Sunday, August 13, 2006
Not so Sterling
In the movie Tin Cup, Molly Griswold (Renee Russo) was told repeatedly that her boyfriend, David Simms (Don Johnson), was only nice in the public eye and, in reality, hated dogs, kids and old people. Well, it looks like Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling has a bit of Simms in him.
The DOJ is suing the real estate mogul for housing discrimination. They claim that Sterling refused to rent to many tenants in Los Angeles because they were either black or had children. And this isn't the first time Sterling has been sued for housing discrimination. Last year, Sterling settled a case and had to pay $5 million in plaintiff's attorney fees for discriminating against blacks and hispanics. All this coming from a person who makes money by hiring a team of mostly back athletes to play basketball for him. So where's the outrage? Where are the people screaming if they're good enough to play basketball for you, why can't they live in your houses?
This case has barely made a blip on the national sports scene. I stumbled on it when Bomani Jones addressed the issue for ESPN's Page 2. Jones rightly wonders why this isn't big news. Why did the ESPNs, New York Times and L.A. Times of the world jump all over the Maurice Clarett story and not this?
David Stern and many NBA players have missed the boat as well. They should be jumping up and down with outrage and demand that something be done, that someone be held accountable. Housing discrimination is a serious issue. It is an individual or organization behaving in a systematic matter to keep a certain class of people from obtaining housing. That's not acceptable in America, and that most definitely shouldn't be acceptable in the NBA. But nobody is opening their mouths to say so. And that's even worse.
The DOJ is suing the real estate mogul for housing discrimination. They claim that Sterling refused to rent to many tenants in Los Angeles because they were either black or had children. And this isn't the first time Sterling has been sued for housing discrimination. Last year, Sterling settled a case and had to pay $5 million in plaintiff's attorney fees for discriminating against blacks and hispanics. All this coming from a person who makes money by hiring a team of mostly back athletes to play basketball for him. So where's the outrage? Where are the people screaming if they're good enough to play basketball for you, why can't they live in your houses?
This case has barely made a blip on the national sports scene. I stumbled on it when Bomani Jones addressed the issue for ESPN's Page 2. Jones rightly wonders why this isn't big news. Why did the ESPNs, New York Times and L.A. Times of the world jump all over the Maurice Clarett story and not this?
David Stern and many NBA players have missed the boat as well. They should be jumping up and down with outrage and demand that something be done, that someone be held accountable. Housing discrimination is a serious issue. It is an individual or organization behaving in a systematic matter to keep a certain class of people from obtaining housing. That's not acceptable in America, and that most definitely shouldn't be acceptable in the NBA. But nobody is opening their mouths to say so. And that's even worse.
# posted by vinism @ 8:21 AM 
