SOUL wrote:
We're different politically but I agree with most of this!
IMO there shouldn't even be the anthem before games anyway, at least not publicly. Save it for special events or the Olympics or stuff like that, it doesn't make much sense in the context of happening before every sporting event.
That being said, I agreed with Kap's choice to kneel as long as it was for a respectful reason (which it was) and anybody that now stands for a respectful reason (which I'm sure Isaac's is from his explanation) is fine by me. I'm not too religious so whatever his explanation is didn't really mean anything to me, but he has been helping people in the Orlando area since he's been here and isn't all talk.
It's just **** how everything is a political statement now and both sides are pretty complicit in propping up people for their agenda/what they believe in (whether it's "right" or "wrong"). I think there are tons of people on the right who don't like seeing minorities or black people succeed, as well as people on the left "supporting" BLM/movements who are **** people who just want to look good for "clout" and do nothing to help.
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Hey, I could own a closet full of MAGA hats (which I don't, I don't even own 1) and you could be stepping up to the mic at the Democratic Socialists Convention to ask about a "point of personal privilege" (which you're probably not), but in the context of being fellow Magic fans on RealGM, none of that should be relevant as long as we're all nice to each other. On a personal level, at least. On a basketball-specific opinion, if someone disagrees with me, obviously they're a moron.
But yeah I mean, you mentioned doing things to gain clout, I called it virtue signaling, it's the same kind of thing. How many of these athletes, celebrities, or just normal people on Twitter or Reddit actually care? What are they actually doing to help facilitate righting any perceived wrongs? Because obviously kneeling during an anthem or blasting Trump on Twitter doesn't magically do anything. It's about as effective as Michael Scott yelling "I...declare...bankruptcy!" Nobody should get praised for that. I'm not saying kneeling is just strictly bad and that everyone who does it is stupid. If a guy truly believes it counts for something, and is also actually out there using his privilege of being a well-off athlete to do something tangible, then so be it. Or, in a different scenario, let's imagine a guy like Evan Fournier. Not American, not black, doesn't really have a dog in this race, so to speak. But he kneels to support his teammates that are kneeling. I don't actually know what's in Fournier's head, this is just a hypothetical scenario, with the point being that I think something like that is respectable.
Ultimately I hate that politics is so mainstream and injected into everything. Why in the world has sports become a political platform. A player can't just go out and play his game now. First he has to play another game, where his performance in said game will decide his guilt in the court of public opinion. A good guy like Isaac getting criticized for this is a travesty. And let's not forget that he has never pushed his religion. His religion is known, he hasn't hidden it, we know he's a minister. But this has not been a repeat of a young and naive Dwight Howard talking about changing the NBA logo. Which was overblown anyway, but that's neither here nor there.
11/18/2017 - I have officially disowned Nikola Vucevic and branded him a loser.
- Skal Labissiere was my guy in 2016 pre-trade. Whoops, but I still believe.
- Malik Monk was my guy in 2017. Whoops(?)
- Mo Bamba was my guy in 2018. TBD.
