Canonizing Sports Stars
Too soon? Maybe but it's been several days now and the moments of silence, special tributes and reverential comments all over the media seem to be picking up, not slowing down and I can't stand much more.
For the non-Americans, I'm talking about a basketball star named Kobe Bryant who died in a plane crash this week. I like basketball, it can be a beautiful, exciting sport and I appreciate that he was one of the all time bests.
That does not mean he should be worshiped to such an extent that we're ready in 2020 to forget everything we learned last year from the Me-too movement. What happened to "believe the woman?" Al Franken's career is over based on a joke photo of him with his hands, over several layers of clothing, on the breasts of his fellow comedian while she slept? It was tasteless, but not horrible.
What was horrible was Kobe Bryant's 2003 "date" that left a 19 year-old woman with bruises on her neck, vaginal lacerations, and blood on her clothing and his shirt. After a huge amount of pressure, leaking her name and the death threats from his fans that followed, the victim decided not to testify in a trail that vilified her while Kobe continued to claim it was consensual. No one consents to that kind of sex.
What we seem to be saying is that raping women is never okay -- unless you're really, really good at playing a game. In which case we will not only brush it aside but go on to revere you in death.
Worst of all, to my mind, is that a few reporters have mentioned the rape case since Bryant's death and been suspended or fired for it.
For the non-Americans, I'm talking about a basketball star named Kobe Bryant who died in a plane crash this week. I like basketball, it can be a beautiful, exciting sport and I appreciate that he was one of the all time bests.
That does not mean he should be worshiped to such an extent that we're ready in 2020 to forget everything we learned last year from the Me-too movement. What happened to "believe the woman?" Al Franken's career is over based on a joke photo of him with his hands, over several layers of clothing, on the breasts of his fellow comedian while she slept? It was tasteless, but not horrible.
What was horrible was Kobe Bryant's 2003 "date" that left a 19 year-old woman with bruises on her neck, vaginal lacerations, and blood on her clothing and his shirt. After a huge amount of pressure, leaking her name and the death threats from his fans that followed, the victim decided not to testify in a trail that vilified her while Kobe continued to claim it was consensual. No one consents to that kind of sex.
What we seem to be saying is that raping women is never okay -- unless you're really, really good at playing a game. In which case we will not only brush it aside but go on to revere you in death.
Worst of all, to my mind, is that a few reporters have mentioned the rape case since Bryant's death and been suspended or fired for it.
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Comments
Or not, as the case may be...
As for the canonisation of sports stars, well, Sport (along with Slebrities, Sex, and Shopping) is now one of the four Religions of this country, so I expect it's the same on your side of the Pond.
(Hostly warning: the first Daily Beast link is decidedly strong meat. Reader beware.
DT
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O indeed.
'Help for Heroes' - you don't automatically become a Hero if you simply join the armed forces...
I'm of the "he's the universal soldier and he really is to blame," school myself, but my husband is career military and part of the local honor guard who buries veterans. Some of the family members demur that their loved one never actually saw combat and he tells them that by joining up he/she was showing a willingness to die for their country and that in itself makes them a hero.
I can see both sides and in any case the soldiers who die in combat are surely closer to the definition of "hero" than anyone who is particularly good at sports.
But...what is it with Sport? As Martin says, WHY?
I was totally cool with taking over the teacher's class, but it struck me as odd that he was given the time off, and I can't help but thinking that the over-valourized nature of sports had something to do with it. If I had asked to leave early in order to catch the last screening of a movie that I really wanted to see, I doubt I would have been indulged.
I suppose the communal nature of sports might have something to do with this: everyone's depending on you, can't let down the team, etc. Somehow elevates it to being more than just another hobby.
Well, sports is a not a religion in any recognized sense of the word, but since it does bear some similarities(group loyalty, idolization of supposedly exceptional individuals), we can possibly call it a pseudo-religion.
Now, if you're talking about people who make comparisons AMONG religions, like eg. saying that the JWs are pseudo, but Anglicans are legit, I'd agree that they're positing differences that simply aren't there.
Well, I concede the point.
If death or injury at work are the prime criteria, then deep sea fishermen, divers and farmers are the real heroes. I see another fisherman was lost off Lewis in the last few days. A crofter was killed here and another seriously injured when the hydraulics failed on a bailer they were inspecting just the year before last. One of our elders got rammed by a bull and it was only luck that he was pushed through a wooden barrier, breaking some ribs, rather than crushed against a wall. A couple of years ago a rope snapped on the ferry and wrapped round the leg of one of the shore crew, causing extensive compression bruising. A few feet higher and he'd have been dead.
Ah, but they're not exactly trained to kill people the 'government' names as 'enemies', are they?
And that seems to be the point, doesn't it? It's not actually the dying that makes them heroes but the killing, it seems.
In 1967 one bloke, a Journo, decided that enough was enough and he founded the Anti-Football League. In 1972, he ceremoniously burned a football in the middle of the Melbourne Cricket Ground, the most sacred bit of turf in the country, judging by the number of worshippers. He was a heretic until the day of his death, and he is much missed.
On the other hand, he was also a fool. How could anything compete with this. That's a cut of a home video and scenes from a professional game. Judging by the players and the clothes it was filmed in the late 1980's.
My team was abolished in 1996. I will never recover. I went to all the games I could in the 1990's. These days I barrack for this mob, mostly to please my brother and his boys.
This video called The Merge is about the betrayal, execution, skinning and stuffing of the Fitzroy Football Club. It will give you some idea of the deep cultural resonance football has in my town. I appear as a curly-headed young gent for a few seconds at the 56:59 minute mark. I was interviewed at the Fitzroy Club Hotel on the night our impending death was announced.
I had never heard of the bloke the subject of the OP. I wish I had remained ignorant.
--Hmmm...various coverage I came across--mostly on TV, and probably some on NPR--at least acknowledged Kobe's behavior indirectly. Some were more direct, though I'm not sure I heard anyone say "rape". Some also said that he had major problems; but that he'd owned up and changed.
Please note: *I'm* not agreeing that he owned up and changed, just mentioning that I came across different media reactions.
I don't follow basketball, but I know his name 'cause he was mentioned in the news so much throughout his career. I didn't remember about the rape case. I did know that lots of people (friends, fans) loved and admired him. Whether he deserved that is another matter.
I'm sorry that the people on the helicopter died, that anyone died that way. I repeatedly saw pictures. The helicopter was in amazingly small pieces. I don't think I've ever seen a crash with pieces that small. I don't know anything about the physics of it. But I wonder if the copter blew up (due to a technical problem, or when it hit the ground); or was going very, very fast when it hit, maybe nose first.
--Re Al Franken: What he did wasn't just "tasteless". It was bad and wrong, full stop. Other people did much worse things, but that doesn't mean what he did doesn't matter.
I was very sad to see him go. I initially thought maybe people manufactured something to get a liberal out of Congress. (I don't mean the accuser/victim. I didn't know much at that time. I didn't know that there actually was a real person in the equation.)
I'm still kind of in shock and numbed sadness that so many men I liked and admired turned out to be #MeToo perpetrators. Not Weinstein, etc. But Al Franken, Charlie Rose, Tavis Smiley, etc. TBH, I still am shocked and sad about Stephen Collins' child sex abuse perpetration that came out many years ago. There was a recording of him talking about it--in some detail, IIRC--and it was sickening and disgusting, and his voice seemed really strange.
Anyway, what Al Franken did was wrong.
I'd not heard of him until his death. That was then emblazoned over every paper here, although I suspect that many others were in my position.
Which Al Franken action are you referring to?
At the time of the original events stirred up by the Tweeden allegations -- and I'm persuaded that was in fact a deliberate hit job to oust a hard-working, intelligent, effective progressive from Congress -- he was a professional comic. It's entirely possible that at that point in his life he never remotely considered running for public office. And let's face it: the performance arts often lead us into questionable territory; that's part o their function. They confront us, head-on, with the "edges" of our culture. For good or ill? Who can say? Some audience members will reflect on what they see and question their own attitudes and beliefs; others will see their attitudes and beliefs "confirmed."
Was the humor displayed tasteless? Absolutely. Was it misogynistic? Absolutely. Do I personally deplore the nature of the "humor" involved? You bet I do. There's a powerful, deep-rooted strain in US humor which ridicules and reviles women qua women, and I hate it, and I would love for all American humorists to drop all such approaches. But at the times and places of the Tweeden accusations, such humor was also part and parcel of the kinds of stuff that routinely went into making up the content of USO entertainment of the (almost exclusively male at the time) troops.
I am sorry that Leeann Tweeden -- or anybody -- was humiliated in this way. It's not clear to me how much her career or her psyche suffered as a result, but that shouldn't matter; she should not have had to suffer at all. It's also worth noting, however, that Tweeden began her original modeling career as a hostess in a Colorado Springs Hooters, where female servers are required to wear full face make-up, wear their hair down, and perform their duties in "too small" sleeveless tank tops and orange short-shorts (Google Hooters uniform) and later appeared in Playboy (see Wiki). Had she brought suit against Hooters and Playboy for their exploitation of her, I might view her take-down of Franken somewhat differently; its timing raised my suspicions as well.
The difference between the situations is key: Tweeden presumably accepted the Hooters and Playboy assignments of her own free will, and presumably freely accepted the conditions/requirements involved. She had no control over the indignities to which Franken subjected her. Worse, I am not convinced even now that Franken (like sadly too many men in his generation) fully grasps the illicit "entitlement" he displayed in using this brand of humor, in securing the infamous photo, and in laying hands apparently on various women while campaigning. (Why so many men seem to feel free to lay hands on women they encounter, I don't know. Franken says of himself "I'm a warm guy" and seems to think that's an excuse / explanation / justification. YMMV. Mine does.)
A younger Franken, committed to entertaining mostly male troops in fairly grueling condtions, should have known better, tried harder, been more thoughtful than to go for the cheap, easy shots of low humor. He didn't. While no meaningful comparisons can be made between Tweeden's humiliation by Franken and what US citizens have lost through his resignation, the fact remains that US progressives have also lost a powerful, effective voice.
Actors, singers, dancers, comedians, etc. No one deserves, or should receive, one iota behavioural excuse or admiration beyond their ability to perform their job.
But we all do it just the same.
Tweeden wasn't the only accuser. Eight other women said that Franken had done inappropriate things with them, including actual touching (not just joke photos).
And don't even start me on the awards given to Civil Servants for doing their jobs ...
I understand that. When I consider my acquaintance among my own age group (Decidedly Antique), I can count a substantial percentage of men who have the habit of laying hands on women (and sometimes also men) without invitation. This is not necessary sexual in nature; some people just are a lot "touchier" than others, and receivers of said touch will also vary in what they consider "inappropriate."
Here, though, is the question I'm really raising, which goes to the concern over Kobe Bryant's adulation vis-a-vis the settled rape case against him:
Imagine you're a manager. You have among your staff a truly talented worker who shows enormous potential for an important aspect of your company's development. You can easily imagine him rising through the ranks and becoming VP of something.
His secretary comes to you complaining that he's always "touching" her -- a hand on an arm, a pat on the shoulder; nothing overtly sexual, but it bothers her.
Now what?
Do you ask her, "Did you ask him to stop?" (As his subordinate, she might not feel able to do so.) She may or may not have this right as a matter of company policy. I would hope she does, and if so, encourage her to use it.
Do you instantly erase your good opinion of him as potential leadership material?
Do you fire him on the spot? (Of course not; there are no doubt procedures in place for separating people from their employment, and you have to follow and document them.)
Do you carefully observe his behavior over several days, to see if he's singling out his secretary, or if this is a more generalized behavior? And does it apply to only one gender, or both?
Do you call him in and suggest he keep his hands to himself, as touching could land him in trouble? Do you offer institutional support or training in correcting his habit?
What we're negotiating here is the complicated intersection between public and private behaviors and the extent to which we allow the famous, the gifted, the idolized, etc. to exhibit private human failings the rest of us also fall prey to, and the extent to which we deprive ourselves of others' contributions by a fair amount of black-and-white judgmentalism about public figures.
For what it's worth, I'm not aware that any subsequent sexual assault accusations were ever lodged against Kobe Bryant. Accounts of his good works and his stable marriage redound to his credit. I confess that the rape allegation came instantly to mind when I heard of his death, but I also believe that (A) he did victimize someone, and (B) he became a changed man in the aftermath of that event, even though his victim received no real vindication.
Imagine, though, that he had gone to trial and been convicted. Would that have helped his victim? What other knock-on effects would have resulted?
In Franken's case, I think he's a "touchy" guy, sadly insensitive (like many in his age group) to the potential for touch being interpreted as an expression of dominance, and clueless about people reacting negatively to that.
Is he rehab-able? Do we really want to toss a potentially re-trainable guy (who by all accounts had been a hard-working, capable senator) over the side (instead of trying to rehab him) because, culturally speaking, he never caught up with changing roles and relationships between women and men?
1. He was killed in a helicopter accident.
2. He played basketball, which is a sport I know nothing about, and
3. He was accused of a sexual outrage.
To my lights, to be a hero, you have to have done something heroic. That requires an inner quality of personal bravery or nobility, not just sporting skill nor being somewhere at the right/wrong time nor just being dead.
Of the three items in my list, none of those make a person a hero. So unless there's a part of the story that hasn't reached me, it's sad for his family that he's been killed in a helicopter accident, but so?
To be commended to others as a saint, you have to have served the Lord in a special way and exhibited remarkable Christian virtues that the rest of us can be encouraged to emulate. Unless I've missed things I ought to have seen, nothing about him has been presented in those terms.
So @Twilight I agree with you.
As for Kobe's good behavior since, well that's nice. He still violently raped a 19 year-old woman and paid no price for it. Most rapists don't get the opportunity to stay free, make millions and "do good works." so we can later on praise them for not raping women anymore.
I suspect it's more to do with the "reasonable, occasional request" thing. I imagine you'd be given time off to travel to a wedding, or some other occasional thing that meant you needed to leave early on Friday.
"I really want to see this movie" - well, is it only being shown today? Did you not have the opportunity to see it at the weekend?
Actually, I think most rapists do get the opportunity to stay free. Most rapists don't get convicted. RAINN seems to estimate that 0.7% of rapes result in a conviction.
Most rapes don't even get reported. Of those that are reported, most don't go anywhere because of lack of evidence.
Good posting !!!!
We have 2-3 runs a year on Sunday mornings, and the standard route goes right past our church. The city maintains access via a side street, though, so you can still drive to church, but you might have to take a rather long detour.
There are people who are "trapped" in their subdivisions by the race route. In those cases, the city stages a police officer at specific exit points, and the officer will wave people across the race route when there's a gap. If you want to leave when the pack passes your house, you'll have to wait a few minutes.
Right, I was thinking of convicted rapists. A lot of the problem is that lack of evidence so it comes down to a he said, she said situation, but in Bryant's case there was quite a bit of forensic evidence so I expect if the victim hadn't been scared off he probably would have been convicted -- unless the jury thought his long marriage and his basketball fame excused him.
Hmmm, Australia Australia oi oi oi!
I wish we would lionise the people who carry around matting in their ute so the kids can play cricket on a Saturday morning, or the people who wash the muddy team jumpers every week, or cut up the oranges to be eaten during breaks.
It sounds like you have copped a nasty set of organisers who might benefit from an understanding of disability discrimination, Rhubarb.
Our city has an annual half marathon. It used to pretty much cut us off at our previous house, as it ran past one end of the road. It also basically restricts access to the area around St Quacks, as well as most cross city routes. As we're an AC parish with a fairly wide catchment, the long-standing tradition is that Sunday is always an evening Mass, by which time the roads are back to normal.
My understanding is that running can addictive. Like heroin. The poor bastards just can't help themselves after a while.
Yebbut addictive things surely need to be give some short term pleasure, to form the habit.
I've been told that. It doesn't. Nor does any other form of exercise. They just hurt.
People are getting fired for telling the truth, right and left.