FLAMES-OILERS
Fans of decency should be sickened
because I’m just so numb to the fact that it happens so much that I’m just so good at ignoring it. Which shouldn’t be the case at all.”
Indeed, just because Kadri has built a survival mechanism that’s made him adept at blocking out racism doesn’t mean racism ought to be expected, let alone accepted.
Just because it doesn’t seem to faze him doesn’t mean it shouldn’t faze us. St. Louis-area police took the threats seriously enough that extra security was brought in at the arena and the Avalanche’s team hotel. And there are jurisdictions on this planet where authorities pursue online trolls who lob racist vulgarities at athletes.
Authorities in Britain have been known to arrest and prosecute those who send racist messages to soccer stars.
As it was, the Blues organization didn’t exactly condemn the disgusting barrage that members of its fan base aimed at Kadri. To the contrary, St. Louis coach Craig Berube issued a terse “no comment,” when he was asked about it. As much as it’s understood that the Blues would love nothing better than to see Kadri feel pain on the ice for taking out their goaltender — Binnington didn’t play in Game 4, after which Blues veteran David Perron was fined $5,000 for landing an after-the-whistle cross check on Kadri — it should have been incumbent upon Berube to take a moment to condemn Islamophobia and criminal threats.
As it was, it wasn’t until Tuesday afternoon that the NHL players’ association sent out a tweet condemning “the hateful and offensive comments directed toward Nazem Kadri and his family.”
Maybe it’s no wonder that more than a few BIPOC NHL players have long expressed their frustration with the way the league has approached issues of race. In an interview earlier this season Kadri said he found it “disappointing” that the Hockey Diversity Alliance, the player-activist group that includes Kadri, cut ties with the league not long after the organization was formed, dismissing the league’s involvement in their cause as “performative” public relations that avoided difficult conversations about real action.
“You’d think the league would want to rally around its very few BIPOC players that have made it and have seen first hand what it takes to get to this position, having been through all these obstacles,” Kadri said. “We’re going to try to not to take that personally.”
Sadly, it’s not so much personal as it is institutional.
That Kadri has performed so masterfully despite it all — if you’re a fan of the Maple Leafs, it’s enough to make you sad he’s no longer on your team.
If you’re a fan of human decency, it’s enough to make you sick that Kadri and his family are still forced to confront such a scourge with insufficient support.
It’s no wonder that more than a few BIPOC NHL players have long expressed their frustration with the way the league has approached issues of race