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NBA owner Donald Sterling is a racist.
Jebus314
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So NBA owner Donald Sterling is probably, most definitely a terrible human being. Being the owner of the LA clippers makes this pretty much a given. But in an especially highlighting moment, Sterling was recently recorded arguing with his mistress/girlfriend (who's a model in her 20's, and is of african and mexican decent) where in he made several overtly racist comments. Here's a link to the audio recording, and here are some choice exerpts:
This is of course not the first time that Sterlings racist nature has been an issue. Naturally, there are now quite a few people asking for the forced removal of Sterling as an owner.
In my mind there are a few unique and interesting this to discuss about this recent development.
The first big point of discussion is where do you draw the line. Many posters here will fight tooth and nail for the right of free speech, even racist free speech. Should a private conversation be enough to demand action? Given the highly public nature of the NBA this may very well be all the evidence that the NBA requires, as it will almost certainly have a negative impact on the income of the NBA as a whole. But is that a good thing, or should we require evidence of some form of discrimination before we demand Sterlings removal? To my knowledge there has been no proven instances of discrimination, although there have been several allegations.
Another interesting question, is even assuming 100% validation in Sterling being a racist and having been discriminatory in the running of his franchise, what can we as fans do about this situation? How do we demand action? And before you post a one sentence response boiling down to "vote with your wallet", I'm going to ask you to read this article by my beloved Dave Deckard (an NBA blogger for the best NBA team). For those of you to lazy to click, the main points are that it's unfair to assume someone else will take care of it (either through legal action, or to assume clippers fans will bear the brunt of the burden and boycott their own team). I will also add that I believe it to be unfair to fans of any team and especially to the players, when there are so very few chances to win a title, to ask them to give up what may be their best shot this year because of one racist owner.
So what can we do? The linked article by Dave gives a few ideas like:
Also, because it's so hilariously WTF:
It bothers me a lot that you want to broadcast that you’re associating with black people. Do you have to?
You can sleep with [black people]. You can bring them in, you can do whatever you want. The little I ask you is not to promote it on that ... and not to bring them to my games.
I’m just saying, in your lousy f******* Instagrams, you don’t have to have yourself with, walking with black people.
This is of course not the first time that Sterlings racist nature has been an issue. Naturally, there are now quite a few people asking for the forced removal of Sterling as an owner.
In my mind there are a few unique and interesting this to discuss about this recent development.
The first big point of discussion is where do you draw the line. Many posters here will fight tooth and nail for the right of free speech, even racist free speech. Should a private conversation be enough to demand action? Given the highly public nature of the NBA this may very well be all the evidence that the NBA requires, as it will almost certainly have a negative impact on the income of the NBA as a whole. But is that a good thing, or should we require evidence of some form of discrimination before we demand Sterlings removal? To my knowledge there has been no proven instances of discrimination, although there have been several allegations.
Another interesting question, is even assuming 100% validation in Sterling being a racist and having been discriminatory in the running of his franchise, what can we as fans do about this situation? How do we demand action? And before you post a one sentence response boiling down to "vote with your wallet", I'm going to ask you to read this article by my beloved Dave Deckard (an NBA blogger for the best NBA team). For those of you to lazy to click, the main points are that it's unfair to assume someone else will take care of it (either through legal action, or to assume clippers fans will bear the brunt of the burden and boycott their own team). I will also add that I believe it to be unfair to fans of any team and especially to the players, when there are so very few chances to win a title, to ask them to give up what may be their best shot this year because of one racist owner.
So what can we do? The linked article by Dave gives a few ideas like:
... players and coaches across the league could agree to take the floor 15 minutes late for each playoff game in protest of Sterling's words. If they want to make a more powerful protest, take the floor for the tip but then have all players sit down right there on the floor for 15 minutes before rising to play...an old-style sit-in, a visible sign of the diversity and determination of the NBA community. The games would still go on. They couldn't forfeit everyone. But this would mess up television schedules, leave a quarter-hour of air time for announcers to talk about the reason for the protest, and keep the issue public without destroying the process.
Also, because it's so hilariously WTF:
"The world is a mess, and I just need to rule it" - Dr Horrible
Jebus314 on
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I've been following this and I feel that a lot of people (wrongly, imo) believe that the Clipper players should protest to play.
And I wonder where is the justice in that. Why are the racist words of some old white guy the players' responsibility?
If anything, I think its in the hands of the NBA commisioners to do something. But they won't because of money.
Really, this is just another example of racism and prejudice at the highest level of corporate America.
I'm not really sure that "society" needs to do anything here. If he's discriminating against black players I guess one of them could bring a lawsuit against him and the courts could decide? Either way that's more the responsibility of the individuals involved. We're not really in a position to render effective judgement one way or the other. An internet lynch mob does nothing to make the world better in a situation like this.
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Again, I disagree with this.
You make it sound like its someone's responsibility to change his mind.
Personally, I could give a fuck what the guy thinks and I feel he deserved all criticism directed at him.
maybe i'm streaming terrible dj right now if i am its here
I don't think you are responsible for changing his mind at all, but the OP specifically asked "what can we do?" That seems to me like the thing an individual could do with the highest likely rate of success.
If you don't care what he thinks, then the thread topic probably isn't really all that interesting to you, and you won't feel the need to take any action at all. That's fine too! No one is obligated to take any kind of action just because some random stranger has opinions they don't like.
Why would hurting him be the goal in this case?
Also, it's Donald. Should probably fix the title.
Actually, this topic is interesting to me.
Because no matter how many times things like this happen people act like its some kind of isolated issue.
My point is that this isn't isolated, its just a symptom. To me Sterling is another racist who gets away with saying and doing racist things in a society that treats said actions as some kind of foreign thing.
I don't think Sterling is the interesting thing, rather the conversation that surrounds him.
To my knowledge, no one in this topic has implied that racism is an isolated issue, or that this sort of racism is foreign to them. If anything, I'd say most people find it depressingly common. What people are acting like this is an isolated issue? Is it someone here?
It's not really clear to me how the frequency of racism really changes the policy perscription in this case. Racism was quite common in the 50s, and that didn't stop people from working to convince others that it was wrong. If anything, it's probably a lot easier to do that now, because more people now agree that racism is wrong.
Why it not be a goal? Isn't the whole point that you help change society by protesting or whatever stuff you feel is unjust?
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Because a)you're not changing his mind (the man is an infamous racist slumlord who has been sued over racist renting policies), b) he's an old school rentier who only cares about the Clips making him money, c) the other NBA owners will not set the precedent of the league stripping an owner of his franchise (for obvious reasons), so d) "hurting" him (making the Clips unprofitable) is the only way to get him out of the league.
Like I said, I'm talking about this conversation at large and since this is a topic on the subject I thought it a good place to think out loud.
Also, you'd have to tell me what policy perscription you're referring to.
So you are saying that in order to stop people from doing things we do not agree with, we need to punish and hurt those people in order to frighten others into not doing those things? How would you say that sort of retributive justice has worked as a strategy in, say, the drug war?
In general, the goal of protest (and other tools of civil rights movements) is always to convince people that you are right. Generally, the goal is not to hurt the people on the other side, but to convince them not to think or act in a certain way.
If you ever find yourself thinking "how can I really hurt this person?", you're probably not on the path to making the world a better place.
That's what I'd wonder though.
At this point the guy is already rich as fuck.
All you can do is make him slightly not as rich as fuck.
And making the Clippers unprofitable would probably hurt the people at the lower levels more than it hurts him.
After they give the Warriors Chris Paul as a toll to pass through Norcal of course
Well for one It's pretty unlikely you could ever really cause any direct economic damage. Dude is a billionaire. He could literally lose millions of dollars over this and it wouldn't even really register. Alternatively, the other NBA owners (who are the only ones with the power to remove Sterling) aren't going to be happy with almost any negative economic effects since they aren't the ones who screwed up. So even if the boycott starts fairly small, so long as it is spread across the entire NBA and not limited to just the clippers, It's possible you could convince the other billionaires that it would just be easier to outcast the outspoken racists.
Sterling is an old man, he no doubt grew up during a time when racist opinions such as his were common. Much of society has moved past that, he clearly has not. At this point, I would argue that his age and immense wealth will make it virtually impossible for anyone to change his mind.
On the other hand, lots of very old very wealthy people (including many politicians and their donors) have changed their minds on gay rights within the last ten years. I'm sure you could have made the exact same arguments about many of them. This suggests to me that it is not impossible to change someone's mind on issues like these, even if they are old and wealthy.
In general, we don't know the guy and aren't really in a position to comment on how feasible it is. The picture we see of him is limited to the narrative he serves.
It's more about making it clear to every other less-publicized racist out there that this kind of thing is unacceptable and that society's response will be to ostracize them.
The goal of making this an issue is not really to influence the opinions of dudes (like Sterling) who have strong, nigh-ideological opinions about race. It's to influence the great number of people who probably just don't spend a lot of time thinking about these issues and get them to support removing some of the structural racism in society
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
Would you say that the mindset of "Try very hard to hurt the people who do bad things, so that others will be too afraid to do similar bad things" has worked out well for America, as a whole? Obviously we see a lot of that impulse in how we handle criminals, how we handled the war on terror, ect. Would you say that it has worked out well for us, or the focus on retribution through things like the drug war or the war on terror have made the world substantially better?
If not, what makes you believe that punishing the bad guy will solve the problem in this case? Why is it different?
Like the War on Drugs has been shown to have a very racial undercurrent in the last decade or so.
I don't think we really can punish sterling, at least not meaningfully. Saying racist things isn't against the law, and I'm pretty sure the NBA can't even force him to sell the team if he really doesn't want to.
in the broadest sense I am comfortable with saying that society should take action to dis-incentivize things that it finds objectionable. I would for example favor disinvestment in an apartheid government, or boycotts of other racist institutions.
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
We just get to call them assholes, challenge their opinions, refuse to associate with them, and encourage others not to do business with them.
I don't think anyone was talking about what we should personally do to this person as you seem to be wording it.
That said, seeing as these sports organization tend to have codes of conduct for their players I don't think its that farfetched to wonder why they don't seem to be extended to their management.
Oh yeah...because they're the guys who run things.
http://deadspin.com/5263277/the-sordid-life-of-clippers-owner-donald-sterling
Is it feasible for players in the NBA to simply walk away from a team to join another one, or does the NBA have the typical pro sports contract structure?
They still need to update the graphic on their website, though.
Thank god for that.
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televise it
Players don't have power like the owners do. I agree it's a double standard.
I'm forced to ask, how did someone with his history of lawsuits being filed against him for being a racist landlord find himself getting honored with an NAACP lifetime achievement award in the first place?
Edit: oops just saw your follow up post
They might consider this different since the recording was in private, and Sterling (presumably) didn't know he was being recorded.
Hopefully they feel the pressure's a little too strong and wedge him out regardless.
nah
NBA has no problem fining owners who do objectionable shit too
look at how much money Mark Cuban has donated to Ex-commish Stern over the years
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