Breathtaking Hypocrisy

I've rarely seen a story that more clearly shows a case of unbelievable hypocrisy on a massive scale than the current dust up about the NBA and China.  And of course it's such a massive scale because it's all about money.  A lot of money.  A veritable butt load of money.  More money than you and I can conceive of.  And that is because China brings huge money to the NBA.  I heard yesterday that basketball is the most popular sport in China.  Upwards of 300 million people play basketball at some level (recreation through professional).  The NBA pre-season exhibition games are perennially sold out.  But an even bigger (much bigger) thing is gear (clothing, equipment, memorabilia, etc).  The NBA literally makes billions from the Chinese.  So it's no wonder that they don't want to kill the goose that laid the golden egg.  

You've probably heard the story but if you haven't here's the Reader's Digest version.  The GM of the Houston Rockets put out a tweet supporting the freedom protesters in Hong Kong.  And heads all over the NBA and China exploded.  The NBA because China is a huge cash cow and China because they were supposedly offended.  There are a ton of articles about this issue, but a pretty good and comprehensive one is here.  

So this whole thing brings a couple things to my mind.  First, the freedom fighters in Hong Kong are fighting an unwinnable battle.  At least it appears unwinnable.  At the end of the day China will prevail.  They might not crush the protesters like they like to, but at least the status quo will continue. That is until 2047 when they take over.  Then Hong Kong will likely descend into the totalitarian state that is China.  So someone in the NBA tries to give them some support and he gets not only shut down but he might lose his job.  And the NBA grovels to new depths to lick the ass of The Chinese.  

But how they have gone about groveling to the Chinese by shutting down speech is disgusting.  At some point I would think they have to look at themselves in the mirror.  The epitome of the hypocrisy is an interview with Steve Kerr, coach of the Warriors.  Now he's a big lefty but his response to a question about China was reprehensible even by his standards.  Someone asked him about human rights abuses and he responded that no one asked him about "Americans with AR-15s mowing people down in malls".  Huh?  How is that remotely comparable to one of the most repressive and cruel governments on the face of the earth.  It's not difficult to find out what they do.  It's easy to understand about their massive internment camps of dissidents, their oppression of free speech, their unbelievable state sanctioned prejudice against some ethnic and religious groups.  It' goes on and on and it cannot be in even the same conversation with anything that happens in our country.  It was a pathetic and weak attempt at deflection that essentially summed up the whole story.  And here's another thing.  The NBA is the very first organization to cow tow to the politically correct crowd.  They regularly kiss Nike's ass.  They cancelled the All Star game in North Carolina because of the ridiculous  transgender bathroom issue.  They are spineless hypocrites in so many areas. 

So I get that you can hold your nose and engage in economic arrangements that are beneficial.  Because those benefits might accrue to a lot of people in our country.  But to defend, to repress your own people, to cow tow to the oppressors, especially in such a public and hypocritical manner, seems to me to be shameful.  I'm not a big fan of he NBA.  I'm much more of a college basketball fan.  And I'm quite positive that will remain the case.