America's Team
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Summary
In this episode of the Radix Crew, Mark and Mark discuss college football and the current state of the sport in America. Mark talks about his background in the sport, how he got into college football, and why he thinks the sport has become the national pastime.
Transcript
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Mark how are you I'm doing well how about yourself great let's talk football
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hopefully this won't get banned from any place we're just talking sports you know
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this isn't that what YouTube wants we'll do an unboxing I would yeah I wouldn't hold your breath
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well among the Radix crew we're kind of the the jock element I guess so to speak in the sense that
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we like to watch football and maybe even play it a little bit did you ever play football
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yeah I did yeah good I was more of a hockey player though and okay you know that was more my sport
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yeah New England you know so exactly um yeah I played football in Texas so that was a rite of
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passage you if you didn't play football you were a cock and I'm glad I did even though I wasn't that
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great yeah no I was glad to have the experience as well I mean it's an interesting sport I don't
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think I fully I probably appreciated it more after I was out of school just because I had more of a
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you know I don't I wasn't really a sports fan in high school even though I played sports um so I
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don't think I had a kind of appreciation for football um or kind of as much of an appreciation
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for football as a kind of football sports fan would have been uh starting football in high school but um
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uh and I think that one of the we talked about this on our other uh podcast but um yeah one of the
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things that was less exciting about the sport to me is that you are kind of a sort of cog in the
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machine if you're not like kind of a primary cog it's not like it's a little less fun well you have
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to kind of give up your ego to play football I mean I I played when I was when I was on freshman and
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JV team or I guess we just had a freshman team we didn't have a JV because my school is too small but
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when I was on freshman football I actually played tight end and fullback so I mean I would
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you know catch the occasional pass and run the ball and and whatever but once I entered varsity
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they were like all right you're playing on the offensive line
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but you kind of I don't know you kind of have to give up your ego and block for people who are
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faster than you are or they're gonna sit you on the bench like it's how it goes and it's pretty
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obvious when you're not like going with the flow and getting with the program and if you're not like
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they will bench you faster than you know you you can say uh throw me the ball coach like they're
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just gonna put you on the bench and I don't know I mean I I think that's actually kind of part of it
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and that's part of the reason why the foot the the sport kind of does have value I I remember my my
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father went to Lawrenceville which was an all-boys boarding school uh up in New Jersey it was actually
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kind of a bit of a Princeton feeder but you know people would go to other schools as well but
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yeah I mean part of the ethos of the school was for everyone to play house football and um you know
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and basically everyone played so it didn't matter how little you were how unathletic you were how
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nerdy you were uh you still got out there and played and you know obviously it was you know
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competitive without being super competitive it was basically about the you know process of becoming
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a team and um you know the you know the ones who are the most athletic carrying the ball and
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the other guys blocking for them and it kind of all working so yeah I mean I think in that sense
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there's a lot to admire about the sport uh very different than baseball which is uh individual you
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know about individual matchups um but um anyway it football has become the national pastime much
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more than baseball I mean baseball is still around it still has lots of fans um I like baseball but
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the football is really on another level in terms of uh you know just coverage in the media I mean the
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the world series is barely covered at this point um you know and whereas with football you know any
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minor injury or controversy or uh uh or drunken violence uh uh arrest is uh covered hotly by the
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media uh it's just much bigger and I you know I don't know maybe we've seen peak football but I
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don't think it's gonna change dramatically uh at least in the next couple of years although we're gonna
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talk about that um but it has become a national it has become the national pastime or the national
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game but that also means that it has to go with the flow of the national mood and in this sense I
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think it's worthwhile to look at football as kind of a microcosm of what is going on and in terms of
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you know America and and everything I mean first off just in terms of the coronavirus I mean you know
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everyone's talking about the upcoming season as if there's going to be one I don't know if there will
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be one I don't know what exactly is going to happen but it's certainly in dispute uh but beyond that um
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what we've seen from the George Floyd protest is this move towards iconoclasm as the ultimate meaning
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of the death of St George Floyd so you know at the beginning it was about oh we need to arrest these
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bad officers and then it quickly went into we need to rethink the police entirely if not defund them or
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or should we end policing and bring back or bring forward community whatever um uh and that that was
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actually a real issue there were you know protests around the nation around the world uh but it seems
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like the the the death of George Floyd has kind of settled down into iconoclasm we saw this similar
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thing happen with the um mass murder committed by uh Dylan Roof uh back in 2015 and uh you know at the
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very beginning of that controversy it was all about gun control and maybe a little bit of you know
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radicalized lone wolf for incel violence there was a little bit of talk about that but then it just
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quickly shifted to we need to remove the confederate flag from state houses across the country and um and
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we indeed need to remove confederate books from Amazon we need to remove confederate flag paraphernalia
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uh and so on and so it's it's almost like America seems to settle in to we're going to engage in
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symbolic change or symbolic destruction and I I mean symbolic quite literally we're going to change all
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our symbols but we don't actually have to change the infrastructure uh so and we seem to be settling
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into that with George Floyd as well where we're not going to actually end the police that's a bit much
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uh I I do think that the the era of tough policing and mass imprisonment I do think that that will
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change and and kind of come to an end but I think it's a bit much to ask the government to end policing
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in total uh but what we're going to do instead is have rioters tear down monuments and then also have
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legislators just kind of do it legally so um this past weekend the Mississippi state legislator
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legislature you know which is predominantly Republican of course uh voted to change their flag
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um and and football as the you know new national pastime just goes along with this and I you know
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you can think of a lot of these things as kind of like oh well they're you know this is a side issue
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it's sports it doesn't really matter whatever but it actually does matter and it definitely
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matters to normies who care about football much more than they care about politics or uh and know
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more about it than they know about politics or culture or you know geopolitical affairs to say the
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least and um it actually also it kind of acts as a microcosm for what's happening so basically there
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are two major things that have occurred the first is that the Washington Redskins um are I would say
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at this point almost certain to change their name um it's been a controversy for a few decades I can
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even remember rumblings about this controversy um back in the 1980s and uh and then in the 2000s I
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think it's the latest 2009 there was actually a court case and there was an appeal that was not heard by
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the supreme court so I mean it got that far there was another kind of blow up um around um uh maybe
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when was it 2013 or something like that uh and then now this you know a month after George Floyd's death
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has come to the fore as we must end this now uh there's also an issue with um the uh the national
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anthem so um and we can maybe talk about that first and then delve into the redskins but the
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colin kaepernick was in 2000 and um and uh 17 I guess was kneeling for before the national anthem and
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this became a crisis it became a hot button political issue with donald trump saying you know
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uh if I were the owner of those football teams I'd say get that son of a bitch off the field and um
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and people started you know boycotting the nfl not watching the games and uh then um colin kaepernick
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kind of even though his career as a football player ended effectively he became a hero of sorts
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and a kind of left-wing activist and cause celeb um you know for all sorts of things I think there's
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a new series on netflix dedicated to his high school years or some nonsense like that um and it was
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almost I think this is a microcosm as well where the right kind of wins a short-term victory and then
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long-term defeat where you know colin kaepernick was basically expressing the ideology of
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black lives matter I mean not exactly but more or less and donald trump succeeded by
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making it kind of about patriotism and symbolism and so he's you know he said oh he's disrespecting
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the flag he's disrespecting you know our republic uh and then they kind of the conservatives always
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kind of lose in the end they gain these you know immediate victories be that are basically kind
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emotional and reactive uh and then they ultimately get cocked at the end of the day and I think you
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can see that here now so you know colin kaepernick was was persona non grata in the league he was not
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signed by any team even though he was actually pretty good his his career was declining but he he was better
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than a lot of other people playing quarterback in the nfl uh but then he became a hero and now he's kind
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of ultimately won regardless of whether he goes in back into the nfl which I think is almost I I imagine
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some team will sign him but um he's ultimately won in the sense that the nfl is now um doing something
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uh apparently this is this was leaked to ESPN I believe but I I could go check on this but apparently
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on week one of the nfl they're going to sing lift every voice which is I did not know this uh is the
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black national anthem of sorts um it's a uh fairly non-offensive song kind of negro spiritual type thing
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I think was written by this kind of Booker T Washington black educator or something um but uh that
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will be sung uh at the beginning of every game on week one um you know they they aren't quite
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kneeling in the national anthem but they're almost getting what they want um I have no doubt that blm
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or blm's core message will be prominent at these football games and and so it's it's kind of like
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one more example where the right spasmodically reacts to something but then also kind of
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misunderstands it and so they they they turned Colin Kaepernick's protest which was about police
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violence and black identity and so on and they kind of said well we're not going to address that issue
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really but you're disrespecting the flag that's unpatriotic you should never be able to burn a flag
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blah blah blah and they kind of misunderstood it or kind of brought it into their frame of reference
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and they won a short-term victory but then lost the war and um I think they will definitely lose
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this upcoming war uh the NFL has been over the last 10 years or so it's been dom or more than that
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probably 20 years it's been dominated by a military aesthetic and ethos with you know huge
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flags that cover the entire field and f-14s flying over during the national anthem and soldiers
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everywhere and veterans and I think in one month they dress up in camo and stuff like that they also
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dress up in pink for breast cancer which maybe that's worthy of a podcast in itself uh but they they
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definitely have you know embraced a kind of hyper patriotism and I think now that is going to shift
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towards a a BLM a kind of black identity um you know neo-religious overtones surrounding black
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suffering uh but I think they're going to go in in that whole hog and it's yet another example of
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these conservatives again just kind of winning a little short-term victory getting people to hate
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on the NFL a little bit uh and the NFL kind of standing up against something that's controversial
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by you know effectively kicking Colin Kaepernick out of the league not signing him but then just kind of
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ultimately losing and doing something that almost Colin Kaepernick couldn't even imagine you know in
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2017 when he was kneeling you know you know lift every voice stuff like that so um uh what are your
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thoughts on this Mark uh well yeah I mean there's a lot there it is interesting though that um
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there is this sort of uh initial phase of resistance from the conservatives um where it seems like they
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achieve some victory early on but then they end up losing and I think that um it does it does in a way
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it does create a kind of theater where the success of BLM becomes greater because there's perceived this
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period of struggling and resistance where this sort of the racist conservatives were uh you know
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effectively putting down their efforts at reform but then they eventually succeed so it creates a kind
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of narrative and you could say a kind of moralizing narrative for BLM because they can look back at this
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supposed uh period of struggling um and you know I mean Kaepernick is a kind of martyr I mean his
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his career I mean look his career was declining uh but you know the you know I don't know how old he is now
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maybe in his early 30s I mean he was a that was the prime era to be an NFL quarterback for him and he that
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was taken away from him I mean he has not played in is it going on four seasons uh so he was kind of he
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became a martyr of sorts uh you know a very well funded martyr but a martyr yeah no so I mean um
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but so I guess the question then becomes because what happened in uh 2017 2016 whenever exactly it was
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I guess it was 2017 where uh Trump was uh counter signaling basically the NFL and he was I mean his
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and this shows us kind of the the power of political leadership and how sort of sheep-like
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people are effectively where Trump was basically saying ah you know the NFL thing's not patriotic
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they're not uh sufficiently honoring the national anthem and that in the NFL was actually was seeing
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a decline in ticket sales and viewership as a consequence of this you know basically something
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that Trump uh I mean it was out there in the culture but Trump was kind of leading
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the charge as it were and had Trump not taken that stance uh the NFL may have suffered uh but
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probably only marginally and maybe not really at all you know so it shows really kind of the influence
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that Trump had uh during that period as it turns the NFL as it concerns the NFL and um but his leadership
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now is kind of like he he is in a way a sort of discredit discredited leader I mean he just doesn't
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have the same sort of uh clout that he once had because he just doesn't have the same popularity
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uh and for a number of reasons that are um you know that should be obvious to people now uh but I
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don't know what what is the fate of the NFL though if it changes this or it it kind of rebrands in this
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way uh where it becomes effectively a BLM league because we have to assume that people are going to be
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kneeling throughout the season now right I mean if if the if what's happened in the larger society
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uh will be reflected and it will be reflected in the league uh then all the players that were
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formally standing up and that wouldn't take a knee you know all this sort of you know the Tom Brady's
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or whoever else yeah these kind of white players that were kind of like ah you know it's all right if
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a teammate does it but I you know I I'm patriotic this is the best country on earth or you know
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sort of the standard view that a kind of white football player would have and even some black
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football players like not everyone was taking a knee no uh and it kind of varied from team to team
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uh depending on sort of the culture of that team as it were uh but everyone's gonna be kneeling now
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oh yeah JJ every game yeah well JJ Watt is kind of the he's he's a bit of the face of the NFL even
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though he plays defensive line and he is very good uh but he's kind of like the golden boy of the
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NFL he despite the fact that he's a lineman and he you know he's blonde you know super strong very
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good you know no scandals nice guy and uh I I actually saw something where he was tweeting out
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like um I I might you know don't someone was saying I don't think JJ will take a knee and he's like
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don't speak for me like this is about bigger issues and you know uh stuff like that I I think it would
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be actually quite symbolic if the the the white players like JJ Watt and Tom Brady took a knee I
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I think that would be huge and but it would be done in a kind of Hegelian synthesis so to speak
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well yeah and this is a theater this is yeah it's it's like just briefly this is like that tearful
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moment in the movie where like the grouch the racist grouch finally like breaks and says you know
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you were right all along and starts weak or whatever right so anyways uh continue what you
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were saying well for instance um the Dallas Cowboys uh are the most popular football team in America
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and I think they might even be the most popular or even or the very least valuable franchise around
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the world or they're they're up there and um Jerry Jones is kind of the face of the franchise in a kind
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of funny way the owner uh because he's just so you know he's like a Texan billionaire and and charismatic
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and and really funny uh but but also clearly a Republican and he's never spoken out in favor of BLM
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he's gotten some heat for that uh but what he did in 2017 was this kind of synthesis where you know if
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you have Colin Kaepernick out there you know wearing like anti-police socks I think at one point he's
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wearing like pig socks or something like that and then it becomes this like black activist or you
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know in in Kaepernick's case you know angry mulatto you know bashing America kind of thing uh but when
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Jerry Jones did it he had the entire team come out including his half black quarterback and their white
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coach and they all kind of came out and they were arm in arm and they kneeled almost in this way of like
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flipping it around and making it patriotic you know so I mean it it kind of it is theater and but it's also
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like symbolism where you don't quite know what it means like you could read that as ah you know the whites
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of you know knelt before the power of BLM like they've they've lost or so what or you could flip it around
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and say like some bad things happened in our country's history but our founding ideals have led
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us to this day where all men are truly created equal and to be pro equal rights is to be an American and
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you know and and and and also the kind of religious overtones of kneeling together arm and arm I mean it's
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inherently this Christian act and I I think Jerry kind of in his brilliant way I mean he is clearly a
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genius of sorts a bit of a genius like Trump I guess uh was able to kind of flip it and he recognized
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that he was losing and that if he went out and just confronted Kaepernick directly he would lose
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and so he kind of flipped it on its on its head and made it this weirdly patriotic thing to do and I think
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the NFL will do that as well and they'll make it kind of like you know to truly be a proud white man
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you have to kneel or something it's kind of you know what I mean it's just it kind of it's weird
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uh but that that's how it you know that's how it becomes like not just a single man protesting and
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becomes this national phenomenon yeah well it's as in Christianity it's a kind of humbling yourself
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before a higher ideal as it were right humble brag kind of yeah yeah I don't I mean so uh but I mean
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ultimately it is a kind of a deep form of humiliation yeah right I mean on a deep sort of psychological
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level it is a form of racial uh degradation and humiliation um in Christianity Christianity also
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contains this as well in the sense that you're kneeling I mean to the extent that you're not a
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Jew yourself you're kneeling before Jewish savior here you're kneeling before like pretty explicitly
00:24:05.880
before uh blacks in the interests of blacks like you're kneeling before the interests of blacks I mean
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there's no there's no other way to sort of interpret kneeling uh in the name of uh black lives matter
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right I mean so um yeah it's very striking uh in that regard but um you know I I mean I guess a uh
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a couple of things I would say is that um in in a way I mean these problems are just kind of baked
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into multiculturalism in the sense that there has to like every society naturally kind of conforms
00:24:42.900
uh to one direction or toward one ideal or toward one direction and we we see that sort of forming in
00:24:50.160
America in the sense that like you know our greatest concern are really the lives of blacks you know black
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lives matter and you know the you have this sort of this rhetorical battle going on where you know
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these civnats or these amnats are saying well all lives matter right and that you know it's offensive
00:25:07.960
to consider that only black lives matter but in the retort of course is that well we're not saying
00:25:14.300
only black lives matter but we're saying it's time to support blacks because they've been oppressed or
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persecuted in America you know through especially through this police brutality uh but of course that's
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not I mean psychologically the these amnats are are are responding to something that's
00:25:32.560
quite real what is going on is that the black lives matter is taking uh black racial interests
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and making it the priority right so if you support black lives might matter you're also making black
00:25:47.580
lives matters or black lives a priority as opposed to your own interests right uh even all lives matter
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is a total cock and I'm not I'm not saying that in the sense that we should start chanting white lives matter
00:26:01.100
that that that has also kind of rubbed me the wrong way but it's I guess you could call this caducean
00:26:06.100
if you want but it's this sense of like it's like the left is saying well you know there's still racism
00:26:13.040
the legacy of slavery lives on through systemic racism and brutality etc and then the the white response
00:26:20.260
is no all lives matter we're all one you know in the in this kind of it it's like both are wrong
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and uh and I'm not sure saying white lives matter is is much better um you know that that declaring that
00:26:36.660
something matters like that is is almost inherently a kind of inferiority position of of saying you know
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if you have to say it that that means that it's in question you know so to speak and so I just I don't know
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the degree to which saying white lives matter is moralizing I mean my response is to say no lives matter
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which is that like oh you know I I just want to get out of the frame of humanism and basically say that
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you're only you only matter if you're part of something that is bigger and bolder and greater than yourself
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you're only you only matter as an individual in the sense that you're part of a in an achievement of
00:27:20.080
flourishing and greatness and um yeah but I'm not sure no lives matter will really catch on on
00:27:26.880
twitter but um but again I guess my major point is even the right response is just a total cuck out
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you know it's just basically saying oh yeah we're all the same here you know we all fled oppression
00:27:40.200
and tyranny to to end up in this land you know where we could achieve individualism or something it's it's
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just it's inherently demoralizing even in itself yeah white lives matter uh the adl actually um
00:27:53.920
it declares that like a hate slogan or like a slogan of white supremacy right I mean it's absurd so
00:28:00.320
it's okay to be white as well it's like we're that's where we are it's like we're saying it's
00:28:05.680
it's okay guys it's okay to be what yeah but what's implied there is that adl is saying that
00:28:12.060
white lives don't matter and they're white supremacist if you believe that white lives matter
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so it's it's a very uh we live in very uh interesting times as they say um and I don't
00:28:23.560
but it's also it feels like it's just peak cuckery and I mean and on some level too I mean
00:28:29.740
and I think that from our perspective like obviously I think demoralization among whites is
00:28:35.160
like at an all-time high I I you know I and I I'm personally I'm not feeling it but I because I
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think that there's kind of two sides to it and the other side is that this this kind of system of
00:28:48.600
multiculturalism is kind of grinding to its logical conclusion right in the sense that it's becoming
00:28:54.460
uh it's becoming more and more offensive to rational and sound-minded people and it's becoming
00:29:01.740
more draconian in in the way that it sort of enforces its will so it has to de-platform dissenting
00:29:07.920
voices it has to become more draconian in terms of censorship but it's also it just it's just becoming
00:29:14.280
to anyone that is still kind of awake I mean because as we've discussed before is there's two sides of
00:29:19.600
this demoralization one of one is that um that they are legitimately demoralizing people so that they
00:29:26.660
don't have the will to resist or dissent right and I in in it probably to the majority of the people
00:29:33.380
they are effectively doing that but the other side of it is that they're angering people because it's
00:29:38.600
clearly uh yeah I mean it's it's clearly uh hypocritical and it's clearly uh very aggressively
00:29:45.920
anti-white so two things are happening simultaneously and probably what they're doing is they're kind of
00:29:51.620
distilling a resistance that's just like you know this is just completely out of control and now
00:29:57.820
people who are resisting this system are armed with all this evidence of just like this thing is
00:30:03.600
clearly a sort of anti-white system and multiculturalism uh does not uh has no benefits for me it is only
00:30:12.520
against my interests it's only sort of contrary to my interests so it's a kind of double-edged sword
00:30:17.720
um but uh yeah it's fascinating I mean I wrote an article um that I was pretty proud it's actually in
00:30:24.860
that the first it's a chapter in that first book and it's the right not to be offended in your own
00:30:29.900
land yeah right and so this is just the kind of inherent problem to multiculturalism in the sense
00:30:35.100
as I mentioned before is that the society has has one direction it's going in one direction or the other
00:30:41.400
and ours is kind of going in this blm direction this this multiculturalism anti-white
00:30:47.660
direction and um it's becoming increasingly a hostile and offensive culture for us but in the
00:30:55.980
process it's becoming ostensibly a more a less offensive and more livable and uh in a more benevolent
00:31:04.100
culture from the perspective of blacks now I mean I think it's a more there's a more kind of complex
00:31:09.120
equation there but you understand what I'm saying so it for this society to become unoffensive
00:31:15.880
and pleasing or appeasing to blacks it has to become offensive to us right in order for them
00:31:22.720
not to perceive themselves as persecuted it's required that we become uh you know more persecuted
00:31:30.040
more censored uh you know people who can be offended uh with impunity and don't really have a say in it
00:31:37.820
um and also suffering real likes kind of economic consequences and not even just if we're kind of
00:31:44.280
speaking up speaking up and being rebellious and therefore losing our jobs but you know through
00:31:50.360
this sort of uh it kind of increasing uh the increasing of anti-white racial uh discrimination
00:31:59.040
in general economic in the workplace you know in hiring everywhere I think you you understand what
00:32:07.200
what I'm saying yeah I mean again on YouTube I mean it's it's like this podcast cannot be possible
00:32:16.980
you know like no one should listen to this and and the thought that someone might be offended
00:32:25.040
by it you know that that needs to be taken so seriously that we just need to simply ban it from
00:32:31.560
the platform altogether and that goes for you know a whole host of other people um I I saw E. Michael
00:32:39.360
Jones was just banned today um even though you know he doesn't agree with the two of us on much but
00:32:46.260
we're we're kind of equally offensive and uh we don't have a right to speak in our own land
00:32:52.400
yeah so this is the other aspect of this is that the Washington Redskins franchise is being
00:33:05.400
effectively forced to change their name and and I I I don't know exactly what was going on behind the
00:33:13.120
scenes for a while again I can remember this controversy surfacing is as early as the 1980s it
00:33:19.980
might have even surfaced before then and so it's been around but it's it's obviously been very um
00:33:27.720
marginal uh for a long time and you know just just the fact that the Redskins play in Washington I'm
00:33:35.140
sure there are a ton of you know liberal fans of the the skins uh particularly when they were so
00:33:41.460
successful in the 1980s uh but now it's really coming to a head and so there there was a you know
00:33:47.600
there was a potential Supreme Court case that was never heard uh there was a major media efforts to
00:33:53.800
get them to change and the owner Dan Snyder who is this uh tech billionaire I think uh who is a
00:34:02.700
obviously a terrible owner because the Redskins have sucked for a long time now but um he is a you
00:34:11.260
know a fan himself and he just refuses to back down on this up until uh this weekend a lot happened
00:34:21.060
this weekend this came on July 3rd uh certainly symbolic this is all coming around the 4th of
00:34:27.600
July and Trump's Mount Rushmore speech and all this kind of stuff uh in light of recent events around
00:34:34.500
our country and feedback from our community the Washington Redskins are announcing the team will
00:34:39.680
undergo a thorough review of the team's name this review formalizes the initial discussions the team
00:34:45.680
has been having with the league in recent weeks that's an interesting sentence right there so
00:34:51.360
clearly he's getting pushback from Roger Goodell the NFL commissioner uh Dan Snyder owner of the
00:34:58.880
Redskins stated this process allows the team to take into account not only the proud tradition and history
00:35:03.600
of the franchise but also input from our alumni the organization sponsors the National Football League and
00:35:09.220
local community it is proud to represent on and off the field uh Ron Rivera head coach of the
00:35:14.700
Washington Redskins remarked this issue is of personal importance to me and I look forward to
00:35:19.280
working closely with Dan Snyder to make sure we continue the mission of honoring and supporting
00:35:23.360
Native Americans in our military I believe that Ron Rivera is Hispanic not Native American although I
00:35:29.320
might be wrong about that we believe this review can and will be conducted with the best interest of
00:35:33.640
all in mind um so you had this you know Dan Snyder being just absolutely forthright and in in apparently
00:35:44.200
intractable for a long time saying we will never change the name uh and he was kind of viewed I think wrongly
00:35:53.420
as almost like a nationalist owner right-wing owner uh but if you actually look at what the Redskins
00:36:01.460
have done and and even in terms of drafting players uh they've clearly tried to keep everything in
00:36:09.660
house um and they've also been very eager to um certainly draft black players I mean all the teams are
00:36:19.280
to a certain extent but draft black quarterbacks for instance um Doug Williams uh what is a major
00:36:27.700
figure in the Redskins organization and to be honest he's you know probably a major figure in the fact
00:36:33.300
that they have been mediocre at best and you know absolutely uh crappy at worst uh for a long time in
00:36:44.180
terms of evaluating talent and so on uh so you know within Dan Snyder's intractable nature about the name
00:36:53.860
you know which he loved when he was a kid watching you know all those great teams from the 80s
00:36:59.840
Joe Theismann Doug Williams himself and and others win Super Bowls uh John Riggins uh maybe the last
00:37:07.340
great white running back for what that's worth and um he he was intractable in there but in terms of
00:37:15.900
um what he was doing in in his organization uh he was actually uh I don't know you could arguably
00:37:23.500
maybe the most pro-black owner uh in terms of promoting um black Redskins within his organization
00:37:32.420
uh and there was also some you know some people were saying that the um uh the other teams are
00:37:41.240
going to change their name so Donald Trump actually tweeted out uh this morning uh they name uh they name
00:37:48.000
teams out of strength not weakness but now the Washington Redskins and Cleveland Indians
00:37:53.860
two fabled sports franchises look like they're going to be changing their names in order to be
00:37:58.860
politically correct Indians like Elizabeth Warren must be very angry right now uh I mean I I don't quite
00:38:08.080
know how Indians uh Native Americans and your imitation has improved that was pretty good
00:38:14.440
uh I was muted so you couldn't hear my uh my chocolate uh believe me I've been practicing um
00:38:22.560
it's it's a complicated issue because you know Trump is right to to a to a large extent actually
00:38:31.860
there's a there's a reason why there are no teams named after you know the n-word for instance or
00:38:40.880
the black skins or the Africans or whatever and the reason is that even though Native Americans have
00:38:48.820
had a really terrible time um they've always been respected and romanticized and and and blacks have
00:38:57.480
been romanticized as well but they haven't been romanticized in the same way uh Indians were
00:39:02.680
romanticized as fierce warriors and were pushed off their land and and and killed you know to a very
00:39:09.740
large degree and eventually put on reservations that are kind of you know like outside of society
00:39:15.560
they aren't I mean they have smaller numbers but they aren't really thought of as like a voting
00:39:20.200
block very I don't know if I've ever heard someone say Native American lives matter I mean they they are
00:39:24.940
they are not the political football that Africans are they aren't viewed as this pathetic victim that we
00:39:31.500
must always be kowtowing towards endlessly uh in the way that African Americans have I mean in a way
00:39:37.520
to their detriment they've remained independent and and semi-sovereign in their reservations but Trump
00:39:45.660
is correct in the sense that you know you name a sports franchise after something you like um or just
00:39:52.840
something characteristic about it like the Red Sox or or whatever but you you want to name a team the
00:39:58.480
athletics the Indians um the cowboys the rangers you know you want to name something about something
00:40:07.260
that's good or manly or badass in some way and that is the way that Americans of earlier generations
00:40:14.340
viewed Indians and not the way that they viewed African Americans you're not going to have a team
00:40:19.860
named the slaves or anything like that so he is right and I don't and I don't think even despite the
00:40:26.080
fact that Red Skins is kind of more you know obviously racist in the sense of it's it's not
00:40:31.980
the Chiefs or the Seminoles or the fighting Illini or something like that it is the Red Skins it just
00:40:39.200
feels more brutal uh but there's you know the idea that they would name a team after a racial slur i.e.
00:40:50.380
something you despise is ridiculous of course it was in some way a means of honoring Native Americans
00:40:58.360
and it's now gone out of fashion but you know I I think it's you know I don't think any Native American
00:41:04.500
will benefit from this but it is just a way of engaging in iconoclasm and kind of messing with
00:41:11.200
the heads of white people who like that team you know it's a way of just taking away their toys
00:41:19.580
taking something that they beloved and and and changing it and they'll they'll probably reach
00:41:26.420
a compromise they'll probably name it after say a tribe or something like that which you know is
00:41:31.300
kind of objectively less offensive and more honoring calling them the Seminoles the Cherokee or whatever
00:41:38.480
but at the same time just that that degree of taking away of an icon is the MO and it is
00:41:49.560
the motivation uh behind everything that's happening uh so I I don't know I could go I'll let you
00:41:57.700
respond then I'll go a little bit into the history of the Red Skins because they're an interesting team
00:42:01.640
yeah no I think you raise a a good point and I think it's correct that these were names that were
00:42:09.900
uh designed to honor um Indians right and yeah Red Skins it's probably the most uh sort of offensive
00:42:18.420
of the names because it does refer to a racial characteristic or racial trade of Indians yeah um
00:42:24.020
the hue of their skin as it were um but I you know I in but that you know I don't know I I think there
00:42:31.000
are instances actually where blacks have been honored too in a kind of like manner uh if maybe
00:42:36.360
not in sports name uh in not maybe not in the names of sports teams but um those lawn jockeys for
00:42:45.340
example the black lawn jockeys that are now considered like super racist oh those were actually
00:42:50.180
yeah those were actually designed as a kind of homage or veneration of black jockeys because at one
00:42:55.400
point uh horse racing it was exclusively black jockeys that were racing the horses uh so having
00:43:02.460
a black lawn jockey on your yard was not intended as an a as a way of humiliating blacks it was a kind
00:43:10.660
of it was a uh it was a kind of affectionate I mean you might say it's patronizing but it was a kind of
00:43:17.200
affectionate uh homage to the black jockeys that people were watching um you know who were also like
00:43:24.240
risking their lives especially in that day and who people were fans of that were you know they were
00:43:29.680
betting on the horses as they do today and um so there were fans so it was not designed to denigrate
00:43:35.780
blacks now I can see why people would see it as kind of patronizing or or condescending and certainly
00:43:42.640
reflected the the racial hierarchy of the time but it was the uh intention very much with the names like
00:43:49.320
the redskins or the indians or the chiefs was very similar in the sense that they were honoring them
00:43:54.200
and there were actually I I think in up until the 1980s there was a um I don't know if it was a high
00:44:01.180
school basketball team but in Illinois in Pekin Illinois which I think etymologically is derived
00:44:07.620
from Peking the mascot was uh or the the team name was the c word uh for Asians right um so you know
00:44:19.360
other c word you mean yeah like so yeah the hole in in armor right so it's right no right because I
00:44:28.220
don't you know look I don't think we should be using words like that to you know if I you know
00:44:32.660
if it's offensive to a group I don't yeah we're not we're not going to needlessly antagonize anyone
00:44:37.740
yeah within you know if they are sort of scientific words or they're I think that you can use scientific
00:44:43.740
words right it described groups um but as far as words that are obviously kind of insulting and
00:44:49.240
derogatory and more kind of colloquial words you know I I just think it's kind of unnecessary right
00:44:54.960
yes but um uh in any case uh not to be a total pussy right no no we don't needlessly antagonize
00:45:04.820
anyone here um we are offensive enough so we don't need to we don't need to prove anything
00:45:11.480
um yeah that that that is interesting I mean even something like the state of Oklahoma actually
00:45:19.360
could be translated as red skin it means red man it was a um neologism created by a missionary I believe
00:45:27.120
meaning red man um homo meaning red um interesting yes so I mean this is every I mean people have
00:45:34.660
joked before of like you know that if if the name fighting a lion eye is offensive are you going to
00:45:40.780
change the name of Illinois itself which is you know named after the tribe I mean it can kind of go down
00:45:47.000
this road of infinite grass and we might actually go down that road um who knows but uh which is it
00:45:54.160
also brings up this this kind of other aspect to it which is that it you know it is an erasure of
00:46:01.840
Native American culture I mean even in the kind of like trinkets you find at airports in New Mexico
00:46:09.400
of like turquoise jewelry or and you can find really well done examples of that um around the west
00:46:16.960
certainly out here in Montana um you know the the kind of decor of evoking Native American art in some
00:46:25.280
way in a hotel or restaurant uh or things like or in people's homes um you know and and that you can
00:46:32.940
extend that to team names and things like that I think it they're you know I I do get that red skin
00:46:39.900
is offensive but you know just erasing the Cleveland Indians and so on it it is erasing
00:46:46.960
some kind of memory of these people who pre-existed the white man on the North American continent
00:46:55.900
and defined the continent and kind of defined the mythos particularly of the west
00:47:01.220
and I think that's actually genuinely sad and yeah yeah and it's something we should oppose
00:47:10.020
quite frankly even though the term describes a racial trait there's nothing necessarily derogatory
00:47:16.020
about it right so in other words uh it just it describes a skin hue who cares yeah and again I
00:47:22.780
mean implicitly it's honoring them because they're perceived as these warriors and that becomes the
00:47:28.600
totem of the team in the way that uh in New England uh the Patriots uh you know the Minuteman becomes
00:47:35.560
the totem of that team right nothing right so it's an honoring of a warrior uh a warrior type
00:47:42.300
as a mascot yeah now it is interesting to point out that the Redskins are a racist team
00:47:48.840
at least in their history oh well so uh I I did I I did uh I did look briefly at the uh the wiki though
00:47:58.460
apparently they originated in Boston which is famous for its racist teams yes that residue that
00:48:05.380
beantown residue never they were the Boston Braves and then George Prescott Marshall purchased them
00:48:11.840
or maybe even founded them in Boston and then moved them to Washington eventually but yeah it is funny
00:48:17.380
um the the Red Sox have they were the last team in the Major League Baseball to integrate and um you
00:48:24.840
know it's been kind of legendary even now that black players will will say this and I and I do believe
00:48:31.380
them I don't I don't think they would have any real reason to say this about the team but like
00:48:36.060
the Red Sox still have the most racist fans and so like they'll they'll start if you're playing like
00:48:43.500
right field and you're the visiting team for the Red Sox they're gonna start they'll they'll drop the
00:48:48.200
inward you know um by the first inning let's say that and um but the Redskins were the last team to
00:48:55.480
integrate in the National Football League and until the Dallas Cowboys became a team in 1960
00:49:02.200
uh and then you know 10 years later with the Atlanta Falcons and New Orleans Saints and I guess the
00:49:09.320
Dolphins as well they probably entered in the 60s but anyway the Redskins were the southern franchise so
00:49:15.860
if you were from the south you were a Redskin fan and that obviously is totally changed now but
00:49:21.100
that's how it was and uh Marshall was again he resisted integration um you know up to the
00:49:30.760
final moment um that he could uh by 1962 in which other and and and also when other teams were you
00:49:39.460
know out front in this matter um so I I think there was probably a residue of that I was actually
00:49:44.280
reading um I wrote a long article in football a while ago and I I want to revisit it and kind of
00:49:50.260
expand it but um I was reading this book on the decline of football and they they mentioned that
00:49:57.540
the the Washington Post would troll the Redskins um so they would they would when they were reporting
00:50:06.740
on the teams they would say things like you know the Redskin running back you know failed to be
00:50:12.640
integrated into the other team's defense but escaped to the end zone where he was separate but equal so
00:50:18.720
they they they would kind of use this you know anti-segregationist memes while reporting on this
00:50:25.160
football team in the Washington Post which is you know something and uh yeah so I I don't know I I
00:50:33.040
don't know the degree to which that residue has remained uh I think it probably has I mean the the
00:50:39.660
Redskins were also the team to have the first black quarterback win a Super Bowl Doug Williams so
00:50:44.840
you know it's it's an interesting history uh but I I think that probably does play a part at the very
00:50:52.060
least um with the the attacks on the Redskins yeah I mean that sounds I one thing I wanted because I
00:51:00.700
think it's it's actually a little more complex uh picture in in Boston even though I think that um
00:51:05.720
they definitely has a reputation as a racist uh sports town uh you know at this point it's probably
00:51:13.080
undeserved given how sort of liberal and progressive every you know city has become effectively but um
00:51:19.960
it's uh but you know it's a it's a heavily Irish town so a lot of the fans would have been Irish and
00:51:27.160
the Irish uh I think were were more racist and uh and a lot of it had to do with uh a lot of it was
00:51:33.760
kind of a class thing um you know less so now I mean the Irish are actually a very successful uh ethnic
00:51:39.660
group economically in the country as it turns out um I you know maybe it's not still the case but
00:51:45.320
among white ethnic groups including Jews which will include for this um uh theoretically ostensibly
00:51:52.980
they're the most successful um economically uh ethnic group in America um now this is information from
00:52:01.460
10 to 15 years ago so maybe that's changed though I don't know imagine I can't imagine why or how it
00:52:07.260
would have changed and also whites in general have become so integrated as a group that it's probably
00:52:14.020
harder to kind of uh make a reading like that um but uh that's just one thing I would point out but
00:52:20.160
the um in any case is as it concerns sports I read Auerbach um who was the Jewish um uh coach of the uh
00:52:30.480
Celtics yeah the Jewish owner coach of the Celtics he uh was um very progressive in integrating um
00:52:38.820
uh the Celtic basketball team um yeah but then they were kind of known as the white team
00:52:44.500
in the bird era as well it's it's always kind of murky oh sure yeah yeah so in yeah and again that
00:52:51.580
might you know I don't I and again I think that there may be some latent elements still there in
00:52:56.680
Boston um because Boston actually remains a relatively white city um and I ostensibly there
00:53:03.440
was an old joke among uh you know the brahmin the the wasps in Boston that um though they hated the
00:53:12.280
Irish uh at least the Irish kept the city white was one of the was one of the sort of uh aphorisms
00:53:18.920
that developed ostensibly among the brahmin's right well we'll put a bookmark in here