Some Thoughts on Mercy

Ross Gay is an African American writer and poet who has written many pieces on the issue of race in today's day and age. In July of 2013 he wrote Some Thoughts On Mercy, which exemplifies his friends and his own experiences with race in his community. He also talks about how when dealing with bees, they will sting you if you act hostile toward them and how they will not sting you just because of your race. He relates this scenario to everyday racism. Racism is huge problem in the sport of hockey. As it shows signs of improvement, the end of racism in hockey is nowhere in sight.

All together in the NHL last season there was a total of nine African American players (Miller). Nine players out of all thirty teams in the entire National Hockey League. So as you can assume, hockey today is still considered a white mans sport. When African American players have made it to the league, most of them all recall a time in their career when they were scrutinized because of their race. The most recent case of public racism in the NHL happened this past postseason in the form of a tweet that was projected toward P.K. Subban (pictured above). Subban had what could be known as the biggest game of his career scoring the game-winning goal in double overtime of game one against the Boston Bruins. Following the game a company called Influence Communications analyzed all the tweets that were pored out. In analyzing all those tweets, they found that there were about 17,000 tweets that used Subban's name as well as the N-word in the same tweet (Peters). The Boston Bruins immediately published a statement apologizing for the racial social media posts. But if you think about, what if a white player would have scored that goal? I'm sure there would still be criticism but to what extent? Would the Bruins still be apologizing if only the "regular" hate tweets flew around? It all just shows how the NHL is still working towards become a more integrated game.

  Another incident that has happened in the past couple years involves an African American player named Evander Kane. He has always been known as a more outgoing person and athlete but has been scrutinized for things that many would find unfit for scrutiny. During the lockout in 2012, Kane posted a picture of himself in Las Vegas flaunting some stacks of dollar bills (Solinsky). Most of all reporters covered this story with an aspect that he was a cocky, young, African American hockey player. He was also rumored to have skipped out on a couple restaurant tabs after his drafting into the league (Solinsky). These two stories made headlines all across the hockey news and were amplified to a degree that was not necessary and questions of the team having an organizational problem surfaced. In the same year and incident of Patrick Kane (no relation) and an assault on a cab driver made news (Solinsky). However, the Chicago organization was never questioned if they had a problem on their hand, race being the obvious factor in the issues. If Evander Kane had been white, I’m sure there would have been some scrutiny, but would there have been the questions of the organization having a problem on their hands?

            The issue of race is very much prevalent in today’s game of hockey. Many of the problems with the African American players can relate back to Mr. Gay’s piece in regards to would there be the same response had it been a white person. The sport is working hard to spread knowledge of the game throughout every race but only time will help the issue of race in hockey.

Work Cited:

Miller. "The Prevalence of Black Players in the NHL - National Hockey League." The NHL Arena. N.p., 21 Feb. 2013. Web. 07 Oct. 2014.

Gay, Ross. "The Sun Magazine | Some Thoughts On Mercy." The Sun Magazine | Some Thoughts On Mercy. N.p., July 2013. Web. 06 Oct. 2014.

Peters, Chris. "Bruins Speak out against Racist Tweets Directed at P.K. Subban." CBSSports.com. N.p., 2 May 2014. Web. 07 Oct. 2014.

Solinsky, Kolby. "Is Hockey a Racist Sport?" The Huffington Post. N.p., 15 Feb. 2014. Web. 07 Oct. 2014.

Next Time Someone Says Women Aren't Victims Of Harassment, Show Them This.

        

    It seems like there is always some new story on the news everyday about a sexual harassment case involving one athlete or another.  Not to be stereotypical or anything, but those athletes always seem to be on a football team, or… no that really looks likes that’s all it is.  In the online article “Next Time Someone Says Women Aren’t Victims Of Harassment, Show Them This,” used with permission from Robert Hugs, it shows us how the harassment can be a simple sentence that makes the woman feel uncomfortable in the situation and how easily it can be stopped by bystander intervention.  Now I don’t know if it’s America’s obsession with our Monday Night Football that the media only seem to show us sexual harassment cases in football, but I think people need to realize that it can happen in any sport, even hockey.  Sexual harassment has become unfortunately prevalent in our society, and people need to be aware that it can happen anywhere around the country and within any sport.

            Sexual harassment doesn’t just happen within professional sports organizations, but it also occurs in college sports as well.  There was a case involving two Boston University players in September of 2012 that resulted in two of the team’s high profile players being arrested because of sexual assault charges.  The article states “‘Our assessment has shown that a culture of sexual entitlement exists among some players on the men’s ice hockey team, stemming in part from their elevated social status on campus,’” and we, as a society, need to realize we are a major contribution of said entitlement.  We can’t hold these players on such a high pedestal and give them the sense that they have a “right” to act the way they do.  This is stated well in the article “Next Time Someone Says Women Aren’t Victims Of Harassment, Show Them This.”  It tells us if we simply take action as a bystander, we can stop many attacks of sexual harassment. With the help of that, we could prevent countless acts and hear less about it in the news every day.

            Looking at sexual harassment through the eyes of the hockey world made me realize it is more prevalent in every day life than I thought.  I think everybody needs to realize that being oblivious to the fact that this sort of stuff can happen right in front of us doesn’t make it go away, it just means they are turning their heads to something they could prevent, but instead they will just hear about it on the news later that night. 

           

Work Cited

Hugs, Robert. "Next Time Someone Says Women Aren't Victims Of Harassment, Show Them This.." tickld.com. N.p., 9 Aug. 2014. Web. 2 Oct. 2014. <http://www.tickld.com/x/next-time-someone-says-women-arent-victims-of-harassment-show-them>.

Kingkade, Tyler. "Boston University Hockey Team Has 'Culture Of Sexual Entitlement' Says President Robert A. Brown's Report." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 6 Sept. 2012. Web. 2 Oct. 2014. <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/06/boston-university-hockey-team-report_n_1861007.html>.