China/NBA: Fans of Free Expression Were Not So Generous to Kaepernick

Richard Mellor

Afscme Local 444, retired

Big news over here in the US is a tweet a National Basketball Association (NBA) exec, Daryl Morey the general manager of the Houston Rockets basketball team, sent out supporting the protests in Hong Kong. Basketball has been growing in popularity in China fueled in part by the success of Yao Ming who played for the Rockets and who is the chairman of the Chinese Basketball Association and earlier with the world popularity of Michael Jordan. The NBA has been in China since the late 1980’s.

With issues like these or any other serious matters in society, what determines the reaction to it from the mass media and the political representatives of Wall Street is money. There is no such thing as justice or doing the right thing; money and profits is what matters.

Morey’s tweet was removed and the league says he will not be disciplined but the fallout is heavy as politicians from both capitalist parties criticized the NBA as being weak on the issue and putting money before human rights. NBA commissioner Adam Silver cleared that up in an announcement yesterday (10-8-19) that the league would not apologize for the tweet and supports free speech for NBA players and executives. So the NBA has refused to apologize to Beijing an in response, the Chinese Basketball Association has suspended ties with the Rockets and Chinese media companies have stated they won’t broadcast Houston games. Silver said that it is unfortunate that people are offended and that, "we come with basketball as an opportunity to sow dreams, sow hopes, that to increasingly focus on physical fitness....mental health." So the motive for introducing basketball to China is egalitarian it seems.

Silver's words appeared very sincere but he forgot to mention profits. The US basketball business and its organization the NBA is in China first and foremost to make money for its investors.

Of course money is paramount and with 1.4 billion people China is a very lucrative market. There are 300 million players in China and 500 million that watch the NBA. The Houston Rockets, because of Yao Ming’s association with them, is one of the most popular teams. The NBA is under pressure from the hypocrites at home not to apologize to the Chinese government but the pressure is on. NBA executives are scrambling to find some middle ground between their commitment to democratic rights and the Stalinist bureaucracy.

Rockets star James Harden has publicly apologized to China adding that, “We love China. We love playing there. For both of us individually, we go there once or twice a year. They show us the most important love. We appreciate them as a fan base, and we love everything they’re about.”  Mr Harden was with his teammate Russell Westbrook in Tokyo when he made these statements.

It's possible that the owners and the NBA big wigs might be encouraging players to counter Morey's tweet confirming the NBA's commitment to free speech regardless of whether it's a player, executive or even if they disagree. It's difficult to say but I wouldn't put it past them.  Harden and Westbrook along with many other NBA stars also have lucrative contracts with Nike and Adidas and along with other celebrities go to China to promote their footwear. I don’t think any of them spend much time in Cambodia or Vietnam where workers produce the shoes that make millions for the sports figures that wear them. I seem to recall Michael Jordan, now worth about $2 billion, refusing to meet Vietnamese workers that came to the US to make public the treatment they were facing in the factories that made Jordan’s shoes and his millions.

Houston's James Hardin tries to smooth things over

Today's professional athletes are literally pimps for the corporations. I angered a friend who loves football (the game where you use your feet) at the bar one night when two teams were playing. I don’t watch it as much as I used to and I said to her, “I see Emirates is playing Vodaphone” as the players were plastered with corporate logos to the extent that I couldn’t identify the team.  She wanted me to let her enjoy the game and keep politics out of it not realizing the game is totally politicized.

The Wall Street Journal pointed out today that the NBA has some leverage and that “both sides of this dispute rely on each other.”.   Unlike other businesses that have capitulated to pressure from Beijing which in disputes has alternatives, “…there’s only one NBA….”, the WSJ writes.  Stressing that what strengthens Beijing’s hand in those situations is that, “There are other hotels airlines and clothing brands but NBA basketball is irreplaceable.”

Silver stated on TV last night that the NBA “would not put itself in a position of regulating what players, employers and team owners can say.”

I have to say, I don’t know the details but I wonder how many of these politicians defending the NBA and free speech when it comes to criticizing China’s human rights record were vocal in their public support of Colin Kaepernick, the American football player who took a knee during the playing of the national anthem to protest police violence and racism in US society. The capitalist media assault on Kaepernick was successful in molding public opinion convincing people that he was protesting the flag and insulting veterans and very few politicians were outspoken about the US mass media’s blatant lies. The racists jumped on board claiming that sports events aren’t the place for the public expression of political views as if the presence of US Marines and the flying of jets over stadiums before games is not political.

I don’t know enough about the NBA or basketball to gauge where this will end up but I know that there are players and owners here in the US that are billionaires and millionaires and that apparel company executives also grab their share of the loot from the sports entertainment business as do media moguls. They all get rich off of workers in China, Cambodia, Vietnam, Bangladesh and other places who produce the apparel and the shoes that make them rich. Workers in Cambodia that have gone on strike to get some relief have been shot by security forces.

Healthy competition in sport is an important aspect of human culture. Not so when it is a business and a road to riches for a few. In the US, the universities provide a pool of individuals from which professional teams can draw. There is also rampant corruption and abuse in college sports as well. For many young people from poor backgrounds or marginalized communities sport can be a ticket to a college education. Free education from K through college would be a terrible thing for investors in the sports industry.

I remember when all sport was amateur and you could tell which soccer team was which or which team an individual was on by watching the game. Now, they are simply corporate players.

Like any other major industry, the sports business is global and those with the most money win. What chance Botswana or many of the other African countries or former colonial countries anywhere becoming champions of the world? Very unlikely. In the last men’s World Cup (soccer) that France won, there were numerous African players. “It’s a shame that for an African to make it in to the final of the world cup he has to change his nationality” one guy wrote.

All sport should be amateur and subsidized. It should be an integral part of our education, a healthy collective social necessity. As it is, our children watch and worship millionaires that they are encouraged to emulate, that they desire to be; it has brutal repercussions for the poorest among us. It is individualistic and alienating as we spend time watching these ‘gods” rather than participating ourselves. On the news last night the sport commentator referred to a taunting one player was directing at another as “trash talking” and how  “a little trash talking is to be expected”. Why is that?  Why has humiliating your opponent become an accepted behavior? That winning is everything and the game is secondary is one reason. You don’t bring in revenue when you lose. It’s the same with art. The weekly report of the best film of that week is always dominated by the one that rakes in the most money which is usually the worst piece of artistic creation.

Take the profit and big business out of Education, energy, transportation, health care and all major social needs and major industries including sport. The squabble here between the NBA and the Chinese bureaucracy and the phony defense of democracy from the US political representatives of capital is of no serious consequence to working class people. Let’s not forget that in China, the conditions that many workers face are so inhuman that in one factory (Foxconn) nets were placed below the windows in workers ‘dorms as so many workers chose suicide to escape a life of misery.