ESPN Determined to Kill its Brand With Left Wing Politics
Conservative viewers not welcome.
The leadership at ESPN seems to think it can change the way people think by injecting left wing politics into its coverage of professional sports. Instead, they are alienating sports fans, many of whom are conservatives, and destroying their brand at the same time.
Host Jemele Hill published a tweet on Tuesday, calling President Trump a white supremacist:
Donald Trump is a white supremacist who has largely surrounded himself w/ other white supremacists.
— Jemele Hill (@jemelehill) September 11, 2017
He has surrounded himself with white supremacists — no they are not “alt right” — and you want me to believe he isn’t a white supremacist?
— Jemele Hill (@jemelehill) September 11, 2017
As a result, ESPN tweeted this statement:
ESPN Statement on Jemele Hill: pic.twitter.com/3kfexjx9zQ
— ESPN PR (@ESPNPR) September 12, 2017
You may recall that back in April, Curt Schilling was fired by ESPN for disagreeing with the progressive position on transgender people and bathrooms. The Daily Caller reported:
ESPN Fires Curt Schilling For Conservative Views
MLB legend and baseball analyst Curt Schilling was fired by ESPN Wednesday night for his conservative views.
Schilling shared a meme on Facebook that clearly showed he was against transgender individuals using bathrooms against their biological sex. The legendary pitcher was fired over the post with ESPN saying, “Curt Schilling has been advised that his conduct was unacceptable and his employment with ESPN has been terminated,”
The former Red Sox pitcher has been very open about his conservative views in the past. He was previously suspended by ESPN for comparing ISIS to the Nazis.
That was a bridge too far for ESPN, but one of their hosts calling President Trump a white supremacist causes… nothing?
Here’s another example of the double standard:
So @espn suspended Linda Cohn for saying ESPN was talking too much politics. Didn’t suspend Jemele Hill for saying Trump was a racist.
— Clay Travis (@ClayTravis) September 13, 2017
Tucker Carlson spoke to Clay Travis of FOX Sports about this and Travis explained what’s happening.
From the FOX News Insider:
‘Endless Stupid Political Nagging’: Tucker Blasts ESPN After Anchor Calls Trump a ‘White Supremacist’
Carlson called ESPN “Endless Stupid Political Nagging” and asked Fox Sports’ Clay Travis what he thought of Hill’s attack.
Travis said ESPN’s statement is another example of Hill’s politics “going all the way to the top.”
He said parent company Disney CEO Bob Iger and ESPN president John Skipper hold left-wing views, and that of the 59 people Iger follows on Twitter, Hill is one of them.
“They want left-leaning politics the forward facing front of ESPN,” going on to repeat Michael Jordan’s famed warning about mixing sports and politics, “Republicans buy sneakers too.”
Travis pointed out that when former Chicago Bears coach Mike Ditka criticized President Obama in a much more minimal way, and announced his support for President Trump, he was fired from ESPN.
Here’s the video:
I’m reminded of this classic Iowahawk tweet:
1. Identify a respected institution.
2. kill it.
3. gut it.
4. wear its carcass as a skin suit, while demanding respect.#lefties— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) November 10, 2015
Featured image via YouTube.
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Comments
The color diversitists speak.
Trump recognizes and represents diversity. Over 300 million American People and Posterity.
Progressive diversity recognizes “color”. It denies individual dignity, human dignity. Progressive diversity is unabashed practice of racism, sexism, etc.
Then there is the selective-child doctrine (a.k.a. pro-choice) that is established with a quasi-religious/moral rationalization at the twilight fringe, practiced under a legal layer of privacy, no less.
Judge people by the “content of their character” (diversity), not the “color of their skin” (progressive diversity).
Close the abortion chambers, and the Planned Parenthood/Mengele clinics, too.
Neo-National Socialists, indeed. The Democratic Party, and progressive liberals, need major reconstructive reform.
Even though Color is the only thing that matters to Progressives – There is a priority of colors. Black, Red, Brown, Yellow and White seems to be the order.
In decreasing order of exercisable political leverage.
Watch black and brown fight each other over degree of victim status. Then, the LBQT whatever will get in on the act so they won’t be outdone. In the end, who has the numbers and $$ will come out on top.
don’t forget their hate of Jews and Israel and
their identification with killers of Americans ‘Fakistinians’,
who speak out of 2 sides of their mouths.
Have pity on their kids – wait they don’t have kids they have abortions.
It is no longer predominantly about color. At the very least you have to give credit to some progressives for realizing that race was loosing its exploitative value to some degree. And that is why you see this nascent but rapidly escalating growth of “social science” effort to define a booming set of new categories of victims and new ways to “oppress” those new victims. Microagressions is the prime example of something that perhaps even 5 years ago wasn’t even recognized as a meaningful term outside of a select few in the academe.
This is another reason why a progressive meme around “anti-science” pasted on anyone (even other liberals) who disagree is so fundamentally important in a public sense. They must deflect analysis and as much criticism as possible about the “new” social science findings. And there is a reason it is born out of academia and not politics. It give the politicians the ability to claim it is “science” or founded in “scientific analysis”, or whatever. It’s not preplanned every step of the way. But it all works nicely in concert nonetheless.
I should think that most lefties don’t even follow sports because competition and winning (iow, someone has to lose). Oh, and violence, or something.
You’re right, most of them don’t care about it. But destroying sports is part of their campaign to tear down our society so they can re-build it the way they want it. You know, where we all bow down to centralized government and every decision is made by the “best men” in a centralized fashion.
The Vietnam was run by the “smart” men in Washington. How did that work out? Won on the battlefield with blood, given away by Cronkite and the morons.
Well, the DEMOCRAT ‘whiz kid’ who ran the failed war in Vietnam was Robert McNamara.
The dumbass lying swine who sabotaged the war against the United State was CBS’ Walter Cronkite. CBS is still at it.
As it is impossible to win a war when all you do is defend LBJ made is a certainty that we would lose. He sent 500,000 men to fight and die in a hopeless cause. The only point of this war was to make him look tough. In addition, the Vietnam war disaffected an entire generation which enabled Tyrant Obama the Liar to become President.
I asked DISH to drop ESPN from my package and I saved $88 a year.
How does one do that? I thought ESPN was included in even the basic packages.
These folks can’t be very bright. Viewers bring advertising dollars which makes their paychecks possible. Regardless of your cause, trading tomorrow’s dollars for today’s pennies is a losing proposition. I think there’s something about a golden goose in there somewhere…
It’s the same mindset that brings you “protesters” who burn down their own neighborhoods. Derp.
Here’s a survey that compared the decline in ESPN viewership between 2015 and 2016 to the political leanings of viewers in Cincinnati:
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https://www.deeprootanalytics.com/2017/04/27/as-espn-got-more-political-in-2016-it-lost-republican-viewers/
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Bottom line – Republicans are fleeing ESPN in droves and they continue to do so today. I’m sure ESPN would swear that it’s a bunch of Nazi racist Trump supporters and they don’t want their money anyway.
I haven’t watched ESPN or any other television channel in years. Their bias has been obvious for a long time, but they’ve really stepped it up recently. So I’ve taken to ridiculing my friends who still watch it. I’m actively trying to get everyone I know to cut the cord and stop funding this insanity.
So many lefties, still recovering from the BHO years (BHO, as in blatant harmful overreach).
Don’t forget ESPN also fired Jason Whitlock (black guy) for saying Scoop Jackson (black guy) was, “fake ghetto”. ESPN also gave the ax to Rob Parker (black guy) for saying that RGIII was a “cornball brother” and who can forget when ESPN cut ties with Rush Limbaugh after only three weeks when he stated Donovan McNabb was “overrated” and received the benefit of the doubt because he is “black”.
Gee, if Rob, Jason and Rush had just picked on white guys they’d all still be at ESPN, right?
Another big win for the Frankfurt School.
For those down-thumbers, here’s one explanation of the Frankfurt School. Perhaps all y’all need to erase a knowledge deficit.
Marxist-socialist-progressive-democrats are relentless, and determined. Busybodies, they will make you care.
As long as Lefties have peace of mind the rest of us won’t.
They will never be happy. They are mentally ill, and happiness will only come when they give up their Messianic Complex of making the rest of us better, for our own good.
C. S. Lewis had an evergreen observation about these chosen people.
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may be more likely to go to Heaven yet at the same time likelier to make a Hell of earth. This very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be “cured” against one’s will and cured of states which we may not regard as disease is to be put on a level of those who have not yet reached the age of reason or those who never will; to be classed with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals.”
― C.S. Lewis, God in the Dock: Essays on Theology (Making of Modern Theology)
Maybe the point isn’t to proselytize, but just to keep killing American institutions. If they keep this up long enough, what will remain?
Spot on. Destroy American institutions. Especially those of honor and integrity. They don’t care what remains, as long as it bears little resemblance to what we have now.
“They don’t care what remains, as long as it bears little resemblance to what we have now.”
After further reflection, the replay officials have over-ruled this observation. They do care what remains. It isn’t enough, for example, to destroy marriage with liberal divorce laws, financial incentives for out-of-wedlock children, easy divorce, and making single-parenting fashionable. They need to create same-sex marriage as a mockery of sacramental marriage. They want to create a false monster for every real hero. Thus we have Rubenesque women in Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition. Part of that Gramercian thing: non-representational art. Rap instead of real poetry or music. They foul everything they touch, and when they are done hating what is good, hate each other.
Plenty. The marketplace will correct.
Baseball is doing fine.
Henry VIII of England, didn’t martyr Thomas More because he publicly disapproved of the King’s behavior. St. Thomas More was martyred because he would not publicly endorse Henry’s behavior. The evil, and the left, insist on the same. We will be made to care. And voice our support.
https://www.google.com/search?q=fox+sports+political+views
Ha ha ha, thanks for the photograph. She’s pretty. Those two dudes in the photograph are actually listening to whatever this absurd racist is blacksplaining. It’s exactly like gorilla pundit. *whispers* Didn’t read a single word. Why let any it have contact with one’s brain, with one’s own soul? That doesn’t even make sense. You don’t kill a zombie by continuously giving it bits of your brain. No. Instead you simply ignore stupid little twisted sister. Top trolling with the selected photo.
Let me expand on your astute observations. According to Rush, the ESPN producers told Limbaugh to say something ‘engaging’ or ‘controversial’ during the group talk. At the time, even one of the other ‘talkers’ somewhat agreed with him. But when the snit hit the fan, and their careers were on the line, to a man they abandoned and criticized Rush.
My point: Don’t think for a minute Ms. Hill hadn’t been encouraged to be social justice warrior-like, you know, for ratings. What do y’all think this whole MNF debacle was about? Woman broadcaster, inept and inexperienced Mexican soccer sideline sportscaster, talking all about ‘diversity’ and ‘inclusion.’
Flake on, ESPN!
This was my response to WillS68.^^
The surprising thing is just how primitive the political Left has become.
This woman isn’t a Leftist so much as an outright racist.
To the Party, racism is a tactic; it’s not part of any realistic party platform. But when Leftists defend the indefensible, or—worse—tolerate the intolerable, it gradually becomes an organic part of a political movement, and eventually an essential part.
This need not have happened. The politically sensible thing to do would be to reject this woman. A good Leftist should throw her out. And none of this lightweight “tut, tut … this doesn’t represent the position of ESPN” stuff; fire her, and don’t return her phone calls. That wouldn’t impair Leftism in the least. And if they’re interested in virtue signaling, they can accomplish that too; there’s no downside to rejecting blatant racism. When it’s too blatant, its usefulness as a tactic is impaired.
But they’re not doing any of that. Why not? Maybe Leftists are just dumb.
Q.E.D.
You are exactly right; but I suspect that there is something more blatantly racial in play here, being done foolishly by the ESPN execs.
I think they have decided that, with their viewing numbers dropping, and many traditional middle class sports fans tuning them out, that they are going to go all out with an effort to pull in a large number of black viewers who will stay “loyal” to the brand. And in the idiotic way of thinking that is shown by most white media execs today, they’ve decided the way to do that is to become the Black Nationalist Sports Channel.
So, it’s not just brainless leftism – I believe they are being *intentionally* racist because that’s what THEY think black viewers want to watch. And it’s just as insulting and demeaning to those viewers as it is to the rest of us.
Bundling by cable and satellite providers is the only thing keeping ESPN alive. ESPN received $7-$10 for every cable/satellite customer.
In addition to its political correctness and far-left dogma problems, a lot of other things have changed in the past 30 years. There are at least four other cable/satellite sports channels. More importantly, virtually every major metro has a local sports cable channel that televises local baseball, hockey and basketball games.
It’s not whether ESPN dies, it’s a matter of when.
I watch games, not ESPN, except when ESPN is my only choice for a given game. I’ve never watched ESPN’s non-game programming and wouldn’t regardless of political slant either way – I just find sports talk shows really boring on cable or radio. But if ESPN’s political agenda is going to infiltrate the actual game coverage, I’m done with ESPN. I can well afford live-stream internet coverage.
Yopu would think supposedly experienced, expert sports programmers would understand that if you change your product, you’ll change your customer base accordingly, and further, that the cheese and wine lefty soccer and tennis crowd cannot financially support ESPN alone. Just being a 24/7 sports channel is tough enough. Going full bore leftist only makes it harder and less profitable to fill 168 hours of sports programming per week.
ESPN, CNN, MSNBC, NBC, ABC, CBS, etc – RIP.
There are a lot of other options. The marketplace will provide the correction.
What do ESPN president John Skipper and Atlantic Coast Conference President John Swofford have in common? Remember, Swofford came out against the NC Legislature’s “Bathroom Bill”.
Right. Both are grads of the ultra liberal University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. They are steeped in liberal progressive orthodoxy. and share the same worldview.
ESPN did kill its brand in our home. It will NOT be on our television.
The NFL has done the same thing. Yesterday I turned down a free ticket to go to an NFL game on Sunday with a friend. Told him I would have gotten mad and walked out when the first player refused to stand for the National Anthem; wasn’t setting the day up for failure.