Freedom of Expression in Sports

There has long existed a double standard in sports, though the extent of this hypocrisy is only now become clear. After another loss to the hapless Atlanta Falcons in the NFL’s Monday night game earlier this month, five Falcons players were fined for wearing shirts and decals the league found inappropriate. The displays the players brought to field were in support for ex-Falcons quarterback Michael Vick. The franchise quarterback was sentenced last month to a shade under two years for his involvement in a dog fighting ring.

 

Five of his teammates were fined a combined $45,000. Receiver Roddy White wore a shirt underneath his jersey saying “Free Mike Vick” while the others sported black eye strips displaying Vick’s number and initials. Fellow receiver Joe Horn received a $7,500 fine simply for lifting White’s jersey.

 

That Vick received more jail time, as a first offender, than other, more serious offenders who have harmed actual humans – such as assault, drunk driving, etc – is not the issue. Nor is it issue that the restitution the court ordered Vick to pay the dogs is more, per canine, than any war veteran receives upon his return home from Iraq.

 

No, I’ll leave those arguments on the table and deal with just this one. Why aren’t players, in any professional sports organization, allowed to freely express themselves as other, regular citizens are able.

 

The NFL’s official explanation for the fine was:

 “NFL rules prohibit clothing that advertises any product other than a direct sponsor.” 

The rule, it should be said, is ironclad. Chicago Bears linebacker Brian Urlacher was fined $100,000 for wearing a nonapproved hat during Super Bowl weekend last year, and Dallas Cowboys receiver Terrell Owens was fined in the same season for waving a towel inscribed with his initials.

 

This rule, according to the NFL, does extends as far as personal messages. Several years ago, knock-around QB Jake Plummer was fined for placing on his helmet the number of deceased safety Pat Tillman, who left his team and six-figure contract to serve the United States in Afghanistan.

 

Athletes, due to their perceived luck and the privilege of occupying such a prestigious position, are subjected to draconian rules and regulations in their respective leagues – and we, as fans, seem to welcome it.

 

The first thing athletes are forced to abandon, as they are assimilated into the league, is their freedom of speech. In the NBA, players are forbidden from wearing certain articles of clothing deemed too “urban” by league headquarters. Fines are thrown out for speaking ill of referees or calling attention to the vaguely racist tendencies of Commissioner David Stern. For example, Atlanta Hawks forward Al Horford received the same punishment for intentionally hitting Toronto Raptors guard T.J. Ford, a foul which sent Ford to the hospital, than the NBA would level if someone were to suggest the referees tried to sway the outcome of a game. Besides, we now know the notion of referees fixing games is not as outrageous as the league wants us to think.

 

It should be said that Horford says his foul on Ford was unintentional, something Ford himself has backed up. But, the point remains: leagues fear so much the free expression of their players that they are willing to impose a more severe punishment on a rabble rouser than someone who intentionally smacks another player in order to save a basket.

 Somebody smarter than me must know why this is.

Cop cars

 After reading this story, I’ve become conflicted. Apparently car makers are considering placing blood alcohol monitors in new cars so that they will not start if the driver is impaired. I actually find this part pretty cool:

One of them uses sensors embedded in the steering wheel or gear shift that can measure blood-alcohol levels through the skin — much as an exercise machine can measure a heart rate.

Now, on one hand, people killed by drunk drivers would diminish drastically. The numbers wouldn’t fall right away as not everyone will buy new cars the first year the technology is introduced. But eventually, hopefully by the time my future kids are learning the ropes of the road, alcohol related road deaths would be a thing of the past. On the other hand, I’m nervous about any invasion of privacy, even an intrusion as benevolent as this one.

Right now, Canada has these “interlocking devices” on the cars of convicted drunk drivers.

The driver blows into the device, which registers his blood-alcohol level. If he registers above a set mark, usually 0.02 or 0.04 per cent, the vehicle won’t start.

It makes sense. But is it constitutional to force every citizen to use these machines? Don’t we have a right to get into our own car without blowing into a tube? I’m going to guess such a measure would not stand up under its first constitutional challenge, which I’m positive will happen immediately after the devices are put in. It begs a very good question; will people sacrifice their personal freedom for the country’s greater good?

Killer Water Bottles

New health hazards seem to pop up all the time. Every week, a study uncovers mortal danger in seemingly innocuous products. A while back, we had the Chinese baby toy recall. Now, even water bottles have turned against us. I’m starting to wonder if there isn’t danger in everything we use. Most people will use anything without paying attention to how it is made or even what goes into making it. I know I do. Sometimes, I’ll willfully ignore warnings just so I can keep using a dangerous product.

What I don’t understand about the dangerous product craze is why anyone cares.

This ominous quote comes from the American advocacy group Environmental Defence on the offending chemical found in the water bottles:

“The writing is on the wall for bisphenol A. When a product loses consumer confidence to this extent it’s obviously time to move to the safer, comparably priced alternatives.”

While I can’t say anything about whether bisphenol A is exactly the terror described by Environmental Defense, I can say, with relative certainty, that the things we eat, from fast food chains to store bought meat, are probably a whole lot worse.

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, bisphenol A disrupts the human hormonal system but is safe to consume up to 50 parts per billion daily. That is, of course, much more than one would find in a single bottle. It makes me wonder, now that everyone is so environmentally conscious, as long as environmentalism does not disrupt their daily lives, what’s next on the ban list? I mentioned that the food we eat is probably more poisonous (long term exposure to fatty foods has been proven to kill, whereas Bis A has not) than a water bottle. Maybe we’re about to enter an era where the government will start banning foods.

We’d probably live a lot longer and be much healthier but if I want to kill myself with poutine and poison water bottles, shouldn’t I be able to do just that?

The Model Minority Myth

When someone from a poor minority group – whether it be blacks or Native Indians – complain of being treated unfairly by the job market or the legal system, the conversation invariably veers toward well-trod territory. Somebody will, at some point, highlight the fact that Asian immigrants have done well for themselves financially in their adopted countries, therefore the blacks and Natives have only themselves to blame for their poor conditions.

At first glance, the Asian argument appears to be a significant one, worthy of discussion and heavy consideration. Although I never agreed with it, there did exist some superficial evidence to substantiate the claim. When I first began writing, I vowed to write about this topic at some point.

Time Wise, Znet contributor and author of White Like Me, has beaten me to the punch. He writes:

Whereas the black population represents a cross-section of background, the APA community is highly self-selected. Voluntary migrants from nations that are not contiguous to their country of destination tend to have the skills and money needed to leave their home country in the first place. As many scholars have found, Asian immigrants are largely drawn from an occupational and educational elite in their countries of origin.

Blacks and Natives are more like to have been born in their country of residence, whether it be Canada or the U.S. Most Asian immigrants have not.

A total of 10.7 per cent of Canadian immigrants come from either Africa or the Caribbean while over 36 per cent of immigrants hail from Asia. Native Indians, of course, have not immigrated from anywhere, unless we count Australian aboriginals and scattered Central American tribes – which Stats Can does not. The likelihood of an Asian immigrant having a college degree compared to blacks matches up perfectly to the immigration percentage:

As the Glass Ceiling Commission discovered in 1995, between two-thirds and three-quarters of the highly educated APA community already had college degrees before coming to the U.S., or were in college upon arrival. Thanks to preferences for educated immigrants, APAs are two-thirds more likely than whites and three times more likely than blacks to have a college degree.

So it would seem that Asians aren’t harder working or more innately intelligent than other minority group. After all, one would only have to take a stroll through many of parts of China or India to see that there are many who are in as much need for help as Canada and America’s native minorities.

I doubt any amount of writing on this subject will change the minds of those who subscribe to the “model minority myth.” With such a charged subject as race, who could expect different?

Bringing out the dead

There seems to be a growing trend in the media where reporters denigrate a human being’s character after they are the victims of crimes. Yes, you read that right. The media takes subtle jabs people, even victims, if that person is a celebrity, athlete or person of colour.

It happened again today. Last night, NFL safety Sean Taylor was shot and wounded in his home. The details are sketchy. What we do know is: people broke into Taylor’s Dade County home a week ago and left a knife by his bed. Last night Taylor left his bed to investigate a noise at his back door and was shot, once, in the groin, losing so much blood that he faces brain damage if he’s lucky enough to survive.

Here are some subtle jabs at this man’s personal character I took from a Canadian Press article:

Taylor played in his first Pro Bowl last season, where he drew attention by levelling the other team’s punter in what is usually a well-mannered exhibition game.

Taylor has been in trouble numerous times since he was drafted as the No. 5 overall pick in 2004. He has been fined at least seven times during his professional career for late hits and other infractions, including a US$17,000 penalty for spitting in the face of Tampa Bay running back Michael Pittman during a playoff game in January 2006. He also was fined $25,000 for skipping a mandatory rookie symposium shortly after he was drafted.

In 2005, Taylor was accused of brandishing a gun at a man and repeatedly hitting him during a fight that broke out after Taylor and some friends went looking for the people who had allegedly stolen his all-terrain vehicles.

All told, an 879 word article with the supposed purpose of reporting a home robbery contains 279 words discussing Taylor’s brushes with the law. That’s nearly 32 per cent of the story.

At best, this abominable reportage owes to shoddy sensationalist journalism. At worst, it’s another case of indirect racism. The story ensures the reader knows Taylor was a thug, who spit in people’s faces, cheap shot defenseless punters, and waved guns with the wonton abandonment of an uncivilized animal. The purpose, it seems, is not only to inform us a football player may die but that he also may have deserved it.

As contrast look how beloved Canadian Kiefer Sutherland is treated by Reuters. I pulled this from a story on how the Writer’s Guild strike will affect the new season of 24.

The show’s star, Kiefer Sutherland, is also scheduled to do a stint in jail later this year in connection with a drunk-driving conviction.

Not only is the arrest given scant mention – which, I believe, is the proper treatment for something that has nothing to do with the story – but the wording is as friendly as one could hope. Sutherland wasn’t arrested for driving drunk. Rather he is scheduled to do time in connection with a conviction. This clever wording gives the impression he was operative a vehicle under the influence but was connected to some vague drunk driving conviction.

Was Sean Taylor asked for a donation in connection with a spitting incident? No. The story states plainly he spit in another man’s face.

Similarly, in this piece about goaltender Patrick Roy, nowhere does Matt Higgins mention his domestic violence arrest in 2000. I’ll say it again: Higgins did right. There is no reason to include it in this piece. But, would a cocky, brass ill spoken athlete like Sean Taylor receive the same treatment? Obviously, no.

The fact past transgressions are mentioned in a story with enough salacious details (elite football player fights for his life after home invasion) to satisfy the most inattentive reader is irresponsible journalism. What is unforgivable journalism is when it is applied unevenly.

Climate Change

It’s not so much the fact that Stephen Harper continues to ignore the climate change issue, or that he implicitly called the Kyoto Protocol a “socialist scheme” that would do too much harm to his friends in the oil and gas industry, it’s that we knew he was ignorant and we still voted for him.

 

For all the ridicule heaped on the American electorate for their masochistic voting habits, it would appear Canadians are not too far behind.

According to a 2007 Angus Reid survey 77 per cent of Canadians believe global warming is real. A third (32 per cent) call global warming is “the most pressing issue facing humanity today.”

 How real is the impact of global warming for Canadians? Very real. Almost half (47%)think warmer temperatures will impact not only the lives of future generations, but alsotheir own. Women are more inclined to believe this (51%) than men (44%).Only 10% of respondents say global warming will have no influence at all on the planet, while 42% think it will exclusively impact the lives of future generations. 

Yet Canadians, while mostly recognizing the issue’s severity, voted for Harper who is unabashedly against addressing this issue because, as we all know, turning a profit in the oil field is much more important.

Seventy-six per cent were in support of the child care bill the Liberal government introduced before their defeat. Harper scraped it and instead offered families a $1,200 yearly subsidy paid to parents of children six years or younger. Only a third (35%) of Canadians support it.

Somehow this does not dissuade Canadians from lining up behind him.

Certain aspects of his ideology is right on point with a slim majority of the population. For instance, 73 per cent of people want tougher gun laws and 71 per cent are fine treating youths who’ve used a firearm in a crime as adults. Fifty per cent approve of the Afghanistan mission while 45 per cent don’t.

These issues have in common the fact they prey on fear for support. Most Canadians think crime is out of control, and that the court system is too lenient on dealing with it. Yet, only a third of Canada’s 605 homicides involve firearms, far lower than the U.S. So it remains unclear why we are becoming more fearful of guns. As for the War in Afghanistan, the majority of Canadians (22%) believe we are involved only for peacekeeping purposes. Another 18 per cent think we are there for humanitarian and rebuilding aid. Why so many are not clear of our real objective is a subject I’ll discuss on another day.

The fact remains, environmental scientists agree, almost unanimously, we are facing a climate crisis. It seems now, Canadians are bowing under the threat of something bad happening. We now look for a strong, bull headed leader so we can hide behind his pant legs, whether that fear be of environmental catastrophe, marauding gangs, or mentally unstable terrorists. The only difference is, the environmental threat is actually real.

Harper’s War on a Noun

In case you missed it, Stephen Harper has imposed mandatory jail sentences for drug dealers. We’re all quite familiar with the many ways in which drugs tear at the fabric of decent society, so much so that our government not only criminalizes the distribution of said substances but will also punish those who ingest them in their own bodies.

According to Justice Minister Rob Nicholson:

 “Drug producers and dealers threaten the safety of our communities, they must face tougher penalties.” 

This latest law is one of the Federal government’s mandate to crack down on crime, namely by filling our jails with drug dealers, kids, and identity thieves.

I’m assuming federal policy wonks aren’t stupid, and are at least casually familiar with the efficacy of jailing drug dealers. One need look no further than south of the Canadian border to see how good a War of Drugs work.

The United States spends $600 per second on the drug war. So far, in 2007, 1,414,723 people have been arrested for drug offenses, half for cannabis violations. Yet, drug use remains constant, and has done so since 2000.

Ethan Nadelmann, founder and director of Drug Policy Alliance says:

 “The United States ranks first in the world in per-capita incarceration, with roughly five per cent of the earth’s population but 25 per cent of the total incarcerated population. Russia and China simply can’t keep up. Among the 2.2 million people behind bars today in the United States, roughly half a million are locked up for drug-law violations, and hundreds of thousands more for other “drug- related” offences. The U.S. “war on drugs” costs at least $40 billion U.S. a year in direct costs, and tens of billions more in indirect costs.” 

To determine why the U.S. is so determined to persist with a preposterous policy, it would be helpful to look at the origin of illegal drugs compared to legal ones, and who is most likely to face incarceration under this rouse.

To answer the first: cocaine comes from Columbia (and therefore crack), heroin from Afghanistan whereas tobacco can be readily found in the U.S. while alcohol can be easily distilled anywhere. When you factor in the revenue these poor countries stand to gain from a legal drug trade, it’s not hard to see why the U.S. is so opposed to it. As to who strict drug laws penalize the most are minorities and the poor. Drug use among the higher educated – such as college students – is relatively equal to drug use among minorities, yet more police resources are allocated to low income neighbourhoods.

Everybody’s favourite anarchist Noam Chomsky describes strict drug laws as follows:

 “US domestic drug policy does not carry out its stated goals, and policymakers are well aware of that. If it isn’t about reducing substance abuse, what is it about? It is reasonably clear, both from current actions and the historical record, that substances tend to be criminalized when they are associated with the so-called dangerous classes, that the criminalization of certain substances is a technique of social control. The economic policies of the last 20 years are a rich man’s version of structural adjustment. You create a superfluous population, which in the US context is largely poor, black, and Hispanic, and a much wider population that is economically dissatisfied.” 

I have a feeling, while we Canadians operate under the Conservatives led by George Bush Lite, we are seeing the beginning of a policy shift toward the United States’ vaguely racist, criminal model. Most won’t care. Some will even applaud the Conservative’s “tough stance”. After all, your average voter does not do drugs therefore we’ll see a positive response.

Saskatchewan Elections

Though they have virtually zero change of winning – to be fair, I’m not sure they even want to win any seats – the Marijuana Party of Saskatchewan is actually raising an important issue in the run up to the provincial election.

I think it’s about time weed use is discussed rationally in the public sphere. Despite the pointed rhetoric on weed’s every ill, we know now that the drug is not all that dangerous. Since we’ve started keeping score, no one has ever died from a marijuana overdose. We know the gateway theory (smoking weed will lead the user to harder, more dangerous drugs) has been shot to bits (since being legalized in Holland, during the 1970s, heroin and cocaine use has declined) and that it does not contain more carcinogens than cigarettes. But, for the sake of argument, let’s pretend everything we learnt from those grainy, grade 8 Health videos were true. Why then does the government allow us to smoke tobacco and not marijuana? Why does our government’s concern for our health exclude cigarettes and alcohol?

The answer, I think, is politically motivated. Canada is already the “Weed Capital” of world. We account for the greatest per capita marijuana usage of all industrialized countries. Police aren’t foaming to arrest people with a couple joints in their pockets either. Cannabis arrests have dropped from over 70,000 in 2001 to just under 60,000 in 2005. Still, a lot of lives have been altered, and a lot of money has been thrown at a drug that is much less harmful than ones which are still legal.

Now that a rational discussion has erupted in the political arena, we can talk about drugs without the pulpit exaggerations for which our representatives are so well renowned.

Photo Radar

Is speed enforcement a revenue-grabbing scheme cooked up by a greedy municipal government or does having police officers jump from behind bushes brandishing a radar gun actually promote safe driving? We’ll be hearing a lot about it now that the city wants to put photo radar devices at intersections, at the same spots as red light cameras. So far, it seems there exist little to no evidence that exceeding the speed limits, causes more accidents, injuries or deaths. In fact, according to a University of California, Irvine study, higher speed limits actually lower fatality rates. See here too. Some studies do show a decrease in traffic accidents though some people argue the studies use total accidents and deliberately ignore collision percentages such as the number of accidents per 1,000,000 drivers.

 

Anyone who has ever driven knows speed traps and photo radars are marginally effective, at best. Most speeders (myself included) slow down when they see a van with tinted windows parked on the road’s shoulder. We slow down, until we’ve passed the car, and accelerate as usual. If I do this, and I know plenty others who do the same, then I’d have to assume municipal governments, who are, I hate to admit, a lot smarter than me, know the same thing. 

 

 I’m going to go with “municipal cash grab” on this one.

More people, more problems

It seems that many Albertans, caught in the crunch of our long running population boom, really, really want the new migrants gone:

Turned off by traffic jams, increasing crime and housing costs, the majority of Calgarians polled by the city said their quality of life has deteriorated in the past three years.The 2007 Citizen Satisfaction Survey found 61 per cent of those polled said their quality of life had declined since 2004, compared to 51 per cent in the 2006 survey.Overall, 67 per cent said life in Calgary was good or very good, a drop from 85 per cent just two years earlier and 77 per cent in 2006.

But does quality of life really decrease as population increases or are native Albertans ill equipped to dealing with the change? Well, let’s look at the minuses of Calgary’s growth. The rapid increase in Calgary’s population has led to urban sprawl, meaning the city is spreading into rural lands, mostly with sparsely spaced, single dwelling family homes several kilometres away from the nearest gas station, grocery store, etc. With Calgary so spread out, people have come to rely heavily on their cars, causing, in some people’s minds, adverse health effects. Back in 2003, the American Journal of Health found that, due to reliance on automobiles, people get fatter in suburbs than inner cities, where amenities are within walking distance. The city’s growth has also resulted in absurd home prices, making it almost impossible to buy or rent unless equipped with a high paying job. For a growing number of Albertans this seems too much to handle. 

About 30,000 people moved to Alberta in June — and nearly 23,000 packed up and left, according to Statistics Canada. 

Once again, does all this suggest quality of life is dropping? I say “yes” and “no.” Although the urban sprawl issue is bothersome – I mean, nobody really wants to spend an hour in their car everyday – and annoy me half to death, it is, at best, a nuisance. The real problem lies in homelessness and home prices. It’s sad we have so many homeless (especially since nearly half of them work) but I believe the situation is somewhat overstated. Only 12 per cent of homeless people live in the streets. This, I believe, shows we are doing at least an average job of making sure as few people as possible are left out in the cold. By the way, this survey was taken in spring, when the climate is a little kinder. During winter months, Calgary opens more emergency beds such as the new Mustard Seed facility in the S.E. Also, only one child below the age of 12 was found in a homeless facility the night of the survey. There were none under five. Now the bad news: homelessness has increased 32 per cent since 2004. However, I don’t agree the blame for this problem lies with Calgary itself as opposed to our government refusing to put our surplus to anything other than oil subsidies. As for home prices, those are set by the market. If someone thinks they can get a cheaper home while maintaining their income, then it on them to move to that place.