Shut Up and Play

Last week Daryl Morey, GM of the NBA Houston Rockets, tweeted his support of the pro-democracy protestors in Hong Kong.  That didn’t go over very well in some places.  Various Chinese businesses cut their ties to the team, and the NBA apologized profusely, in Mandarin, no less.  (The NBA subsequently tried to walk back the apology without offending anyone.)  A chastened Morey then deleted his tweet and offered his own apology.   

As you might expect, a whole lot of people are upset with these apologies, which Sally Jenkins of the Washington Post finds kind of funny, or sad, depending on your perspective.  In a column the Tribune ran yesterday, Jenkins noted all the American businesses that have made a habit out of looking the other way when it comes to Chinese behavior.  If you don’t like how the NBA is acting, wrote Jenkins, “Then you [should also] have a problem with hundreds of U.S. companies.”

There’s also an element of “people who live in glass houses” to apply here.  A country that gets bent out of shape when a handful of NFL players kneel during the National Anthem shouldn’t be all that surprised, or upset, when someone else does likewise.  After all, imitation is the highest form of flattery.