This is the World That We Live In

[Todd Gack]

and what else? How long is that list?

Do you honestly think it's that long so as not to be navigable? Don't talk despairingly about minorities, gay people, or women -- more than 300,000,000 do it successfully every day.

And don't bring up comedians who do so, because we're all smarter than that. That said, I think rappers who talk [crap] about women and gays and who are outraged by this should be called out, too.

 

[ssbriefcase]

and what else? How long is that list?

How long are you gonna make it?

 

[Scooch]

I think Kareem Abdul-Jabar agrees with Moqui http://toprightnews.com/?p=2777

Kareem's op-ed is very well written.

That site...is...something else.

 

[jekelish]

That is not what he said. He is opposed but he does not condemn. Do you understand that one can hold a position different from yurs and not be a lesser human being?

Who said anything about anyone being a lesser human being?

 

[mayselc]

I read this whole thread and almost subjected you all to a sliver of my dissertation.

Bullet dodged.

Suffice it to say, privacy in anything but the privileged legal context is a thing of the past. Want to discuss something you wouldn't want the world knowing? Say it to a psychologist. And if you say it anywhere else, you better be prepared to back it up.

 

[AZOrange]

I really don't get comparing this to Jay-Z's lyrics. One is a guy writing what is technically art. The other is saying racist crap in every day life. There's a massive difference. Just because Tolkien wrote about Orcs doesn't mean he believed they existed. Same thing with what Jay-Z writes in his songs. Artistic license is a legitimate thing.

Real life racism is quite another thing.

The nba didn't just look past jayz's lyrics... All these guys have skeletons...that's what Cuban is talking about...

 

[longislandcuse]

I have to say, Sterling has proven himself to be a bigot and a racist. I fully approve of the measures the NBA and Silver took today.

That being said.. Can we calm the down now!? Skip Bayless is on FirstTake being the poster boy for white guilt, every network is covering this story like Sterling lynched Chris Paul with his Klan henchmen.

This is why it's so hard to have progress without pissing people off because no one in this country can be rational. We're now at the point of irrational in response to this story. Sterling is a bigot and racist, he just got knocked the out by Silver.

Everyone can relax now, but no this story is going to continue to morph into lunacy while everyone pretends to be super surprised and offended.

Quick, everyone wear black tomorrow and turn your shirt inside out! We need unity against ONE 81 YEAR OLD SENILE MAN.

 

[AZOrange]

Eh, I just like pretending I'm smart. And I don't disagree with the general sentiment of the quote, but mis-attributed quotes have always been a pet peeve of mine. It's like way Shakespeare say, "That sh** be cray-cray."

And at the end of the day, it comes down to this: Sterling has the right to say what he wants. But he has to deal with the consequences since he works for a private organization.

Sterling doesn't work for anyone but himself. He's a partner in an association. Silver works for him.

 

[Todd Gack]

I have to say, Sterling has proven himself to be a bigot and a racist. I fully approve of the measures the NBA and Silver took today. That being said.. Can we calm the down now!? Skip Bayless is on FirstTake being the poster boy for white guilt, every network is covering this story like Sterling lynched Chris Paul with his Klan henchmen. This is why it's so hard to have progress without pissing people off because no one in this country can be rational. We're now at the point of irrational in response to this story. Sterling is a bigot and racist, he just got knocked the out by Silver. Everyone can relax now, but no this story is going to continue to morph into lunacy while everyone pretends to be super surprised and offended. Quick, everyone wear black tomorrow and turn your shirt inside out! We need unity against ONE 81 YEAR OLD SENILE MAN.

You can't help but think people are also reacting to your super-excited-position either, right? It's a much too late-to-do with Sterling, but it's not about nothing -- and few people (including vocal critics) have clean hands. But if this is the worst thing a white man like me has ever had to withstand, sign me up.

To be clearer: Sterling is a Grade-A dick, and a lot of people with unclean hands are making hay of that -- but there are also a lot of people who think it's much ado about nothing, when it isn't, and a very powerful institution was just rightly shamed from making money from a dick until they couldn't.

 

[rrlbees]

Sterling doesn't work for anyone but himself. He's a partner in an association. Silver works for him.

And that partnership can be severed by 75% of the other owners.

 

[PoppyHart]

A few questions that have popped into my mind

1. The justification for taking away the team, apparently, is "willfully" violating the by-laws. Can one "willfully" violate a catch-all provision?

2. Along the same lines, can you willfully violate something when you are, essentially, entrapped?

3. Was the ban, and accompanying punishment, more owing to the fact that Sterling stated that he didn't want blacks to attend the games? If he had just stated "I hate black people", or something to that effect, would the economic interests of the league have been as endangered?

 

[AZOrange]

And that partnership can be severed by 75% of the other owners.

Can it? I've never seen the association bylaws (they're a pretty well kept secret). But what one can do via agreement and actually do legally can be two diff things. My response though is more to the fact that sterling was not a "worker" in any sense of the word...

 

[longislandcuse]

Calm the down???!!! Are you serious??? Look man, I don't know you from a can of paint. I believe you are an intelligent individual. But don't minimize this with that BS!!! Who do you know cares about skip bayless??? You compare this with "Sterling lynched Chris Paul w his Klan henchmen??????????????? Adios!! Until you my man have EVER dealt with racism in YOUR family don't tell or pretend like you know about a single INCH of it!!!! I pray to GOD you or your family NEVER have to deal with TRUE RACISM!!!

You can twist my words all you want to make me look insensitive by quoting me and then Caps Locking a response but I fully support everything Sterling had coming to him but at some point you have to stop beating a dead horse. At some point people will go from being sympathetic and thinking (rightfully so) that we need to still fight racism in this country to an attitude of "ok, enough". This guy was a complete jackass bigot/racist bit you're honestly telling me that one old man's bigoted view of the world is worth an apocalyptic national debate that will probably last into next week? Welcome to he world of 24 news and Twitter man. At some point cooler heads need to prevail.

Action was taken. The racist was condemned. Society has for the most part acknowledged a need to reignite the fight of racism. Yet, this wont end. It will remain a hot button topic for who knows how long at which point people will become apathetic to a cause they were at one point fired up about.

 

[djcon57]

Can it? I've never seen the association bylaws (they're a pretty well kept secret). But what one can do via agreement and actually do legally can be two diff things. My response though is more to the fact that sterling was not a "worker" in any sense of the word...

http://mediacentral.nba.com/media/mediacentral/NBA-Constitution-and-By-Laws.pdf

They just posted these. Interesting stuff.

 

[RF2044]

A few questions that have popped into my mind

1. The justification for taking away the team, apparently, is "willfully" violating the by-laws. Can one "willfully" violate a catch-all provision?

2. Along the same lines, can you willfully violate something when you are, essentially, entrapped?

3. Was the ban, and accompanying punishment, more owing to the fact that Sterling stated that he didn't want blacks to attend the games? If he had just stated "I hate black people", or something to that effect, would the economic interests of the league have been as endangered?

Just my opinion, but I think this went beyond "racism" in the way that word is bandied about casually to denigrate anyone with whom one disagrees politically. This was core from the heart racism in that the owner of a team in a league in the nation's second largest city (1) was caught expressing support for illegal discrimination based on race, (2) admitted it, (3) didn't express remorse, (4) had a history of similar issues that the league had basically ignored (and they were about to get lots of shiz for ignoring it up till now), and (5) the league's black players were (rightfully) up in arms and threatening to boycott the playoffs if swift action to remove him weren't taken. I view this as a one-off case with the right result, and not having anything to do with the usual knee-jerk race/PC reaction like Deen and Phil Robertson got (both of which I thought were unjustifiably railroaded: Sterling not at all).

 

[Todd Gack]

A few questions that have popped into my mind 1. The justification for taking away the team, apparently, is "willfully" violating the by-laws. Can one "willfully" violate a catch-all provision? 2. Along the same lines, can you willfully violate something when you are, essentially, entrapped? 3. Was the ban, and accompanying punishment, more owing to the fact that Sterling stated that he didn't want blacks to attend the games? If he had just stated "I hate black people", or something to that effect, would the economic interests of the league have been as endangered?

I'm a newbie to this thread, so maybe you've addressed it -- but a question from me: Why do you care to defend this guy? He didn't write a book or even a school paper -- he expressed an opinion in which fellow billionaires in his club thought would cost them money, so they pushed him out. None of them are Branch Rickey. But you should still feel free to say whatever you want in your backyard BBQ. I'll still think Amy Schumer is comical. But I'll have no sympathy when supposedly sophisticated people don't know their audience or are actually demeaning (e.g., Paula Deen).

 

[AZOrange]

http://mediacentral.nba.com/media/mediacentral/NBA-Constitution-and-By-Laws.pdf

They just posted these. Interesting stuff.

The nba did? Wow. If they are relying on 14(a) they got problems. Their best bet is to work out a settlement/prepAckaged sale with sterling. What a mess.

 

[Todd Gack]

At some point people will go from being sympathetic and thinking (rightfully so) that we need to still fight racism in this country to an attitude of "ok, enough". This guy was a complete jackass bigot/racist bit you're honestly telling me that one old man's bigoted view of the world is worth an apocalyptic national debate that will probably last into next week?

You need to read more into this story than you have. Listen to the Bomani Jones interview from the Dan Le Betard show -- where he talks about this racist douche from nine years ago. That's the problem -- this guy has been an avowed racist up until the point the NBA can't deny it.

I can't believe the ignorance of the kumbaya crowd.

 

[longislandcuse]

You need to read more into this story than you have. Listen to the Bomani Jones interview from the Dan Le Betard show -- where he talks about this racist douche from nine years ago. That's the problem -- this guy has been an avowed racist up until the point the NBA can't deny it.

I can't believe the ignorance of the kumbaya crowd.

Where am i disagreeing with you on Sterling? I fully support the action taken against him but do you think all the other owners are choir boys? For a lot of them I'm fairly confident in saying that you aren't outraged at them because they havent been outed by anyone. This goes for all sports.

 

[Scooch]

Seriously, give this 11 minutes of your time, it's well worth it:

 

[ssbriefcase]

You can twist my words all you want to make me look insensitive by quoting me and then Caps Locking a response but I fully support everything Sterling had coming to him but at some point you have to stop beating a dead horse. At some point people will go from being sympathetic and thinking (rightfully so) that we need to still fight racism in this country to an attitude of "ok, enough". This guy was a complete jackass bigot/racist bit you're honestly telling me that one old man's bigoted view of the world is worth an apocalyptic national debate that will probably last into next week? Welcome to he world of 24 news and Twitter man. At some point cooler heads need to prevail.

Action was taken. The racist was condemned. Society has for the most part acknowledged a need to reignite the fight of racism. Yet, this wont end. It will remain a hot button topic for who knows how long at which point people will become apathetic to a cause they were at one point fired up about.

Twist?? Your's are there for the picking. Caps locking, like "at some point you have to stop beating a dead horse". Can that point be even brought to the next day before saying that???!!! Dam you're quick to defend and want this to go away. Beating a dead horse. LOL. What after a few hours to your discretion?? My man, you need to live life and experience good things. You so far have not. So we need to move to we've got an attitude of "ok enough" ? LOL Man you're a trip. I would NEVER wish any of this type of BS on your family. BUT DO NOT tell somebody what's enough of BLANTANT RACISM!

 

[Todd Gack]

Where am i disagreeing with you on Sterling? I fully support the action taken against him but do you think all the other owners are choir boys? For a lot of them I'm fairly confident in saying that you aren't outraged at them because they havent been outed by anyone. This goes for all sports.

That you think this incident will spark a response of -- to paraphrase you -- "okay, enough."

This guy wasn't managing a Pizza Hut. What else does Chris Paul need to do not to be demeaned?

 

[SWC75]

The difference between Eich and Sterling is that Eich opposing gay marriage has nothing to do with running Mozilla while Sterling's racism could have a lot to do with running an NBA franchise. Mozilla's action was unwarranted but the NBA had to do something.

 

[Todd Gack]

The difference between Eich and Sterling is that Eich opposing gay marriage has nothing to do with running Mozilla while Sterling's racism could have a lot to do with running an NBA franchise. Mozilla's action was unwarranted but the NBA had to do something.

This is simply not true -- and in fact fantastical. Someone else pointed this out in an earlier thread, but do you know how competitive the tech world is? And how young? And how young people are offended by homophobia, however slight? Eich didn't have to quit -- but he would've been pushed out when his best minds left to competitors.

The First Amendment is a great thing -- but it doesn't protect you from repercussions.

 

[longislandcuse]

Twist?? Your's are there for the picking. Caps locking, like "at some point you have to stop beating a dead horse". Can that point be even brought to the next day before saying that???!!! Dam you're quick to defend and want this to go away. Beating a dead horse. LOL. What after a few hours to your discretion?? My man, you need to live life and experience good things. You so far have not. So we need to move to we've got an attitude of "ok enough" ? LOL Man you're a trip. I would NEVER wish any of this type of BS on your family. BUT DO NOT tell somebody what's enough of BLANTANT RACISM!

You're right my man. My view is that of a white dude. If you experienced racism towards you and your fam then I'm truly sorry, that's awful. I'm with you aside from the over the top coverage/reactions and not just for this issue but in general, everything in this country. There is never a normal response to anything controversial, our country has become South Park screaming Rabble Rabble Rabble over everything. Not just this one topic, every hot button topic.

I personally think these types of responses have become counterproductive to what we hope to achieve as a human race/equality/morality. It becomes just as divisive as it does unifying.