Sports

Curmie’s Conjectures: Eye Black Is Not Blackface. Duh.

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

by Curmie

[It turns out that Curmie and I were writing about the same issue more or less simultaneously. Shortly after I posted “The Great Stupid: Child Abuse Edition,” Curmie sent me this installment of his  periodic column, expressing concern that it was redundant. It’s not, and I’m putting up Curmie’s take for several reasons: 1) I love his writing and style; 2) he approaches the incident from some different angles than I did; 3) I believe this incident is an important one that involves many critical ethics problems: the public school disaster; hypersensitivity to racial offense, real or imagined; the indoctrination and intimidation of children; and more. The plight of J.A. is not just the metaphorical canary dying in the mine, but strong evidence of just how badly our society’s air is poisoned. It is worth more than one post. Finally, I especially want this essay read after Curmie commented recently that he disagreed with my analysis on “countless” topics. In fact, I find that his values and ethical navigation equipment are closely aligned with mine. If they weren’t, he couldn’t have dissected this story so expertly.—JM.]

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A few days ago, I commented on Jack’s post on the high school principal in Sherman, Texas who declared that the musical Oklahoma! contains “mature adult themes, profane language, and sexual content” “would come in third place in a battle of wits with a sack of hair and an anvil.”

I hereby retract that characterization.  It appears that Sherman Principal Scott Johnson was merely a good soldier, enforcing the dictates of a superintendent and school board that can’t decide if the Victorian age was a little too permissive.  So… Johnson appears capable of giving that anvil a run for its money. 

The good news is that the international attention this case received resulted first in a decision to re-instate the original student cast but in a shortened “kids” version of the musical that would have cut the solo from Max Hightower, the trans student at the center of the controversy, and finally—when the students and parents wouldn’t accept that utterly stupid “compromise” or the notion that Oklahoma!, of all plays, ought to be bowdlerized—a return to the original version with the students the director cast.

More to the present point, when compared to Jeff Luna, the principal at Muirland Middle School in La Jolla, California, even the folks who did make the idiotic decisions that led to the kerfuffle would appear to embody all the best attributes of Solomon, Socrates, Confucius, Albert Einstein and Leonardo da Vinci rolled into one.  We do sorta know what Ado Annie means when she laments her inability to “say no,” after all.

I was about to say that what Luna did surpasses credulity, but, alas, it does not.  There are a lot of adjectives that do apply—”boneheaded,” “irrational,” and “unconstitutional” come to mind—but unfortunately “unbelievable” has no place on the list.

Last month, a Muirland 8th-grader identified as J.A. attended a high school football game, looking like he does in the photo above.  That is, he wore eye black, just as he’s seen countless football players (and not a few baseball players) do; I won’t bother you with the literally dozens of photos of players of all races doing so.  Now, whether eye black has any direct practicality is a matter for debate.  It started as a means of keeping glare out of the eyes.  I have no idea whether it actually does that, and even if it does, it doesn’t require the amount used by J.A.  But that, of course, is irrelevant.

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When Ethics Alarms Weren’t Even Installed: A TV Sports Sideline Reporter’s Admission

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

On a recent episode of the “Pardon My Take” podcast, the Fox Sports and NFL on Prime Video host Charissa Thompson blurted out that when she was a sideline reporter in the late 2000s, some of her football halftime reports were just made up on the spot. “I’ve said this before, so I haven’t been fired for saying it, but I’ll say it again,” she began. “I would make up the report sometimes, because … the coach wouldn’t come out at halftime, or it was too late and I didn’t want to screw up the report. So I was like, ‘I’m just gonna make this up.’ Because first of all, no coach is gonna get mad if I say, ‘Hey, we need to stop hurting ourselves, we need to be better on third down, we need to stop turning the ball over … and do a better job of getting off the field.’ They’re not gonna correct me on that. So I’m like, ‘It’s fine, I’ll just make up the report.’”

[Sidebar: This alleged professional sports reporter said “I was like” and “I’m like” in one short statement. She should be fired for that.]

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Stop Making Me Defend (Ugh!) Megan Rapinoe!

/ Jack Marshall / 15 Comments

I haven’t gone back and checked all of the Ethics Alarms “Don’t Make Me Defend…” posts, but its hard to imagine one involving a public figure I admire less than Megan Rapinoe. Her only legitimate claim to significance is that she was a talented player in a game I wouldn’t abandon my sock drawer to watch, yet she has used that narrow platform to bray a series of woke knee-jerk pronouncements that showed her to be ignorant, anti-American, and the kind of militant feminist who gives feminism a bad name. That, added to an abrasive and narcissistic personality, has made her a blight on the sports landscape and others. And yet…

…fair is fair, and unfair is unfair. Conservatives detest Rapinoe, naturally, and today they pounced on an off-the-cuff comment she made exactly the way the progressive media has deliberately attacked every statement made by Donald Trump that could possibly be interpreted as dumb, mean, sinister or otherwise objectionable when the same words would be ignored from anyone else. I sometimes call this “The Perpetually Jaundiced Eye.” I hate it, and I hate it no matter who the victim is. Yes, even Megan Rapinoe.

During the National Women’s Soccer League Championship, in what had been announced the final match of her storied soccer career, Megan tore her Achilles tendon. This, coming off her humiliating botch of a crucial penalty kick in her team’s loss in the World Cup gave Rapinoe an exit that was approximately the exact opposite of Ted Williams’ (or Roy Hobbs’) home run in his last at bat.

In the post-match, post-injury, and post-career press conference, Rapinoe said, “I’m not a religious person or anything and if there was a god, like, this is proof that there isn’t. This is fucked up. It’s just fucked up. Six minutes in and I eat my Achilles!”

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Look! Intersex Track And Field Athlete Caster Semenya Is Back In The News With An “It Isn’t What It Is” All-Time Classic

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments

Let’s see: the last time I mentioned Semenya was at the end of last year, musing about what to do about another mutant in sports, Jeremiah Johnson, then a 12-year-old junior high school running back from Fort Worth, Texas who weighed 5-foot-11 and weighed 198 pounds, counting his facial hair. (I’m afraid to check on what size he is now.) The question is how schools and sports organizations should treat outliers who break all the rules naturally, and clobber the competition. Semenya, you will recall (we have discussed her a lot) is intersex, meaning that she has some of the primary and secondary characteristics of both sexes. It also gives her testosterone levels about 15 times higher than her female competitors. Though she has won many international competitions and set many women’s records (in the 400m, 800m, 1,000m and 1,500m races). A Swiss ruling in 2019 banned Semenya from international races between 400 meters, and Switzerland’s highest court backed the decision. To compete, she would be required to suppress her natural male hormones, which she refuses to do.

Writing about both Johnson and Semeya, I wrote last year,

“We can’t have special leagues and categories for however many gender categories science identifies and activists fight to have recognized, and there is no justification for creating artificial standards to eliminate outlier performers. The “solution” imposed on Caster Semenya—force her to take drugs that eliminate her natural advantage—is horrifying. How is this different from banging brilliant kids on the head until they have brain damage and no longer dominate their less gifted fellow students in school? What right do the sports czars have to declare an unprecedented, unique competitor unfit to compete because her, or his, unique qualities are advantageous? Why are so many woman condemning Caster as a cheat, when they should be defending her as a human being with as much right to compete as she is as anyone? Because she’ll win? Because it’s unfair that God, or random chance, or her own dedication rendered her better at her sport than anyone else?”

The unique physical characteristics of many, many other elite athletes can be said to have bestowed the exact same kinds of “unfair” advantages that allow Semenya to excel. The only question should be: Are these her real, natural abilities? If so, it is unethical to punish her for being born superior. Meanwhile, biological men transitioning into womanhood are allowed to dominate women’s sports competitions in the U.S. This makes no sense at all.

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Saturday Ethics Trick-Or Treat Leftovers, 11/4/2023

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments

November 4 is lively ethics date in addition to the aforementioned robbery of King Tut’s tomb. There have been two notable assassinations on this date that have current news resonance: Then-Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, in 1995, and in 1928, gambler Arnold Rothstein, who was instrumental in fixing the 1919 World Series. (If the Arizona Diamondbacks has won the World Series just completed, I would have suspected a fix, especially with baseball sullying itself with a full embrace of online gambling last season.) Just to show how fast cultural and ethical winds can shift, it was on this date in 2008 that Proposition 8 was passed in California, banning same-sex marriage. Today I wouldn’t be surprised to see Gavin Newsome sign a bill making it a felony to say anything negative about same-sex marriages. The Iran hostage crisis began in 1979: yes, it’s true, Democrats: once the Iranians were the bad guys. In 1956, the USSR under Khrushchev sent in the tanks and crushed the flickering of democracy in Hungary. The late Diane Feinstein was elected California Senator for the first time, highlighting the Democrats’ incredibly cynical “Year of the Woman,” during which misogynist and serial sexual harasser Bill Clinton was held up by the party as a paragon of virtue. And in 2008, of course, Barack Obama was elected, proving that the United States was not the racist nation his administration and its supporters helped convince black citizens that it was over the next eight years.

Boy, this really has been a terrible date for ethics.

Let’s hope today doesn’t add to the list…

1. Could this be it? Is this the tipping point? In Dighton, Mass, (This Massachusetts boy never heard of it!), a female high school field hockey player was badly injured and sent to the hospital after a fierce shot by “a male player” hit her in the face. Whether the player on the other team “identified” as female or was just a male playing a female sport because Massachusetts’ way to avoid controversies is to just eliminate gender separations in all sports is unclear so far. It shouldn’t make any difference.

In the ridiculously woke Bay State, the incident is being treated like a live hand-grenade, but it is still setting off ethics alarms. Dighton-Rehoboth Superintendent Bill Runey said in a letter to families that “[w]hile I understand that the MIAA has guidelines in place for co-ed participation under section 43 of their handbook, this incident dramatically magnifies the concerns of many about player safety,” Runey wrote. Gee, ya think?

2. See? Baseball makes you smart! (As opposed to football, which gives you dementia…) The latest issue of the Baseball Research Journal (the fruit of a generous gift from my friend Bob Kenney) had a feature article on the burning topic of why Ty Cobb was named “Tyrus.” My first reaction was, “Wow, they are really digging deep for topics at SABR,” but, as is often the case, research on a seemingly trivial topic yielded wide-ranging and valuable information. Cobb believed that his first name was original and the invention of his father, a history professor, whom the baseball great thought bestowed on his son the name to honor the city of Tyre’s courageous resistance to Alexander the Great, who eventually destroyed it. This, in turn, would indicate that all subsequent Tyruses were named after Ty Cobb. In the course of debunking that story, historian William H. Cobb discovered and reveals,

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Ethics Dunce: The North American Grappling Association (And All The Sports Organizations Like It)

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

After several female martial artists withdrew from competitions in fear of being injured by much stronger transgender fighters, The North American Grappling Association (NAGA) has overhauled its rules to prevent such unfair and dangerous contests.

It was the right thing to do, you say? Yeah, it was the right thing to do many months ago. What were they waiting for? This is a sport in which physical strength is obviously a major factor, and the advantage of going through puberty as a male is obviously going to be a factor. Natural-born female competitors shouldn’t have ever been placed in the position of having to choose between dropping out and risking getting crushed by recently-minted female with testosterone aided skeletal structure and muscles.

NAGA isn’t an Ethics Dunce because it decided to protect the integrity of the sport and the safety of its female fighters, it’s an Ethics Dunce because it was too cowardly, negligent, irresponsible and incompetent to do it the second the possibility raised its hairy head, stubbly head that a converted male might enter their competitions under their rules. NAGA didn’t take action because they wished and hoped that they could duck the issue without LGBTQ+ activists and social media mobs coming after them. Maybe, these despicable weenies thought, everyone would get along. Maybe women with their original lady parts wouldn’t object.

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Cultural Literacy Competence Fail!

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

As frequent vistors here know, I would argue that competent citizens should be sufficiently aware of cultural history to know who Bill Russell, Bob Feller and Bob Gibson are at very least. The elderly female contestant was alive and conscious while Bob Gibson and Bill Russell were active and frequently in the news. Surely someone presuming to appear as a contestant on “Jeopardy!” should have this level of U.S. sports history knowledge.

But perhaps you disagree…

Finally, The Evidence That Proves “Shoeless Joe” Wasn’t Just An Innocent Dupe (And That Hollywood Has Been Glorifying A Creep)

/ Jack Marshall / 13 Comments

Don’t you love it when new evidence is discovered that casts new light old historical controversies, or better yet, show that the popular version of history is dead wrong?

A long-buried trial transcript that has been withheld from public consumption for almost a century has finally been published. The case was Joe Jackson v. Chicago American League Baseball Club, a two week trial held in Milwaukee in early 1924. “Joe Jackson, Plaintiff, vs. Chicago American League Baseball Club, Defendant—Never-Before-Seen Trial Transcript” thoroughly disproves the popular image of Shoeless Joe Jackson, the greatest player among the eight Chicago White Sox players who were banned from the game for life after accepting money from gamblers to throw the 1919 World Series.

According to “Field of Dreams” (which also has the .400 batting left-handed hitter hitting right-handed) Joe is wise, passionate, and dedicated to the game. “Eight Men Out” the 1988 film about the scandal, based on author Eliot Asinof’s 1963 book, shows Jackson as an illiterate scapegoat who was not involved in the planning of the scheme and who only agreed to participate after the fix was in, The movie shows a conflicted Jackson telling “Black Sox” manager Kid Gleason that he does not want to play in the first game of the Series. Gleason orders Joe onto the field.

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More Thoughts On Baseball Play-Off Ethics.

/ Jack Marshall / 16 Comments

I raised this issue in the last pot-potpourri post, noting that, horrors, I agree with Keith Olbermann: the current system, now combined with the “balanced schedule,” is unethical (Keith didn’t exactly say that, since “ethics” isn’t in his vocabulary), because it is unfair to teams that have achieved the best record over the course of the season. As I explained in a comment thread,

“I detest any system where a team that was decisively clobbered by the team that won the division is ever in the position to eliminate the clearly superior team. That devalues the season. “….As long as the divisions had significantly different schedules, there was an argument that a superior record in one division(or league) didn’t necessarily mean the team finishing second in another division wasn’t as good (or better). The seeding means that the teams that have to play in the first round may actually have an advantage over the better teams that get to sit out the first round [because the extra days off may in fact be a handicap]….With 30 teams, there is no good solution, but it still stinks.”

Forget about your baseball biases: this a basic fairness question.

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The Amazing Trevor Bauer Ethics Train Wreck, Part 2: Villains, Victims, Heroes And Confusion

/ Jack Marshall / 13 Comments

There has already been an addition to what is known about this horrible ethics story. That’s the main (but far from only) villain of the tale above, Lindsey Hill, who plotted to extort Major League pitching star Trevor Bauer, as described in Part 1. I had never seen a photo of her before: she looks exactly as I would have expected her to look. Hill is already hard at work trying to squeeze every last drop of celebrity out of her scheme, and, of course, the popular culture being the scummy place it is, there are plenty of disgusting people out there ready to accommodate her. Now that Howard Stern is old and woke, she moved on to Alex Stein, who had her as a guest on his show “Prime Time With Alex Stein” on Glenn Beck‘s Blaze Media network. Stein is a professional asshole whose idea of comedy is to disrupt public meetings and confront politicians in public. Having Hill on his show gave this creep a chance to get into graphic descriptions of sexual activities, a la Stern.

Hill played the cliche “I’m an alcoholic, pity me” card, then tried to stick to her lie using various strategies. She reminded her host that two more women came out as she was in the process of extorting Bauer to claim he had abused them too. Two words regarding that: Bret Kavanaugh. The me-too #MeToos provided even less convincing evidence than Hill did, and we now know she was lying. She also offered the risible explanation of the damning morning-after video revealed by Bauer that bad lighting was to blame for the apparent absence of the injuries she had claimed. Was bad lighting also responsible for her grinning like the Cheshire cat?

Since we’ve started on Hill, I might as well finish.

1. Lindsey Hill, Villain

As I said, she’s the Number #1 Ethics Villain, and she did far more harm than just derailing Trevor Bauer’s career and reputation. She kicked #MeToo in the metaphorical solar plexus when it already was reeling. “Believe all women” had already been discredited as a slogan, but thanks to Hill, “Don’t automatically believe any women” is about to take its place. And there was more damage, which I will discuss here later.

Several conservative commentators have already opined that the law needs to find some way to punish sociopathic predators like Hill. Writes Miranda Devine in the New York Post, “It will never end until there are penalties for making false allegations that ruin a man’s life. Hill needs to be charged, like Jussie Smollett was for faking a hate crime.  Without consequences, malignant behavior only proliferates.” That sounds good, but this will only happen when women’s rights activists and the eager-to-pander politicians who grovel to them reverse course after opposing any negative consequences for women who falsely claim rape, harassment or sexual abuse. The standard argument remains the same: women are already too reluctant to accuse powerful men of sexual misconduct, and if they face real penalties should their allegations not meet evidentiary standards, even fewer will brave the storm, so more evil men will have their way. This is, and has always been, a utilitarian balancing act, with no clear or ideal solution.

The best that can be done about people like Hill right now is cultural and societal shunning. We should make sure everyone knows that generically attractive blonde face and her name, and employers as well as potential friends and lovers should be well aware that she’s a grifter who cannot be trusted. Post her image and deeds widely. If she ends up alone and making a living in low rent peep shows or as a geek biting the heads off live chickens, good. That’s one kind of justice.

It is only fair to mention that there is an unintended benefit of Hill’s vile conduct. Providing an ugly, throbbing example of how the #MeToo ideology can be abused (and why the Obama/Biden directive to colleges and universities to stack sexual misconduct cases against male students) is useful to those fighting these excesses. Thanks, Lindsey! You’re a blight on society, but not a completely useless one.

2. Trevor Bauer, Ethics Hero

Bauer is the only hero in the train wreck. He did nothing wrong (how he and his consenting sex partners choose to enjoy themselves is not wrong) and consistently denied wrongdoing throughout his ordeal. He followed the system, worked through his labor union and kept his mouth shut other than to tersely insist on his innocence. He did not attack Major League Baseball, nor take to social media to tell the world about Hill. Although well-versed in that mode of pubic communications, Bauer did not seek pity, threaten, or post drawings of himself standing with Jesus. His conduct throughout has been exemplary.

Most admirable of all, Bauer did not pay off Hill. No weenie he. It would have been easy to do so, his career would have continued unblighted, and he would barely miss the money: even with his suspension without pay for more than a season, Bauer has made $111,654,099 so far in his career, and at 32, he may not be done yet. In this matter he is an exemplar and role model. He was determined to fight, and that’s what ethical people should do. True, because he was already rich, Bauer could afford to be principled, but so many others who also can afford it, don’t.

This is as good a place as any to note Hall of Fame Braves pitcher Tom Glavine’s comment on the Bauer fiasco. “I would not want to be playing any professional sport in today’s world,” he said. “Listen, the money’s great, it always gets better every generation, but the things that guys have to deal with today, it’s off the charts. I mean, you can’t go anywhere without somebody having a camera. You can’t go anywhere without somebody videotaping.” In short, they are marks for evil people like Lindsey Hill, and unscrupulous women empowered by society’s current groveling to feminists and #MeToo activists.

3. Ethics Villains, the sports media.

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