Can someone explain why Morant is in trouble - what's wrong with having a legal gun

[Ainosterhaspie]

Exactly. If all you're doing is showing that you actually use firearms to kill living beings, then it's acceptable. Meanwhile, if you never fire the gun or kill anything, it's a different matter altogether and requires a lengthy suspension.

Could it be that hunting is normalized in our society by white Americans (who make up the owner class, NBA administration, and core fan base); and not thought of as some sick, sadistic activity done by psychopaths who enjoy killing for fun -- which it could just as easily be framed as (at least by non-whites where hunting is less popular).

Hunting is common with almost all races and cultures. It certainly isn't a whites only thing. It is also a useful and in some places necessary activity. A good example is feral hog populations that can be dangerous and also cause major ecological damage.

[Goldrush25]

It's an agenda - there's a big push to stigmatize guns, and the NBA is shamelessly being a part of it.

As usual, 3ball is one of the smartest posters on this board.

There are always agendas behind any company's culture.

The primary agenda for most corporations is making money. From a purely financial standpoint there is no incentive for the NBA to promote players with guns. Advertisers don't want to be anywhere near that in these times.

If anyone can point out an financial upside to allowing Ja to run around flashing guns I'd love to hear it. How does the NBA monetize that?

[3ba11]

Whites have cultures like cowboy, motorcycle, hunting and more that glorify and brandish guns, but blacks aren't allowed to like guns.. Maybe if you've kissed enough ass, but no one with black hair styles (cornrow, dreds, braids, etc) is allowed or they'll lose their career like Morant

[Goldrush25]

Whites have cultures like cowboy, motorcycle, hunting
and more that glorify and brandish guns, but blacks aren't allowed to like guns.. Maybe if you've kissed enough ass but no one with black hair styles (cornrow, dress, braids, etc) is allowed or they'll lose their career like Morant

It's not just guns. NBA players are prohibited from engaging in dangerous, high-risk activities like skiing, motorcycle riding, sky diving. Small price to pay for being able to make generational money.

Ja is not entitled to play in the NBA. It's a privilege. Everyone that has a career is beholden to specific restrictions within that career, it's part of being an adult. The league is the one issuing the checks, they don't have to bend to anyone's choices that don't benefit the NBA's bottom line.

[3ba11]

It's not just guns. NBA players are prohibited from engaging in dangerous, high-risk activities like skiing, motorcycle riding, sky diving. Small price to pay for being able to make generational money.

Ja is not entitled to play in the NBA. It's a privilege. Everyone that has a career is beholden to specific restrictions within that career, it's part of being an adult. The league is the one issuing the checks, they don't have to bend to anyone's choices that don't benefit the NBA's bottom line.

This thread has shown pictures of guys like Chris Kaman, Lebron and Draymond brandishing guns.. Why weren't they punished and chastised like Morant is?

It's because Morant hasn't become white or corporate enough, so his culture is perceived as "thuggish" and "gangster", which are racial stereotypes.. Morant isn't a criminal - there's no reason to chastise him for brandishing a gun anymore than Kaman or Draymond were chastised and punished.

So the NBA doesn't care if you brandish a gun because Lebron and Draymond did it - they just don't want the NBA being perceived as having too much hip-hop culture

The preferential treatment extends beyond the gun issue, aka why can't high school kids jump to the NBA? Baseball players, golfers and tennis players can win the French Open at 17 years old.. So it's a racial thing that goes far beyond the gun issue

[Goldrush25]

This thread has shown pictures of guys like Chris Kaman, Lebron and Draymond brandishing guns.. Why weren't they punished and chastised like Morant is?

It's because Morant hasn't become white or corporate enough, so his culture is perceived as "thuggish" and "gangster", which are racial stereotypes.. Morant isn't a criminal - there's no reason to chastise him for brandishing a gun anymore than Kaman or Draymond were chastised and punished.

So the NBA doesn't care if you brandish a gun because Lebron and Draymond did it - they just don't want the NBA being perceived as having too much hip-hop culture

The preferential treatment extends beyond the gun issue, aka why can't high school kids jump to the NBA? Baseball players, golfers and tennis players can win the French Open at 17 years old.. So it's a racial thing that goes far beyond the gun issue

Perhaps you're right. The question I have is, so what if that is their preference?

Their decisions are based on what is in the best interest of maximizing their bottom line. What is the financial payoff to allow Ja to do whatever he pleases with respect to guns in clubs and his IG Live videos? In the business world decisions are pretty much binary. Is this in the best interest of business or not? If it is not, what is the point of allowing it?

To me it seems like your ire is misplaced. The NBA has masters, and those masters are advertisers and the media companies that distribute their products. Those advertisers and media companies have masters too called consumers. The opinions of those entities matter too, so maybe take it up with Disney, McDonalds, Coca-Cola, Verizon, etc that they don't want their businesses associated with a certain perception.

Perception is everything in business. If the perception of your product isn't well received, then that costs you money. The NBA is in the basketball business, not the hip-hop video business. Their goal is to put on the best product that they can on TV. I think your argument is that it's unfair that the perception of Ja is what it is, but it's not the NBA's job or obligation to change the perception of hip-hop culture.

How does the off-court attention that Ja has recently generated serve that goal of maximizing financial revenue? If Ja wants to make rap videos he should do that. I think the NBA is perfectly within its rights to determine what they will and won't allow on their dime.

[PeroAntic]

Whites have cultures like cowboy, motorcycle, hunting and more that glorify and brandish guns, but blacks aren't allowed to like guns.. Maybe if you've kissed enough ass, but no one with black hair styles (cornrow, dreds, braids, etc) is allowed or they'll lose their career like Morant

oh stfu. the kid is a complete moron, the fact that so are white rednecks/hunters/whatever doesn't make him any less of a moron.

[3ba11]

Perhaps you're right. The question I have is, so what if that is their preference?

Their decisions are based on what is in the best interest of maximizing their bottom line. What is the financial payoff to allow Ja to do whatever he pleases with respect to guns in clubs and his IG Live videos? In the business world decisions are pretty much binary. Is this in the best interest of business or not? If it is not, what is the point of allowing it?

To me it seems like your ire is misplaced. The NBA has masters, and those masters are advertisers and the media companies that distribute their products. Those advertisers and media companies have masters too called consumers. The opinions of those entities matter too, so maybe take it up with Disney, McDonalds, Coca-Cola, Verizon, etc that they don't want their businesses associated with a certain perception.

Perception is everything in business. If the perception of your product isn't well received, then that costs you money. The NBA is in the basketball business, not the hip-hop video business. Their goal is putting on the best product that they can on TV.

How does the off-court attention that Ja has recently generated serve that goal? If Ja wants to make rap videos he should do that. I think the NBA is perfectly within its rights to determine what they will and won't allow on their dime.

Great products sell themselves and the NBA makes tons of money regardless of what they do like when they turned people off with the woke bubble stuff - the NBA didn't care that they might lose money - it was about principle and they still made tons of money.

A tiny proportion of people saw Morant's IG live and the only reason everyone knows about it is because the NBA decided to punish him and bring attention to it.

And this idea that it's all about "perception" - well then people should change their racist perception.. i.e. unlike the cowboy, motorcyle, gun range or hunting cultures that are allowed to brag and brandish guns, guys like Morant aren't allowed to enjoy their culture of saggy pants and the occasional cool pose with a gun and sunglasses because people have a racist perception of it.. So it all comes back to the racial issue.

[Goldrush25]

Great products sell themselves and the NBA makes tons of money regardless of what they do like when they turned people off with the woke bubble stuff - the NBA didn't care that they might lose money - it was about principle and they still made tons of money.

A tiny proportion of people saw Morant's IG live and the only reason everyone knows about it is because the NBA decided to punish him and bring attention to it.

And this idea that it's all about "perception" - well then people should change their racist perception.. i.e. unlike the cowboy, motorcyle, gun range or hunting cultures that are allowed to brag and brandish guns, guys like Morant aren't allowed to enjoy their culture of saggy pants and the occasional cool pose with a gun and sunglasses because people have a racist perception of it.. So it all comes back to the racial issue.

A great product sells itself to an extent but that only gets you to a limited demographic that is devoted to that product. To extend beyond that you have to appeal to other demographics. If you want to promote your product to the highest number of people and have a global product, then you have to make a product that is palatable to a wider range of people. A lot of the people that said they stopped watching the NBA during that 2020 period were not in the NBA's most profitable demographic in the first place. They know exactly who watches and spends the most on their product, and they can see which way the culture tide is headed. And athletes toting guns is not a part of the tide. With all of these shootings in the news you honestly think the NBA wants anything to do with guns at all? Makes no sense for them to go against the tide for no reason. Perhaps if people that like Ja's antics spent more money on the product things would be different.

You can call it racist if you want but there are a lot of minorities that don't want to be associated with that culture either, myself included.

Perception isn't anything that people think about consciously. Making quick judgments about people is hard-wired into us as humans, for survival. That's never going to change. In prehistoric times we had to be able to make quick judgments about our surroundings or a sabertooth tiger would kill us. If I see someone with low-hanging pants and a blue bandana on, I'm going to have a gut perception of that person. I'm not going to assume he's a hedge fund manager. I think a lot of other black people are going to have that same perception of that guy. I don't know how realistic it is for people's perceptions to just magically change all of a sudden when we still have people today that reinforce that perception.

You ever see that Dave Chappelle bit about the woman wearing tight clothes at the club that says that just because I wear this doesn't mean I'm a hooker. Dave says that's true, but you're wearing a hooker's uniform. I'm paraphrasing but that's the premise of the joke. So yeah Ja isn't a criminal for showing up in videos flashing guns, but that's a criminal's uniform, isn't it? You're complaining about realities that aren't going to change any time soon, and they certainly are not limited to white people making judgments about black people.

[Norcaliblunt]

2nd amendment all the way.


Gun control is racist. Think about it.