Furor Over Spain's Controversial Slit-Eye Basketball Photo

[YouJustGotSUNSD]

Wow guys.

 

[Russ Smith]

Sensativity training sounds interesting may be humorous too.

Just to be clear the picture wasn't taken in China, it was taken in Spain before they even left. It's a billboard that's apparently being prominently displayed in Spain. Nobody outside of Spain knew until some British paper picked it up and ran it and said it was insensitive.

So if they did it to be a joke they could share with the Chinese, they did a poor job of marketing it only displaying it in Spain.

I don't think it's a massive deal(I posted the same thing on the World Sports board) but I do think it's more evidence that in large groups people often lose their "this is stupid" filter. In a small group it's likely someone would have said this is stupid and possibly offensive and refused, in a large group nobody wants to be the troublemaker so they wait for someone else to speak up.

The Mob Rules mentality at work.

 

[High Stakes]

who cares?!!!! i mean really, this is not that big a deal, racism exists and the world has become to liberal, this has gotton more attention than the russian/georgia conflict....i mean would people really care if we had the olympics in phoenix and the spanish team all came to town in the back of a pickup truck....just saying

 

[Joe L]

who cares?!!!! i mean really, this is not that big a deal, racism exists and the world has become to liberal, this has gotton more attention than the russian/georgia conflict....i mean would people really care if we had the olympics in phoenix and the spanish team all came to town in the back of a pickup truck....just saying

Really? You must not watch any news channels cause that is all I've been hearing about in all of cable news in the last few days. I have yet to hear about the Spanish team's story except for the web & ESPN.

 

[haverford]

who cares?!!!! i mean really, this is not that big a deal, racism exists and the world has become to liberal, this has gotton more attention than the russian/georgia conflict....i mean would people really care if we had the olympics in phoenix and the spanish team all came to town in the back of a pickup truck....just saying

LOL--yes, of course, "to liberal." This "liberality" you refer to used to be called "politeness," or being "self-aware." Or "caring" about "other people" who are "different." Yeah, what a crazy world we live in now. Ruined.

Every poster here who has expressed some degree of discomfort or disagreement with the Spanish team's photograph has been careful to keep things in scale. It is the "get over it" crowd who have been eager to dismiss them by exaggerating the terms of the complaint.

 

[BC867]

So that is the whole light-hearted joke right there. Nothing else meant. IMO

I respect your opinion, but there is another side to it.

Mocking a whole group of people or using sarcasm are both usually followed by, "What's the matter? Can't they take a joke?"

We all know it's not really a joke. It's covering up insults as supposed humor to escape responsibility.

These are issues that are never going to be resolved.
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Although I've lived in Phoenix for thirty years, I was raised in New Jersey. And I joined in with sarcasm, which was prevalent there.

Ultimately, I reported to a company executive who had his Doctorate in Industrial Psychology.

He gave me advice that I immediately took to heart. He said, "Sarcasm is a coward's way of insulting." I forced myself to lose the habit.

It's one of the many reasons I was determined to leave the East Coast and relocate 2300 miles away to the Valley of the Sun.

 

[Shzm13]

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This racist too?

 

[WuRaider]

The Spanish Tennis Team didn't want to feel left out:

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[Mulli]

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[WuRaider]

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What an "affectionate gesture"

 

[shazaam6]

The Spanish Tennis Team didn't want to feel left out:

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They are flashin the China Olympics gang sign.

 

[CardsFan88]

The thing I found funny in all of this, is how poor other countries are at dealing with our sort of gaffes. Welcome to our world spain.

(as a sidenote this isn't a sign of the world being too liberal, it's basically nothing doing with political ideology, but I found that comment odd, when we're in a 30-40 year phase of ultra conservatism..one might want to check the conservatives in power in europe, and then realize that those in power, and those who point out the power..the media..have been very, very conservative the past generation).

I swear some people think up is down, and down is up..hopefully not because other people tell them, but regardless of how it got that way, people are thinking down is up, because somehow the people that have been in power for a generation here, and for a few years to a decade or so in most of europe, and the media consolidated into a mainly conservative model throwing real news out the window, has gotten people to still think that it's all the people who don't have the power's fault. Amazing, truly amazing) If people wanted to claim things got too liberal, even if the facts do not support that claim, they would have to go back to the 1960's to find a time where liberals were in power enough to create such problems (which were lies and exaggerations then and are even more ludicrous now). The fact remains that what people claim to be one person's fault is really just a bait and switch. Select individuals that some people support cause the problems, then blame it on their opposition, and some people just eat it up. Amazing.

Racism does exist, and just because it's there doesn't means it's supposed to be there, nor something we should accept as human nature. Acting in ways like this photo, is a product of a fundamental problem in the world, not the cause of it. The overreaching aspects of this, if left unchecked, can be a single spoke in the wheels of war/strife/suffering.

Remember that the Olympics basic tenant was to bring different people together, and to settle differences in a non-combative way. So if looked at in this context, it's spitting on that tradition, laid out by those so called primitive people thousands of years ago. Who looks more primitive now? Well Pau Gasol and his teammates.

As people we strive to be better than the previous generation. That's the point, to progress, to become better, to take what we say, 'hey this can be better', and make it better, because it should be better, and it has to be better.

Through a hundred generations or so we've gone from Egyptian, Greek, and Roman times, to now. We can boast a significant increase in our technology since then, just like Egyptians, greeks, and romans could over pre civilized times, however we shouldn't be riding on our big white horse, as we're barely out of the jungle civilly. We're much more advanced technologically, but not too far down the road in terms of being civil.

We shouldn't measure our civility on technological advances. However it seems to be the easy way to mark advances, and ignore civility advances to the point it takes generations to get real change done, and then change only seems to advance in a perfect storm, when everything is just right. (And usually after much pain shows us our idiocy)

This world still contains the following aspects, and these aspects have a large portion of people either believing that they shouldn't be solved, or believing they cannot be solved.

Those aspects are; racism, poverty, and greed. (among others). We can build a computer, send people to the moon and satellite to other worlds, even create an invisibility cloak, but cannot solve racism, poverty, and greed. Sad, as it's the most important aspect to solve, beyond 300 mpg cars and the like, because it overreaches into everything, and not solving them can create such problems that 20 dollar a gallon gas would seem like a cakewalk, but our civility has barely advanced because of no profit motive. It also doesn't help that most people are so busy, either working for a mortgage, or walking 20 miles for water everyday, that people don't have the time and energy to change things. But remember the context, this event is merely one that involves the media of the world all focused on this..it's merely one example of a problem manifesting itself for the billionth time that happened to occur in the spotlight. That's why it's being talked about, not because in of itself, it is so horrible.

There are no universal laws mandating racism, poverty, and greed, to be, only the human race has decided it (in it's collective non-collaborative subconscious that acts like a mob mentality) isn't a high enough priority to weed these huge problems out. If there are, and there probably will be major wars fought over the next hundred or so years, just like most wars in the past, it'll be a derivative of a combination of those three things....allowing for racism, letting poverty occur, and let greed overtake humankind.

You conquer these three things, and you are halfway home to creating a civilized society. Then come the troubles of sustainability in terms of energy, water, land (space), topsoil, and of course climate change. Of course this a post, so these lists aren't everything.

You see if we don't conquer the greed, racism, and poverty that grip this world, those reasons will be exploited by those wishing to control the water, energy, land, topsoil as a means to prevent certain groups of people from having access to them..and conversely those that are kept down in such ways, via history, lash back at those who use such fraudulent reasons to deny them access to such resources or basic rights.

Wars launched from both sides simply because we aren't doing whats right, and what we know is right, but have no mechanism to change things on a worldwide level.

It's slow and there's ebb and flows, progressions and regressions that occur not just through generations, but also nations, at different paces and different directions. One nation can be progressing greatly, but it's neighbor can be regressing greatly. Somehow the human race as time goes on progresses, but usually at a very high cost that if brighter more heartfelt minded people prevailed, needn't occur. (Not to mention sometimes repeating the same mistake 10 times before actually learning)

But that cost might become too high someday, all over a few problems, that we know need to be solved.

It's not any sort of ideological viewpoint, it's a viewpoint humankind needs to adopt if it wishes to survive in an age where one person, who isn't a king, can kill millions (and the number of those that can grows by a couple each decade), or can shut down the power or internet for a country, or poison the water table of millions, or simply look the other way as starvation and genocide kills millions.

I remember reading about why so many african american serviceman settled in france and europe after the war ended. The reason.....because europeans did not hold racist ideas like we the americans did/do. Imagine being an african american who couldn't eat in the same place, sleep, drink from the same water fountain, use the same restroom, etc, etc, and were drafted into the service, here in the land of the free, yet in france and other euro countries they could eat at the same place, use the same fountain, and were treated as relative equals. Sweet deal, given the context and when compared and contrasted. Treated like nothing in alabama, treated like a king in europe. So the question must be asked, why is there now that type of racism flourishing in europe? Propaganda, and ignorance.

Now for this situation, the reason I posted was the following thought. The lie they came up with, that they were complimenting the Chinese, looks like a horrible attempt by a person busted for such racism here in America in the 1980's. Geez we didn't buy it then, so it'll be interesting to see if the world buys it now. I sure hope they don't.

I don't believe the NBA should punish Gasol or others. I think if any action is taken, it needs to be taken in a way that affects, and that is within the olympic sphere. I'm also a reasonable person, if the world, media, and fans hound and boo them throughout the olympics, that might be enough of an egg on their faces as punishment. If not as someone pointed out that Madrid wanted the 2016 summer games...this might be taken into account, and maybe should.

In the grand scheme of things slanting your eyes out is not a major deal, however allowing it to occur, and not condemning it, can and would foster racist attitudes, gestures, and deeds, rolling that dice in a way where sometimes what comes of it is nothing, but throw enough dice, and you'll get snake eyes (in this context 'snake eyes' would be a bad thing). It's simple human nature. If slanting your eyes is ok in a photo, something a bit worse would be ok a few months later. It could take years, even generations, but eventually allowing such backsliding creates a situation which builds steam and feeds off each other, and something bad happens eventually.

It only need take a smart person to pull those strings for their favor, and we as humans always have somebody out there that will. Seeing how the last major world war ended 63 years ago, we are already generations out, and in many ways we as a human race have backslid. We have forgotten some of the things that protected or enlightened us afterwards. How far along are we, hard to tell, but I would say a significant distance. Otherwise we wouldn't be having wars launched during the start of the olympics, and athletes slanting their eyes, for an event that's main goal is just the opposite and was made to bring us together.

For the trillionth time and probably not the last, one of the billion ways it currently can, history has repeated itself. How many more of those billion ways do we want to have repeated?

So is it a big deal? Yes and no. There are very few black and white answers in this world, it's shades of gray, and those that have the desire to, can decipher those shades, and can find the truth of a situation. It's the duality or plurality of man. Like in "Full Metal Jacket", Write 'Born to kill on your helmet, and wear a peace symbol on your chest'. It's complicated, but we better as a human race figure it out before our technology figures it out for us.

Yep somehow I related Pau Gasol slanting his eyes with the potential fate of the world, lol. But the truth is in there. Hopefully we can overcome, but things like this show we still have a long, long ways to go, and it probably won't be solved in our lifetimes.

So here is the obligatory shame on Pau Gasol and the Spanish basketball team. When did Spain, become such a pain?

 

[BC867]

Yep somehow I related Pau Gasol slanting his eyes with the potential fate of the world, lol. But the truth is in there. Hopefully we can overcome, but things like this show we still have a long, long ways to go, and it probably won't be solved in our lifetimes.

Good post, CardsFan88.

Or, as the saying goes: There is no gravity, the earth sucks.

 

[YouJustGotSUNSD]

You actually read that?

 

[jandaman]

Its not meant to be offensive.

But it is...

No harm intended, but harm did occur...

 

[msdundee]

You actually read that?

I decided to wait for the movie.

 

[CardsFan88]

lol coming to a theater near you

A movie about an important subject that affects everyone, but no one sees because they can't be bothered to watch it because it's 4 hours long.

It's all good if people don't read long posts or messages, but one thing that I always find funny is when people say things are too long as that in of itself disqualifies it.

It's funny to think that our actions today will influence whether or not we set up the world in a way that our great great grandchildren will die in wars because we couldn't get our act right 20-50-100-200 years earlier. I always try to see the bigger picture.

Generally speaking the most important things in one's life doesn't fit on a bumper sticker. Those that wait for those short statements will be uninformed, and generally then tend to base their ideas around the propaganda they do receive because it sounds good, rhymes, and fits on a bumper sticker. Then when they use those words, those in the know will either go, man what ignorance, and those that put out those words is, we got another sucker actually believing what we say.

Not saying anyone here does that, but taking time out of one's life to write a post about how long something is, rather than either read it or not read it, is rather funny.

It does make me think that the average person wants their cake and eat it too. I want a solution, but it has to be one word. The problems of the world, or even a single problem within the world, can rarely be sufficiently addressed in a short fashion. If people think that the solution to racism will be found on a bumper sticker, I challenge them to address all the complexities on it. It's physically impossible, unless they write it with atom sized letters.Even then the success wouldn't be that it was put on atom sized letters, but that a solution was found.

But that's what everyone wants, short and sweet, so it won't get done. Why aren't these problems solved, we might have found a big reason why. No one wants to do the leg work. It's the plague I tell ya.

But I understand your position, it is a rather long post, but posting about how long it is, again is rather silly. I always give an abundance of info, rather than a little, and don't get upset if they aren't read, but generally speaking if people take the time, and aren't all lazy about it, they'll enjoy it, or even if they disagree, will respect it.

One of the things that happens when you postulate something, is you have to give background info, put it in a context, address the potential direct, and indirect forces that affect the situation, etc, etc. Things get rather complex.

So when the Spanish team does a racist slant eyed picture, and lies about the reasoning behind it, someone addresses incorrectly that it's a certain groups viewpoint that's causing it, all wrapped around a situation where the opposite is supposed to happen by the Olympic's very nature, among other things, makes it complex if one wants to analyze and absorb the pertinent info and apply it to their everyday lives. Not everyone has to be interested in such things to get things done, but if few are interested, no one should be surprised if nothing gets done. From where I sit, not much has been done, and will not be a fool in thinking things will get done. I'll just champion ideas that I feel are easily deciphered for others and take the 'joshing', I've never expected anything else. My first words (plural by a large margin) dropped jaws, and they have never in my life stopped dropping close to thirty years later. It might be an annoyance to some who don't want to take the time, but those who care and do take the time, would see it as a very great strength. Whether we like it or not, Spain's racist action is indicative of a systemic problem with far reaching consequences, I won't bury my head in the sand because I'm not an ostrich. The first step in the solution of a problem is recognizing there is one. If I can write something to help others decipher something because my viewpoint is one that is similar but different than theirs, maybe comes from a slightly different angle, I will. Nothing good in this life is ever easy. To end I'll use a quote from a great, silly movie, Idiocracy. 'Either lead, follow, or get out of the way'. lol Whoops too long.

 

[cly2tw]

I bet the following conversation came about at that photo shot session.

A: we are gonna to China for Olympics, isn't that exciting and exotic!

B: China? Our readers don't know nothing what's it.

C: Isn't China where billions of slit-eyed figures swarming around?

D: That's an idea. Let's do the slit eyes for everybody to know where we are going.


So, I believe Gasol and co didn't mean anything bad or had the intention to insult. Just some subconscious stereotype and discriminative common sense (among many Spanish and European people) crept up in that moment, and nobody was sensitive enough to raise concerns.

 

[mojorizen7]

I bet the following conversation came about at that photo shot session.

A: we are gonna to China for Olympics, isn't that exciting and exotic!

B: China? Our readers don't know nothing what's it.

C: Isn't China where billions of slit-eyed figures swarming around?

D: That's an idea. Let's do the slit eyes for everybody to know where we are going.


So, I believe Gasol and co didn't mean anything bad or had the intention to insult. Just some subconscious stereotype and discriminative common sense (among many Spanish and European people) crept up in that moment, and nobody was sensitive enough to raise concerns.

substitute:smart. Or as in many cases of off-handed racism......lack of common sense.

 

[Irish]

Since I'm accused to writing long posts (I plead guilty), I am well aware that they don't go over really well with some readers. My recommendation is that if you have something worthy of a long post, assume people with skim so use bullet points when possible. If you are making a series of related but separate points, use subtitles. Remember, this is not a blog.