Eh, it seemed pretty clear from the tape that he wants his racist friends not to think he’s getting overly friendly with black people, and wants his gf to pass as white or Hispanic, presumably for the same group of friends. He thinks her hanging out with black people will hurt those goals.
It gets a little weird since he keeps denying the fact that he’s racist, despite the fact that the gf keeps pointing out that what he said is, in fact, inarguably racist. And because lovers quarrels are always kinda incoherent.
But I thought the basic gist was pretty straightforward.
I’m confused too, SlackerInc. I get racism doesn’t make sense, I get there’s lots of self-contradiction inherent. Still, I look at this and I’m just WTF?
My best guess is he doesn’t mind having her sleep with other guys, but doesn’t want the world to know it. He thinks if she has her picture taken with lots of muscular hot black guys, we’re all going to think “OMG Sterling’s girlfriend is fucking those muscular hot black guys!” when, of course, none of us knew who she was before this, and nobody thinks an Instagram picture with a famous athlete means anything more than the obvious.
That’s a weak hypothesis, to be sure, but it’s the best I’ve got. And I think it’s a tiny bit better than, “because racist!”
I mean, obviously the guy is a racist, but I think this WTF begs for a more thought-out explanation.
I think that he is emotionally irrational in his fears about the perceptions of others regarding a May-December multi-racial relationship. You can almost hear in his voice the panic at being thought of publicly as impotent
and possibly unable to fulfill the needs of his much younger GF.
In the first tape, his sexual inadequacy fears seem evident, but its his GF that seems to be constantly dragging the issue over to race (perhaps because she knew she was recording it?). Based on tape one alone,
I would say that she forced a fight and manipulated the conversation Easily while he was upset (which is possibly another reason he shouldn’t be a team owner).
The second tape is the smoking gun though.
On a total side note, does anyone know if blackmail charges going to be pressed against Stiviano? Also, civilly, if she has a claim against him for 2 million but she by releasing the tape causes him to sell the team at
a fire-sale price where he loses more than 2 million, assuming offsetting judgements, doesn’t she end up walking away with nothing but a bad reputation?
I’ve not followed this all that closely, but the sense I get from what I’ve seen is that it’s not so much that he himself is a racist but that he’s convinced that everyone else is racist, and that too much palling around with black people will therefore make him look bad. That’s what I get out of the stuff about how “that’s the way the world is” and the obsession with public image.
You could argue that catering to other people’s racism is itself racist, or at least morally wrong, but at any rate what he’s saying/doing does not seem to be internally inconsistent to me.
This guy’s racism isn’t new, so it’s not like a demented old man is suddenly going on uncharacteristic, deluded rants about the negroes in his old age.
I love this thread. “He probably has dementia or something. I mean, why else would he say such irrational things?” The man doesn’t have goddamn dementia. He’s been a racist twat for a long damn time and has the lawsuits to prove it.
Yup and yup.
I think he’s racist scum, but I don’t think that was the driving issue behind this particular conversation. I think he doesn’t understand the way young people use social media, and thought that she was clearly sleeping with those guys- why else would she put photos of them together online for all to see? He’s too old to understand that it’s just what people do. Meet Magic Johnson, post pic of self with Magic Johnson. I don’t think he’s senile, just out of touch. And racist, because otherwise he could have articulated his (wrong) point without bringing the race of the participants into it.
Love that video of the Clips taking off their warm ups at the beginning of the game.
I never saw anything to suggest she was sleeping with anyone else- Magic Johnson, the other sports guy in the instagram pic… Donald Sterling told her something to the effect of ‘invite them over, feed them sleep with them, whatever. Just don’t post the pictures of them on line or invited them to the games,’ but I don’t think that’s anything other than a suggestion to her on the difference between public and private behavior.
I’m sure it’s likely she was sleeping around. It’s unlikely that such a young, possibly wealthy woman who is into sports filled with young athletic men and has access to them socially would really find an 80 year old physically attractive enough to want only him for sex. But who knows- perhaps she has a sugar daddy fetish.
I too think she set him up a bit by encouraging him to say things a smart guy like him should know to keep private. She was supposedly taping him because she was acting as an ‘archivist’ in some capacity. Or at least that was a claim I saw online somewhere. I bet this has something to do with the lawsuit Sterling’s wife has going against the mistress.
Indeed–thanks, and I like the stab you took at it.
As a followup to further rebut the “because racism, duh” argument: the journalist, professor, and frequent ESPN panelist Kevin Blackistone said on Tom Ashbrook’s radio show that while on the one hand he was not surprised to hear of Donald Sterling, of all NBA owners, saying something racist, he was “puzzled by Sterling’s logic” in the specific things he said.
Another WTF in all of this is why in the world the NAACP was going to present him with an award, when apparently he has not only been known for years as a racist, but had to pay a multimillion dollar settlement for refusing to rent apartments to black people.
Interesting supposition–makes a lot of sense. Though it raises the question of how an 82 year old guy like him would even be aware of what she is doing on Instagram. I guess he was “getting calls” as he said. It would be nice to know who these callers were so they can be publicly outed and shamed as well.
WTF indeed. So an old guy who sounds not-all-there and/or inebriated says some stupid, surreal nonsense to his mistress privately and everyone acts like Fox News does regarding the other story of the century – Bengazi. It seems to me he feels like he’s been very good to his side gal and would just prefer she not have to have a mostly all black group of buddies and send out a lot of pics. If she felt more comfortable in the company of gay men and Sterling didn’t like her sending out pics of them palling around would that make him homophobic? (Maybe, or possibly just a sad old man with more money than sense.)
Sorry, it just seems a bit like crocodile tears. I saw a black ex-Clipper on CNN this morning who was asked if the team was aware of Sterling’s past history (such as racial discrimination with his rental properties). He said they were aware of the history but because it didn’t affect them, they didn’t care! :eek: But if you get all benevolent plantation master on me I’m outraged by the disrespect and racism; if you discriminate against the common black man my outrage is, well, not so much.
To paraphrase Captain Renault in Casablanca, “I’m shocked, shocked to find that bigotry is going on in here!” [as he accepts his paycheck from the racist organization].
Ignorant fool for sure, but it doesn’t seem to be quite the collapse of civilization that it’s being made out to be. If they’re kicking him out of the NBA for moral turpitude, what was his open affair with another lady while still married to his wife?
He’s 82, well connected, rich, racist, white, and active in Cali’s business industries (like that subtlety?) as well as politics. One white guy tossed from a ball team? It can happen.
Congressmen, Senators, Governors, CEOs, elderly Major Business Icons of CA… all tossed out on their flabby ignorant asses by racist comments on meta-data, intercepts & LUDs? And 18 months before a Presidential Election?
It was a despicable (and illegal) thing for Sterling’s mistress to publicly shame him by revealing a private conversation shared in the intimacy of a relationship.
I do not defend Sterling’s sentiments, or wish to deny him the consequences of his sentiments, though unfairly made public. I defend only the concept of privacy, and essential right of the individual in free and democratic society, a right Ms. Stiviano denied Mr. Sterling. I do not wish to deny Ms. Stiviano any of the legal and social consequences of her actions, either.
It was a despicable action on Ms. Sterling’s part to reveal a private conservation between her in Sterling made in the privacy of their relationship.
I do not wish to defend Sterling’s sentiments, nor deny him the consequences of his sentiments (though unfairly made public). I wish only to defend the concept of privacy, an essential right in a free and democratic society denied Mr. Sterling. I do not wish to deny Ms. Stiviano any the of the social and legal consequences of her actions, either.
I’ve yet to read anything about the release of the tape being illegal. It has already been established that both parties had consent in the recording, and as far as I can tell the release of the recording is not illegal.
This article says “Los Angeles police say they are not investigating Stiviano or the audio’s release at this time.”
This article says “Stiviano’s lawyer, however, told the Los Angeles Times that Sterling knew he was being recorded,” and “Though some may question the ethics of the act, if the audio was legally obtained, no laws were violated by leaking it to a reporter.”
So, can you share some cites about how what V. Stiviano did was illegal and why she should be prosecuted?
Just another rich old guy getting taken by a young hottie, talk about your first world problems!
Sorry, I have no sympathy for him, even if she did release the tape. (Which I don’t see any evidence she did, by the way.)
He was effectively buying her affections with expensive cars, (to such an extent the wife was suing her!), but now he’s/we’re surprised to discover she’s all about the money? Sorry, that don’t wash with me.
Looks like he thought he owed her ass, and he could be an jerk to her. Turns out he was wrong.
Old rich dude suffers from making stupid decisions with his dick. News at 11.
