‘Worldwide leader’ in PC silliness
ESPN buckles by removing football announcer
If you’ve got tickets to the Lou Grant TV show retrospective and Jackson 5 reunion in Sherman Oaks, Calif., this weekend, I’ve got some bad news ...
Yes, the headlines are true: Confederate General Robert E. Lee was, in fact, an AsianAmerican sportscaster.
I’m kidding, of course. The real, but not any less ridiculous, story is that ESPN dumped the regularly-scheduled sportscaster from its coverage of the University of Virginia’s first football game because his name is Robert Lee. Mr. Lee will instead be covering a different game on Saturday, in order to avoid... well, yes. That’s the question: What problem is it that ESPN is trying to solve?
If this were an indictment of our terrible public education system, I would be more sympathetic. According to at least one survey, a quarter of high school students don’t know who fought in the Civil War (Hint: It wasn’t the Starks vs. the Lannisters). But ESPN laid out its motive clearly:
“We collectively made the decision with Robert to switch games as the tragic events in Charlottesville were unfolding, simply because of the coincidence of his name,” ESPN said in a statement. “In that moment it felt right to all parties.” Key word? “Felt.”
Did it make any sense at all? Not a bit. Is there a rational, logical case to be made? Nope. But sense and logic are so passé. In modern, liberal America all that matters are the “feels.” How does it feel when you’re watching a football game and hear “Now let’s go to Robert Lee in the booth.”
If you, like a normal person, feel nothing, you’re irrelevant. But if your reaction is “Did he say Robert Lee? I feel micro-aggressed! And he’s in a ‘booth.’ Like John Wilkes Booth? Where’s my safe space?!” Then ESPN is all about you.
How fantastic it might have been to be a fly on the wall when whatever millennial moron in ESPN management called the staff meeting for this. Can you imagine being a sane person, sitting in that room, listening to that conversation?
ESPN IDIOT #1: “Maybe we could call him ‘Bobby’ during the broadcast?
ESPN IDIOT #2: “You mean like ‘Ricky Bobby?’ The NASCAR guy? That’s even worse!”
If you’re surprised at the level of stupid achieved in the pursuit of PC sensitivity, you haven’t been paying attention. The New York subway system is, right now spending money it doesn’t have, to replace some decorative tiles that remind some people of the design of the Confederate flag. The fact that there is no connection whatsoever between the Army of Northern Virginia and the mass transit system of New York City is irrelevant. Some people claim to feel icky, so the money gets spent.
A few years ago at SUNY Albany, students planned a picnic in honor of Jackie Robinson breaking MLB’s color barrier. Some of their fellow students had been told — falsely — that the word “picnic” comes from an anti-black slur and was code for “lynching.” They demanded the picnic be cancelled. When their error was explained, these students didn’t care. “It still feels bigoted” was their message. So the picnic was changed to an “outing.” At which time a gay student leader complained ...
Closer to home, Smith College President Kathleen McCartney was forced to apologize for tweeting out the phrase “all lives matter,” because some of her students felt that saying “all lives matter” somehow implied that black lives didn’t matter, because … well, there is no “because.” It’s all about the “feels.”
OK, then. Have we asked the folks living in Lee, Mass., (“Gateway to the Berkshires”) how they feel? Or the residents of (Jefferson?) Davis Square in Somerville? Once you start down this road (Stonewall Road, Lexington, Mass.), where does it end?
Will ESPN begin every broadcast day with the “Two Minutes Hate” for Nathan Bedford Forrest?
Wait…did you say “Bedford?”