Southpaw 23: When the Culture Wars Matter
The Tennessee GOP is trying to use the controversy over anthem protests to strip athletes of their rights. In this case, Democrats shouldn’t back down from the fight.
Dear Readers,
One of the drawbacks to publishing this newsletter on Sunday is that, if news breaks early in the week, all the spicy takes have already made their way into the content-sphere by the time we sit down to write.
That’s what happened this week when footage surfaced Sunday afternoon of the Seattle Mariners’ CEO Kevin Mather giving a jaw-droppingly gross speech to a Rotary Club in Washington state. In his wide-ranging and rambling comments, Mather insulted the English-language abilities of some of the Mariners’ foreign players, admitted to manipulating the major league service time of top minor-league prospects so the club could exert more control their contracts, and claimed one of the Mariners’ best veteran players is “overpaid.” By Monday, Mather had resigned.
“Excellent!” we thought. “Kevin Mather said the quiet part out loud and got fired for it!” Well, apparently that’s verbatim what everyone else thought as well.
Fear not though, readers. As is true most weeks, there’s certainly more than one story worth telling. Rather than discuss the depravity of baseball front offices—or even wade too deeply into the Zlatan-LeBron beef—we’ve pivoted to the depravity of the Tennessee State Legislature. Enjoy!
-Ian and Calder
Oh and P.S. Kelly Loeffler is selling the Atlanta Dream! Loeffler has now lost a Senate seat and a professional sports franchise in just two months, causing some pundits to wonder, “what will she lose next?”
The GOP in Tennessee is trying to turn a culture war battle into a real civil rights conflict. It’s a fight Democrats can win.
Two weeks ago, we wrote about the GOP’s melodramatic outrage at Mark Cuban’s decision not to play the national anthem before Dallas Mavericks’ games and the GOP’s sanctimonious defenses of pregame patriotism in the post-Trump era. In that piece, we wrote: “[Congressman] Matt Gaetz and [Texas’s Lieutenant Governor] Dan Patrick will continue to do what they do, but after the Trump Era of American politics, it’s increasingly difficult for the average person, regardless of her political persuasion, to get truly worked up over this pablum.”
We stand by our take, but some news out of the Tennessee state legislature this week reminded us of an important caveat. On Wednesday, all 27 Republican members of the Tennessee State Senate sent a letter to the presidents and chancellors of the state’s public colleges and universities imploring them, on specious legal grounds, to prohibit athletes from protesting during the anthem and encouraging them to punish athletes who do. The letter came just a week after players on the East Tennessee State University men’s basketball team took a knee during the anthem before a game against the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.
As we argued a couple weeks ago, the conflict over the national anthem rings pretty hollow these days, especially since athletes around the country are moving beyond merely symbolic displays of protest to claim more direct political power. But as the letter from Tennessee’s GOP reminds us, that doesn’t mean that the controversy is without any stakes whatsoever. Even low-level Republican lawmakers are eager to take advantage of obscure culture-war battles as an excuse to strip marginalized people of their basic constitutional protections—including the right to peacefully protest. We remain ambivalent about the playing of the anthem itself before sporting events that don’t involve national teams, but we should certainly keep a watchful eye on the struggle over its continuance. The GOP has time and time again shown that, given the choice between allowing reasoned debate and shoving their preferences down our throats, they will choose the latter. The anthem controversy is no exception.
The good news is, even as the GOP tries to incorporate sports into the broader culture wars, its positions are becoming less popular. This past summer, the U.S. Soccer Federation’s board voted to repeal a policy passed in 2017 that required players to stand during the anthem, with 70 percent of board members in favor of repeal. For the first time in 2020, polls showed that more than half of Americans support athletes kneeling for the anthem. According to a poll conducted by The Washington Post last September, 62% of Americans believe athletes should use their platforms to speak out on social issues, including 7 out of 10 adults under the age of 50. This shift in popular opinion can be attributed in part to the willingness of athlete activists—both on the national and local stage—to speak openly and eloquently about political challenges. As LeBron James said in response to soccer star Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s criticism of his activism, “I do my homework.”
Athletes are doing their part to make sure that arguments like the one put forward by Tennessee’s GOP are summarily dismissed. Now, it’s time for Democratic politicians to confront the issue head-on as well. Historically, Democrats have been afraid to wade into fights over the anthem. Just a few months before the 2016 election, Barack Obama, while defending the right to peacefully protest in the abstract, said that Colin Kaepernick should also “listen to the pain that that may cause somebody who, for example, had a spouse or a child who was killed in combat, and why it hurts them to see somebody not standing.” Nevermind that it was a Green Beret who first convinced Kaepernick that kneeling was an appropriate form of protest, or that veterans and military families have consistently defended Kaepernick, or that all Americans live under our flag, not just people who have fought for this country.
In general, the Democratic Party can leave the culture wars to Republicans and focus on the issues that materially impact American’s livelihoods—guaranteed access to good healthcare, a higher minimum wage, a robust social safety net. But when Republicans use culture war battles as an excuse to restrict citizens’ basic civil liberties, Democrats can’t simply look away. When the stakes warrant it, Democrats should mount a full-throated defense of athletes’ right to protest.
In the past, Democrats have run away from the debate over the anthem because they’re scared of losing it. But in 2021, it’s an ideological battle that they can win—and, given the Tennessee GOP’s preferred alternative, a battle they have to fight.
RODNEY’S ROUNDUP
Do you want to read about. . .
. . . the deep roots of misogyny in sports? “Our sports need a healthier version of masculinity, and men need to create it,” by Jerry Brewer in The Washington Post (January 22, 2021).
. . . the strange world of pandemic insurance for sporting events? “What Helped Save Some Sports From Financial Ruin May Not Happen Again,” by Alan Blinder and Kevin Draper for The New York Times (February 26, 2021).
. . . the dangerous insanity of March Madness during a pandemic? “Welcome to the Real March Madness,” by Dave Zirin in The Nation (February 25, 2021).
. . . a hundred reasons not to mourn John Geddert? “Gymnasts’ Abusers ‘We’re Buds and Protected Each Other,” by Juliet Macur in The New York Times (February 26, 2021).
. . . how Title IX is losing its teeth in court? “Judge denies Title IX complaint against Michigan State based on raised standards” by Paula Lavigne in ESPN (February 25, 2021).