Efforts are afoot to make North American (ice) hockey more diverse. Apparently it’s too white. I am not aware of any similar efforts being made in water polo or swimming or in chess for that matter. Nor am I ware of any complaints that American basketball and football and, say, athletic sprinting are disproportionately too black.
Thankfully, sport is not a likely candidate for affirmative action. Nor is chess. The reason is clear. Everything is in the open. Incompetence, inadequacy, inferior performances can’t be hidden. They are overtly penalised.
Take top hockey teams. They all want desperately to win the Stanley Cup – the championship trophy awarded annually to the National Hockey League winner. Don’t tell me they would reject a player who would make a difference whatever his colour. It might be that the bodily physiology of white North Americans is more suited to hockey, as the bodily physiology of black North Americans is more suited to basketball. In any event, it seems to me that the call for diversity is a one-way street.
I support Liverpool Football Team. When they were kneeling before each match last year in some misbegotten homage to Black Lives Matter, the commentators invariable said that it was to symbolise opposition to racism inside and outside the sport. But most of the Liverpool players were black or of colour. Each earning at least £100,000 a week. Egyptian player Mo Salah, £350,000 a week. Doesn’t smack of racism or discrimination to me. I’m not too sure, by the way, what the cut-off point is between black and of colour. I say ‘of colour’, because you can’t say coloured for some reason, though you can say black and white.
How is there racism in English football, I ponder, when most of the players are non-white? I watched the World Cup Final. The Washington Post (WP) in an op-ed lamented the absence of black players in the Argentinian team. While they corrected this piece when they discovered that only one percent of the Argentinian population was black, the bias is evident. They didn’t lament the fact that the Senegalese team had no whites or Asians, or Eskimos (pardon me Inuit).
During the second period of extra time in the World Cup Final, I couldn’t help but notice that all ten of the French outfield players were black. Only the goalkeeper was white. Now, I know that each of these players was there on their merits. So be it, in my view. That’s France today; lots of black people and, presumably (?), the ethnic French, on the whole, are not that good at football. At the same time, the news media didn’t appear to notice at all the hue of the French team. They were selectively colour blind on this occasion. The only sound from the WP was deafening silence.
Bad luck and bad judgment don’t care what colour your skin is or what floats your boat . Wise and smart don’t either . You can play victim poker ,but there will always be someone who has a better hand or is a better player . Its a stupid game with predictably stupid results . Where sport has become woke its losing its audience . For me – when I see woke I switch off .
Right thinking demands a Pantone colour chart and a quick count of vaginas ( or should that be non-penises).
I’m not too sure, by the way, what the cut-off point is between black and of colour. I say ‘of colour’, because you can’t say coloured for some reason, though you can say black and white.
I think it’s historical.
Back in pre-Civil War times, the polite term was “coloured people”. Over the years it moved through Negroes, then Blacks, and most recently “people of colour”. The simple “coloured” is now, presumably, considered racist because of its link to the racist DemonRats of the Old South.
I’m surprised they didn’t call for more African emigration to Argentina to rectify this.
After copping a well deserved smack to chops with this:
WP question: Why aren’t there more black players in the Argentinian football team (aka The Belgranos)?
Argentinian answer: Because Argentina is a country, not a disney movie.
Same with affirmative action. Want gender equality in parliament, CEOs and white collar jobs, not so much in sewage workers, plumbers and brickies.
I’m waiting for a NRL or AFL team that are perennial bottom of the ladder dwellers to all identify as female and play in the respective women’s comps so they can win apremiership.
Old Goat – like you I am sick and tired of this. All this is doing is causing more division and racism.
It will always be there but the accusers are from the higher income earners who don’t move out of their circles.
I dont see them “marring” anyone different and of course the black skinned people crave for their ultimate prize – the white skinned blonde well rounded female.
Check out Arabic art – it’s always there.
Speaking of the Football World Cup, it’s more than a bit of a turn off when European teams sport less Europeans, than Africans or Asians.
What’s the use of having your team named after your country when no one from your country is actually playing for the team.
You get to jump up and down in triumph when your afro-american basketball players beat their afro-american basketball players.
Judge Dredd, that is like the Swiss yatching team that was partly recruited from New Zealand to win the Americas Cup a few years ago. That was the mug that Bondie’s boys won for Australia in 1983.
March 2, 2003 AUCKLAND, New Zealand — Landlocked Switzerland became the first European country to win the 152-year-old America’s Cup on Sunday, a historic victory by a crew loaded with New Zealanders who had been branded as traitors.
Diversity Divides – the clue is in the name….
However it is interesting that South Africans no longer barrack for the opposition when the Boks play now that they’ve had a period of preferences selection.