, at least to those four policemen.
All he had to say was, “yes, this was a terrible incident and it’s terrible how black people, especially black men, have been treated by the police.”
Black Lives Matter means that black live matter, too. We all know that white lives matter – that’s why you could have armed white protesters shouting directly into the face of policemen at state capitols with no consequences.
Even if he personally doesn’t give a shit about black mistreatment (and replying that all lives matter seems to indicate that this this doesn’t seem to concern him much), a smarter person, who is a public face of a basketball team, would respond with more sympathy.
The Kings have many black players, employees, and fans, and they don’t need a tone-deaf idiot downplaying the plight of black Americans in his Twitter feed. Do you agree that his response was pretty tone-deaf at least?
Anyway, he was suspended for a week. It’s not like he was killed on video with a cop’s knee on his neck.
A basketball announcer got suspended for a possible insensitive tweet. Meanwhile the President had peaceful protesters tear gassed so he could cross the street for a photo op.
This stuff just doesn’t matter. Some liberals and progressives sometimes make mistakes. Okay, that’s a shame… but it’s orders of magnitude less bad than the terrible things the current administration is doing (and his party is supporting).
You can focus on these tiny things if you want, but they’re just not even close to what’s going wrong in this country right now.
This was a really good analogy that framed the situation well, thanks!
While I still find that his tweet response was genuinely innocent and innocuous of any racism, I do see the counter point.
I guess I am just frustrated at all the tribalism in our politics and society at large.
While I see the George Floyd video showing no active racism, just a bad cop and an abhorrent human, we have no way of knowing what was in his heart at that moment.
I would like to think that ANY human killed like that would cause outrage, but I must remember that I have not walked in the shoes of our African American brothers and sisters.
The people who actually mean “all lives matter” are the ones saying “black lives matter”. Nobody needs to tell anyone that white lives matter: We as a society already know that. But a lot of people don’t seem to realize that black lives also matter, and so that’s the part of “all lives” that needs emphasizing. And most folks who support Black Lives Matter understand this. Which means that the only people who actually say “all lives matter” are the ones who mean “white lives matter”. And since society already knows that, what that usually means is “white lives matter more than black lives”.
It may well have been innocent and well intended. But it was insensitive, tone deaf, and uneducated. This is not a good look for someone who is a public face for an organization in an industry that is racially charged. It’s unfortunate that he didn’t know the history and intent of “All Lives Matter” but it’s his job to know that sort of thing before speaking to the public. That he didn’t know that is pretty astounding - it not a good look for a sports radio show host.
Due to the history of ‘All Lives Matter’ as a counter slogan to ‘Black Lives Matter’, I can’t say it was innocuous at all. I can easily see an organization fire someone for saying that because when I see someone use ‘All Lives Matter’ (in caps even), they seem to be making a racially problematic statement, at best. I don’t think you can claim ignorance at this point.
The man was publicly trolled and stupidly publicly replied. If you’re in broadcasting and don’t realize the internet/twitter care not a fucking bit about intent and still step on a landmine, don’t blame anyone but yourself.
DeMarcus Cousins @boogiecousins · May 31 @GrantNapearshow what’s your take on BLM?
Grant Napear @GrantNapearshow Hey!!! How are you? Thought you forgot about me. Haven’t heard from you in years. ALL LIVES MATTER…EVERY SINGLE ONE!!!
DeMarcus Cousins@boogiecousins· May 31Replying to @GrantNapearshow Lol as expected.
Blacks killed by police at 96/100,000 vs white at ~40/100,000. So adding that onto mass incarceration, lack of economic opportunity, the impact of mass incarceration on family structure and wealth building would just barely seem to make stopping the obvious targeting of blacks for violence worthy of a small slogan.
The fact that Americans allow police killings at ALL is a separate tragedy that they’re probably not ready to deal with yet. They could just bring the Black, Native American and Latino killing rates down to white ones first. Baby steps.
I’m a centrist too. I could write a book called “This is Where the Far Left Loses Me” which is why I clicked on this thread. But I see right through the All Lives Matter crap.
The All Lives Matter movement is an artfully crafted gaslighting technique. On its face it’s a perfectly reasonable statement that would be hard for any sane person to disagree with. It even sounds sort of liberal. Who could be against that, right? Look, I just called “All Lives Matter” crap. That means I have no respect for human life, right? What kind of awful person am I?
By setting up All Live Matter as a counterpoint to Black Lives Matter, the right wing created a funhouse mirror that distorts the meaning of Black Lives Matter. The inference is that people that identify with the Black Lives Matter movement believe, by definition, that non-black lives don’t matter. Which is, of course, totally ridiculous.
It would be like saying that when people support breast cancer charities, wear pink ribbons and participate in walkathons, that means they hate people with pancreatic cancer and lung cancer and brain cancer and want them all to go die horrible painful deaths. Because they aren’t walking for THEM and aren’t even thinking about them when they selfishly give all their money to the breast cancer people. Because #AllCancersAreBad, or something.
All Lives Matter is nothing more than a ridiculous gaslighting of Black Lives Matter. Don’t fall for it.
Good 538 article on trends among Democratic voters, young educated whites, Republican voters, etc. on to what degree racial discrimination is a continuing problem.
The paragraphs towards the end on chase and effect is interesting:
“You are probably thinking that white people with bachelor’s degrees and under age 50 are increasingly aligned with Democrats, so if many college-educated white people and white people under 50 are Democrats, could they have simply have adjusted their racial views to match the broader Democratic Party?
But there’s some evidence that people are increasingly choosing which party they align with based on racial issues. So it might also be the case that some white people under 50 and college-educated white people see a lot of racial discrimination in America, and that causes them to align with Democrats, while people who think racial issues get too much attention are aligning with the GOP.”
I’m quite sure that if a middle aged white guy passed a fake $20 bill he’d still be alive today. As a middle aged white guy, my interactions with cops go pretty smoothly. If for some reason I found myself handcuffed with an officer’s knee on my neck, I still believe he would let me up before I died. I don’t know what “active racism” is, but I’m not sure we need to see it before we are outraged. Passive racism kills black people too.
I consider myself a centrist, and am happy to see how other centrists think.
I read the first quoted paragraph and thought you might have a point.
But then I read the 2nd paragraph and realized that You.Don’t.Get.It. (If you think you DO get it, submit an essay —30 to 50 words should be enough — on why the expression “All Lives Matter” is extremely offensive not only to Blacks, but to Whites who have a smidgen of empathy. Can’t be bothered? Thought not.)
If yours is what “centrist” means, then I’m changing my affiliation to “militant moderate.”
Interesting, just watched Evening Prayer online from Durham Cathedral U.K. and the priest said All Lives Matter. He’d be torched if he was a USA priest.
How about YOU, Dale? A brief essay from you to see if you have the slightest clue why “All Lives Matter” is extremely offensive in an American context.
