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It's time to look at ourselves — and our collective moral outrage — in the mirror, says former NBA player Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
Moral outrage is exhausting. And dangerous. The whole country has gotten a severe case of carpal tunnel syndrome from the newest popular sport of Extreme Finger Wagging. Not to mention the neck strain from Olympic tryouts for Morally Superior Head Shaking. All over the latest in a long line of rich white celebrities to come out of the racist closet. (Was it only a couple days ago that Cliven Bundy said blacks would be better off picking cotton as slaves? And only last June Paula Deen admitted using the “N†word?)
Yes, I’m angry, too, but not just about the sins of Donald Sterling. I’ve got a list. But let’s start with Sterling. I used to work for him, back in 2000 when I coached for the Clippers for three months. He was congenial, even inviting me to his daughter’s wedding. Nothing happened or was said to indicate he suffered from IPMS (Irritable Plantation Master Syndrome). Since then, a lot has been revealed about Sterling’s business practices:
And now the poor guy’s girlfriend (undoubtedly ex-girlfriend now) is on tape cajoling him into revealing his racism. Man, what a winding road she led him down to get all of that out. She was like a sexy nanny playing “pin the fried chicken on the Sambo.†She blindfolded him and spun him around until he was just blathering all sorts of incoherent racist sound bites that had the news media peeing themselves with glee.
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So, if we’re all going to be outraged, let’s be outraged that we weren’t more outraged when his racism was first evident. Let’s be outraged that private conversations between people in an intimate relationship are recorded and publicly played. Let’s be outraged that whoever did the betraying will probably get a book deal, a sitcom, trade recipes with Hoda and Kathie Lee, and soon appear on Celebrity Apprentice and Dancing with the Stars.
Yes, I’m angry, too, but not just about the sins of Donald Sterling. I’ve got a list. But let’s start with Sterling. I used to work for him, back in 2000 when I coached for the Clippers for three months. He was congenial, even inviting me to his daughter’s wedding. Nothing happened or was said to indicate he suffered from IPMS (Irritable Plantation Master Syndrome). Since then, a lot has been revealed about Sterling’s business practices:
- 2006: U.S. Dept. of Justice sued Sterling for housing discrimination. Allegedly, he said, “Black tenants smell and attract vermin.â€
- 2009: He reportedly paid $2.73 million in a Justice Dept. suit alleging he discriminated against blacks, Hispanics, and families with children in his rentals. (He also had to pay an additional nearly $5 million in attorneys fees and costs due to his counsel’s “sometimes outrageous conduct.â€)
- 2009: Clippers executive (and one of the greatest NBA players in history) sued for employment discrimination based on age and race.
And now the poor guy’s girlfriend (undoubtedly ex-girlfriend now) is on tape cajoling him into revealing his racism. Man, what a winding road she led him down to get all of that out. She was like a sexy nanny playing “pin the fried chicken on the Sambo.†She blindfolded him and spun him around until he was just blathering all sorts of incoherent racist sound bites that had the news media peeing themselves with glee.
[....]
So, if we’re all going to be outraged, let’s be outraged that we weren’t more outraged when his racism was first evident. Let’s be outraged that private conversations between people in an intimate relationship are recorded and publicly played. Let’s be outraged that whoever did the betraying will probably get a book deal, a sitcom, trade recipes with Hoda and Kathie Lee, and soon appear on Celebrity Apprentice and Dancing with the Stars.
You can't, of course, un-ring the bell. That she broke the law doesn't somehow make Sterling's comments somehow less reprehensible. But, as Bryant Gumball (sp?) pointed out on Sunday, the only real surprise here is that anyone is surprised at all. I'd never even heard of Sterling before Saturday, but then I could not care less about the NBA. Just not my thing. But the people around him, the players, the coaches, the NBA "brass," and indeed pretty much anyone in Southern California, have known about Sterling's apparently harbored prejudices for some time now. This should have taken no one by surprise. That people are expressing outrage now seems quite a bit too little, too late, and it rings awfully hollow now against a backdrop of a decade or more of apparently unfair treatment of Black people.
I don't have any particular stake in the outcome of this one way or the other, either from a principled stance or just an emotional "I don't like that" stance. Some people harbor some particularly nasty thoughts. Some people are dumb enough to express those thoughts, either in public or in private. Frankly, I don't find what Sterling said any worse than great flurry of twitter, facebook, and Leftist blog activity yesterday, even while storms were happening and people were dying, celebrating, cheering, and jeering that people in "red states" were suffering and dying because they "deserved it" for not buying into the Global Warming Alarmist Cult. It's derisive, divisive, very hurtful, and yes, I've been guilty of it myself, though I certainly try to refrain. I don't know whether Sterling should actually lose his ownership of the Clippers. My immediate thought is that since he owns the franchise, no one has a specific right to take it away from him. But, the other side of that coin is that apparently there are some contractual obligations attached to that ownership to continue in the NBA. I'll leave that one up to the lawyers. But one way or the other, Kareem is right: those bristling the most with outrage right now really are at least somewhat morally bankrupt for not having that same outrage for the preceding decade or so.
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