Last week Houston Rockets General Manager Daryl Morey tweeted out a rather innocuous statement supporting the protesters in Hong Kong who aren’t too happy about being ruled against their will under China’s highly repressive totalitarian communist regime.
China then responded authoritatively, as one would expect from a totalitarian regime, and cancelled some NBA events under a veiled threat to stop broadcasting future NBA games and firewall the entire concept, as they do with #Democracy.
This put the NBA and its players in a bit of a tough bind. The NBA is the most politically vocal and progressive of any of the major sports leagues, yet they rely on China for a lot of revenue from television and merchandising and also benefit from the fact that their league is becoming hugely popular in a land of 1.3 billion people. That alone could secure you a sweet low-interest loan.
There are several reasons the NBA is comparatively vocal and progressive, as opposed to, say, the NFL, which is run by a bunch of racists.
It is run by a bunch of racists because the players are comparatively expendable and so they can be pushed around.
The NBA has a very strong players union, in part because its players are much less expendable. The NBA’s athletes are the most recognizable in the country, they don’t wear helmets or even hats, and, in solidarity with the player’s union, the NBA has installed as their commissioner one Adam Silver who fancies himself as woke and does the overhanded black guy style handshake.
LeBron James has been the NBA’s best player for at least a decade. As one of the main faces of the league, he has also been one of its more politically vocal members.
There are a few reasons for this. He seems to genuinely care about worthy causes which hit close to home for him, and he faces zero repercussions for speaking his mind. He’s still going to have a contract and he’s still going to get endorsements, although now we have a monkeywrench.
Truth be told, the political causes he has supported have all been entirely low risk and did not require him to stick his neck out on the line.
He spoke out on behalf of this trend that’s been happening for the past 75 years of police shooting unarmed black people. Tamir Rice, Trayvon Martin, and others.
This is commendable, yet while it’s highly troubling that a large chunk of the population supports the police over the black guys they shoot, none of those 99 Cent Menu Trump fellating opiate swilling losers are NBA fans.
LeBron isn’t alienating those people by his political statements. He’s already alienated them, by being black, and, furthermore, rich, and much furthermore, not afraid of them.
The other unfortunate truth is that, when these people call LeBron an opportunist, a phony, and an all around sanctimonious fatherly projecting annoying fuck, they are correct.
Last election LeBron famously encouraged people to vote for Hillary Clinton, and then himself didn’t vote – even though he could have voted in Ohio, a swing state.
It seems rather imminent that while LeBron is championing important causes, for which he deserves credit, he is also incredibly calculated as to how this will affect his bottom line, and frankly LeBron speaking out on the Trayvon Martin situation runs as much risk as some guy at a Trump rally proclaiming that he loves Mountain Dew.
Hence, the rubber met the road with this Daryl Morey China tweet.
A lot of people will tell you the situation in Hong Kong is highly complex, and that you need to understand all of the nuances and factor in, I can only suppose, the Chinese state run media’s official stance?
It’s actually not complicated, at all.
China has colonized and is occupying lands which under no rationale fall under their purvey such as Tibet, Taiwan, and Hong Kong.
People in Hong Kong value free speech. China values killing people who want free speech. It’s that simple.
LeBron recently admonished Morey with the following vague, loopy statement:
“I just think that when you’re misinformed or you’re not educated about something – and I’m just talking about the tweet itself – you never know the ramifications that can happen. We all see what that did, not only did for our league but for all of us in America, for people in China as well. Sometimes you have to think through the things that you say that may cause harm not only for yourself but for the majority of people. I think that’s just a prime example of that.”
Yeah good call, bro. Maybe we should have stayed silent about the Tamir Rice killing for fear of angering trigger happy cops. If Malcolm or Dr King taught us anything it was to peek beneath the blinds, right? What the fuck are you talking about?
The fact is, LeBron’s statement is exactly the type of thing China wants him to say, and that’s not a coincidence, since the NBA and its players roughly split all of the league’s revenue 50/50.
The league’s revenue includes TV deals and appearances and merchandising and all of that in China, so, if China says fuck you to the NBA, the league, and in turn the players will make less money due to salary cap adjustments (which are based on league revenue) – and not a trivial amount either – millions of dollars per team.
Furthermore, LeBron is under contract through Nike, and Nike makes their shoes in China under cheap, inhumane, exploited labor – a cause LeBron has yet to take up.
If China severs business or even sanctions Nike, that’s going to also take money out of LeBron’s pocket, and, I have a theory, which I cannot prove, other than I can prove that when you follow the trail of money you’ll always find the harsh truth:
China told Nike, and then Nike told LeBron and its other athletes to shut their fucking mouths, and they did, which is why you haven’t heard a peep about this from any of them, save for LeBron’s sort of waffling which eerily reminds me of how Trump talks about Vladimir Putin and Russia.
There’s one party that’s right here, and it’s the protesters. Certainly LeBron is on the wrong side of history on this one and Daryl Morey is on the correct one.
By succumbing to their economic interests and remaining indifferent to human rights, the NBA has cemented itself as a paper tiger, as a league which pretends to be progressive in order to appeal to young people, who overwhelmingly trend this way.
Colin Kaepernick went from barely being in the NFL, to not being in the NFL, to growing an afro and securing a deal with Nike worth millions of dollars a year more than he would have made playing football.
He could have taken a knee before he took the field in the Super Bowl – but it wasn’t the right time.
Kareem Abdul Jabar became a pariah. Muhammed Ali went to prison. Jackie Robinson, Hank Aaron, they faced constant death threats. Mahmoud Abdul Rauf was basically kicked out of the NBA for not honoring the flag.
LeBron James is actually profiting. That’s the difference. Theses guys are activists like Iggy Azalea is a rapper from Queens.
You can shave your nasty beard now, enjoy your money, and stop pretending. Maybe go as Medgar Evers for Halloween.
For once I’m agreeing with some racist Fox News lady, shut up and dribble, actually, dribble less and post up.