Blog #5 (Part II of the Donald Sterling thoughts) 6-12-14
Sterling/Silver
Some people may be offended that my last blog amounted to a defense of a likely racist, LA Clippers owner Donald Sterling. Hopefully, others will agree that what I'm really defending is what we should all defend, always - not this one guy but the right of anyone and everyone to be treated with decency, whatever our opinions of them. I'm also suggesting a collective moral responsibility to refrain from hypocrisy and cruelty even when that responsibility is widely discouraged.
The issue seems simple to me: Mr. Sterling is being punished for expressed distasteful opinions, and that is not a value America is supposed to stand for. He's also being punished, by popular censure, for resisting the unjust punishment. Could any of us support the sort of thing the NBA is trying to do if, for example, our grandparents had their cars repossessed whenever they were overheard making less than politically correct statements? Of course not, and in this country, only "crime" is supposed to be punished, not opinions. Opinions, or the right to hold them anyway, are supposed to be almost sacred. Have we abandoned that ideal?
Donald Sterling was fired $2,500,000 and is losing his team. I bet Adam Silver wouldn't have come down on him half as hard if he'd instead "been caught" insulting self-righteous douche-bags, despite their outnumbering all ethnic minorities (probably combined!), and Mr. Silver himself would've then had reason to take it personally. That's all I'll say, unless anyone comments.
Question: Does anyone else think the logo for the Miami Heat looks distressingly like a cartoon illustration of a hemorrhoid [drawing of the Miami Heat logo] (sorry for the bad drawing!
I saw a diagram in a medical book last year that looked nearly identical. A circle with an inflamed, bulbous protrusion...
Personally, I like the Heat, probably because so many people take such pleasure in hating them. But man... will someone fix that logo?