New in PJ Media:
It got hot Saturday at Yankee Stadium, and not just because it was nearly 90 degrees in the Bronx by gametime: Yankees designated hitter Josh Donaldson made a comment to Chicago White Sox shortstop Tim Anderson that Anderson contends was “racist.” The benches cleared, tempers were short, and the controversy is still raging; Major League Baseball officials have begun an investigation.
A disquieting sign of the persistence of racism in American culture today? Nope. The incident was actually a disquieting sign of how our racism-obsessed culture has given all too many people a hair-trigger sensitivity that sees racism everywhere, and manufactures it when it isn’t present.
So what happened? Did Donaldson use the dreaded word that shuts down all discourse and rational thought and excludes one from polite society forever after? Of course not. Did he come out to bat wearing blackface? Did he taunt Anderson with old racial stereotypes about blacks? No. All he did was pass by Anderson in the first inning and say, “What’s up, Jackie?”
Yeah, really, that’s all. Donaldson was needling Anderson over a 2019 Sports Illustrated interview in which Anderson said he felt as if he were “today’s Jackie Robinson” and was “getting to a point where I need to change the game.” What Anderson meant is unclear, as there are no bars to black people playing Major League Baseball today, and contrary to accusations of racism, baseball teams have actually been aggressively courting young black men to play the game, so as to offset those very charges of racism.
Anderson’s remark was a self-important and self-pitying manifestation of what happens when you tell someone every day of his life that he is oppressed and denied opportunity. Tim Anderson made over seven million dollars in 2021 and stands to make nine and a half million this year; in 2019, when he likened himself to Jackie Robinson, he made only a paltry 1.4 million. The poor guy! How did he ever get by on that?
And so, the aggrieved victim fumed about Donaldson: “He just made a disrespectful comment. Basically, he was trying to call me Jackie Robinson. ‘What’s up, Jackie?’ I don’t play like that. I don’t really play at all. I wasn’t really going to bother nobody today, but he made the comment, and you know it was disrespectful and I don’t think it was called for. It was unnecessary.”
Well, sir, he called you Jackie Robinson because you called yourself Jackie Robinson. But in today’s racism-charged culture, Donaldson, a white man, did not accord Anderson, a black man, the cringing respect and honor that the Left demands from the white oppressor, and so had committed “racism.”
There is more. Read the rest here.
mortimer says
In the Leftard world of today, crimes are not committed against mere ‘individuals’, but against a ‘collectivity’ or against an ‘identity’.
Neo-Marxism believes in IDENTITIES and COLLECTIVITIES. So, if you insult ONE black man, you have insulted them all! You have insulted the ‘COLLECTIVITY’ and that makes one a racist.
But this was not an insult … only a joke that was an ‘old’ joke and one which Mr. Tim Anderson felt that he had outlived. He didn’t wish to be compared with the great baseball player Jackie Robinson anymore.
(If someone compared my baseball playing to that of Jackie Robinson, I personally would be complimented.)
This reminds me of the difference between flirting and harrassment. If an extremely gorgeous, fit, young man says, ‘Hi Babe!’ to a cute woman, it is flirting. However, if an out-of-shape, average-looking, middle-aged man says, ‘You like nice today’ to a woman, then that is ‘harassment’.
The trouble with the ‘Jackie’ jibe was merely one of ‘AGE’ … old joke, therefore, not a welcome ‘young’ joke.
James Lincoln says
If I ever had an inclination to return to watching Major League Baseball, this article squashed it.
And if this stuff keeps happening, the money will dry up…
gravenimage says
I used to be a fan. Now, not so much…
gravenimage says
Shock Horror: New York Yankees Player Makes ‘Racist’ Remark to Black Player!
…………….
Well, this is just stupid. If a white player were told they play like, I don’t know, Mickey Mantle?–would it be insulting–and moreover, *racially* insulting–if a non-white player called them Mickey? Let’s just say I really doubt it…
OLD GUY says
Professional Sports lost me as a fan years ago. Sadly I and everyone else on earth pays the professional sports tax every time we purchase a soft drink, beer, car what ever in advertising /promotional fee’s paid to broadcast and promote sports.