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posted by
martyb
on Wednesday November 01 2017, @11:58AM
from the American-game-of-FOOTball-which-is-played-using-your-HANDs dept.
from the American-game-of-FOOTball-which-is-played-using-your-HANDs dept.
ESPN pays $2 billion a year to the NFL for Monday Night Football and one NFL wild card playoff game. I've written for the past couple of years that as ESPN's business collapses that ESPN's decision on whether or not to bid to keep Monday Night Football would be the first big test of how rapidly that business is deteriorating.
What's a deteriorating business look like? In the month of October ESPN lost over 15,000 subscribers a day in October per the latest Nielson estimates.
15,000 a day!
Losing 15,000 subscribers per day is a lot, but is that because of the NFL anthem protests or because cord-cutting has finally reached a tipping point?
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ESPN Can’t Afford Monday Night Football Any More
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When I met th'POPE back in '58, I scrubbed him with a MILD SOAP or
DETERGENT for 15 minutes. He seemed to enjoy it ...
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Wednesday November 01 2017, @09:45PM (2 children)
I disagree. Douchebags may be douchebags, but that doesn't mean they're 100% evil people and everything they believe is automatically wrong, or that they're incapable of doing something good once in a while. They may be really annoying to be around and bad interpersonal behavior, but they can have some good ideas.
If you don't think football players, who are very public figures, have a right to make a political stand, then who should? Politicians? Regular people don't have the visibility that celebrities do; that's exactly why celebrities sometimes take public political stands, to try to use their visibility to make a difference. Being a sports star doesn't make them more qualified than you or me to judge political issues, but they do have a level of visibility that we do not have. It's not wrong to use that advantage, though it is a risk for them.
As for cleaning house of criminals, you can say that about any industry. When is the tech industry going to clean its house of all the harassers and abusers that are rife in its ranks? Or what about the ranks of politicians? Why do we keep voting for politicians who turn out to be criminals? As long as we the people vote for criminals, I don't think we have a leg to stand on in complaining about criminals in any industry.
(Score: 2) by Oakenshield on Thursday November 02 2017, @12:14PM (1 child)
Did I say they didn't have a right? No. My argument is that they are devoid of any inherent authority to assert moral influence over anyone and those who would confer it based solely upon their fame are just plain stupid. I do say that protesting on their own time is perfectly reasonable, but protesting while on the job is wrong, particularly when the "protest" expression is highly offensive to a large chunk of their employers' customer base. If they want to make a statement, they can sit or kneel all they want at MLB or NBA games. Look at it this way. Suppose your largest customer was the Israeli military. Would you want your sales reps to wear Anti-Zionist political buttons when they greet their contacts?
We're not talking about cleaning house for all industry. We are talking about justifying moral authority from an industry that is known for its murderers, rapists, abusers, armed robbers, cheaters, drug abusers, and other criminals. For decades, professional sports has turned a blind eye to the moral standards of their employees because the only thing that mattered was winning. As a result, now the public isn't remotely surprised when a player beats his girlfriend on camera, or murders someone. Proof? They rehired Michael Vick when he was released from prison. The NFL players have no grounds for moral proselytism.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Thursday November 02 2017, @03:06PM
My argument is that they are devoid of any inherent authority to assert moral influence over anyone
OK, then who do you think does have an "inherent authority" to assert moral influence? I can't think of anyone who does. How are football players less qualified to make moral stances than any other random person? I can't think of a single group of people that is somehow morally superior to all or most others. The advantage football players have is their fame, which most other people don't have. Computer engineers certainly don't have that, and aren't ever going to get the general American public to listen to them as a group.
Proof? They rehired Michael Vick when he was released from prison. The NFL players have no grounds for moral proselytism
And what industry isn't just as bad? The religious industry is infamous for shielding child molesters from prosecution, not to mention conning people out of their money. The political industry is full of criminals. The computer/internet industry (that's us) is infamous for "bro culture" and sexual assault and harassment. Face it: every group of people has its share of scumbags.