Prior to the national anthem being played for the WNBA season opener in Bradenton, Florida, on July 25, players from the Seattle Storm and New York Liberty walked off the court and went back to their respective locker rooms. When they returned to the court, 26 seconds of silence were held to honor the age of Breonna Taylor, who was shot eight times after police officers in Louisville issued a no-knock warrant at her apartment in the search of drugs, which were never found. Layshia Clarendon from the Liberty and Breanna Stewart from the Storm then announced that they would be dedicating the 2020 WNBA season to Taylor as well as the Say Her Name campaign, which is dedicated to fighting for justice for Black women.
The NBA will attempt to strike a similar tone when its season resumes on July 30, as players are reportedly preparing to kneel during the national anthem. Since being down in Orlando, NBA players have used their media sessions to advocate for Taylor and social justice on a grander scale. During an interview on “Good Morning America” Wednesday, NBA commissioner Adam Silver expressed his support for the players and coaches who choose to take a knee during the anthem.
“The NBA had a rule in its books that preceded David Stern, who represented the national anthem,” Silver said. “That said, I respect nonviolent protests. I’m not sure what our players will do when they go out at night and of course we’ll get back to it at that time, but I also perceive that they are very unusual moments.”
NBA and WNBA players have been socially progressive and open compared to other North American leagues. When LeBron James says “I’m more than an athlete,” or Maya Moore walks away from the WNBA at the peak of her career to help combat criminal justice reform, she denies the concept that athletes are nothing more than the game they play.
“What happens is that, in sport, in a very sophisticated way, we just restrict that person’s identity, humanity, and sense of identity to be exclusively an athlete,” said Dr. Joseph N. Cooper, president of Sports Leadership and Administration at the University of Massachusetts. Boston. “Then, when LeBron James and Maya Moore push this back, it’s a very revolutionary act. This demanding situation is the stereotype that black athletes are one-dimensional and versatile, have multiple interests, and have the ability to achieve replacement in many ways.”
In the days, weeks and months following George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police on May 25, protests began to appear in all major U.S. cities. It’s not just about calling for justice on Floyd’s behalf, but also Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, who was shot dead in February while running in his own Georgia neighborhood, and many other black men and women who lost their lives to police brutality. This series of occasions was a turning point for many others across the country who flocked to the streets and marched for justice.
Along with the thousands of citizens who attended the occasions were Boston Celtics ahead of Jaylen Brown, Indiana Pacers guard Malcolm Brogdon, Houston Rockets goalkeeper Russell Westbrook, Washington Mystics goalkeeper Natasha Cloud, and Atlanta dreamer Renee Montgomery for calling some.
Athletes who advocate for reasons are new, especially in the NBA and WNBA. However, the number of players who showed up at a demonstration donated or used their platform to communicate about racial injustice and police brutality had never been noticed before. The atrocities are the same, but the reaction of the last few months has been very different. Dr. Cooper, who has done extensive studies on the history of athlete activism, sex and race in sport, racism and other bureaucracies of oppression, criticizes the strong reaction to a mixture of things.
“I believe that the polarizing political climate, the visibility on social media of unfair crimes committed through law enforcement and the courageous acts of activism of the past through Colin Kaepernick and Maya Moore, among others, have increased pressure on existing actors to explain more,” Cooper said. Array” The drop that broke the camel’s back was the eight-minute, 46-second video of George Floyd that shared a pandemic, as more people could see it and witness the blatant injustice toward African Americans and blacks in the United States for too long and is now only recorded and shared more widely.”
Now, months later, after national attention has focused on other urgent outdoor issues, the Black Lives Matter movement, NBA and WNBA players seek to ensure that power remains the same.
“I think basketball is secondary, it’s our job, obviously we have a duty to fulfill obligations, but it’s also our job to fill and protect our neighborhoods and protect other people who look like us and come from places like us and don’t have exactly the same voices as us,” CJ McCollum told reporters last week during a Zoom call. “I think it’s something we’re all involved in. We have been very proactive about it, and as a user passionate about school reform, I continue to seek conversations to converse with other like-minded people. we can continue to locate tactics to have a joint effect and make a change.”
In preparation for the return of the two leagues, statements were made that social justice would be the focal point of the season. We’ve already noticed “Black Lives Matter” painted on the courts that will be noticed on televisions around the world. The WNBA sewed The call Breonna Taylor on the back of each player’s jersey. The NBA will allow players to decide from an approved list of social justice words to place their last call on their jerseys. But even that moment showed how far the NBA still has to go. While words like “I can’t breathe” and “Education Reform” were on the list, a single sentence calling for police reform was not passed.
While players like Donovan Mitchell will wear “Say Your Name” on the back of it and the entire Mavericks team will have “Equality” decorating the back of their jerseys, several players were quick to point out the challenge with the roster. Jaylen Brown said the list was “disappointing” because players had no say in what would be included. LeBron James, although he congratulated anyone who chose to do so, said he would not use any of the approved words because he “didn’t resona with him” and would have liked to have had something to say about what he put in his Lakers. Jersey.
However, the combat to replace is the main theme from the NBA and WNBA at their respective bubble sites. Even the apprentices, Doc Rivers and Gregg Popovich in particular, made statements about racial inequality and wore shirts and hats with the words “vote.” Minnesota Lynx head coach Cheryl Reeve said she would be in favor of not further employing the assistance of Minneapolis police forces to keep the game when the games return to the destination center. Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle begins each media consultation by reading a passage about the racial injustice of a calendar compiled through the Fair Justice Initiative. Players from various groups answered questions with some variation by calling Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron to arrest and convict officials who killed Breonna Taylor.
All these movements ensure that other people get involved in the social justice problems that players fight for. However, Cooper points out that there are still paintings to be made in any of the leagues if they are fully committed to fighting for change.
“Overall, the rhetoric and some of the short-term movements that have been taken, I think are remarkable and deserve a congratulations,” Cooper said. “Do I think they pass far enough? I say no, but when I say no, it’s not just an accusation against the NBA and WNBA, it’s more about our total society. Until we have all these inequalities and inequalities in our society, we haven’t done enough. Until women have the same opportunities as men to take leadership positions in the game, until African Americans are represented in leadership positions in the game comparable to representation in the draw or in the picture, I think everyone has a long way to go.
To illustrate how far we still have to go, Cooper pointed to Moore, who took a license from the game to nullify Jonathan Irons’ unfair conviction.
“It would be wonderful instead of Maya Moore doing this alone, what it would be like for the whole WNBA and NBA to help in the efforts,” Cooper said.
The change would possibly not happen overnight, however, the recent wave of athlete activism has opened the door even more in any of the leagues for players to explain what they need to see and see the results. In a call with reporters in June, Silver announced that the league had already taken steps to make tangible adjustments in the future. The Commissioner highlighted the methods of building black representation in all NBA positions and their teams, to achieve greater inclusion of black-led companies in NBA business activities, and to form an NBA foundation to expand opportunities for educational and economic progress through blacks. Community.
In early July, WNBA and WNBPA announced the launch of a Social Justice Council, which will be the “driving force behind mandatory and ongoing talks on race, voting rights, LGBTQ advocacy and gun control among other vital social issues,” through the league’s press. Launch.
This type of stock, which can be sustainable, is what Cooper sees in sports leagues and their athletes.
“The challenge isn’t what they do right now, right now it’s still very much in the heat of the pandemic and the social unrest, so all of the symbolic gestures are going to catch attention,” Cooper said. “What’s really going to be the measure of whether they are committed or not, is one year, two years, 10 years, 20 years.
“Once this pandemic has subsided, are you still committed to these disorders or are you making symbolic gestures? That’s why they want a set of people, representatives of other generations, other experience, other commitments to the league to combine to expand for a long time in the long run to show that we are committed to solving those disorders.”
We may not see the effects of those adjustments for several years, however, the past few months have shown a replacement in athletes’ activism. In the midst of a global fitness crisis, along with the Black Lives Matter movement, NBA and WNBA players accumulated en masse like never before. Instead of a small organization of players looking to replace them, many superstars, recruits, and veterans used their platform to make a difference. It even had a runoff effect to school level and school level, where the most sensible basketball hopefuls now contemplate the option of attending traditionally black schools and universities, and in makur Maker’s case, participate in this by choosing to attend Howard than the blue – blood systems like UCLA, Kentucky and Memphis.
Cooper is concerned that, because of social media, this current movement will become a fad, and people will grow tired of posting about it. But as players like Malcolm Brogdon launch foundations for social justice reform, real change can be seen. When LeBron James, Skylar Diggins-Smith and Trae Young come together to create a voting rights group aimed at helping and inspiring Black people to vote, progress toward ending voter suppression can be accomplished. These athletes are ensuring that as the games resume, not only are the names of Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, George Floyd and many others not forgotten, but that the conversation on racial inequality, police brutality and many other social justice issues won’t be ignored.
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