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gullycanyon wrote:What I'm feeling about Delmon Young:

I think we are in another one of those situations where we sort of know what happened, but we probably don't know what's really going on. Obviously, we know the basic outline:

"Entree" of Drunk Delmon in altercation with panhandler outside of New York hotel.
"Side Dish" of allegations of racial (Jewish) epithets.

We don't know anything else, and the facts unknown to us may weigh more heavily into the over-all disposition of the matter than will the ones known.

How drunk? Blood-alcohol readings tell us little, as we know. Due to various factors, I could be 3X over the legal limit and barely seem to have been drinking, at all.
We don't know if Young was just noticeably drunk & disorderly or totally snockered & completely out of control.

We also don't know the back-story. This could be one of those situations where a pattern of behavior has been developing and has been one of on-going concern to those close to Young.
It would be telling, in that regard, to know Leyland's internal reaction to the initial notification. Maybe he was taken by surprise. That would be a Good Sign. Or, maybe he was not surprised, at all, and reflected thusly: "Well, I've been seeing THIS comin'." That would be a Bad Sign. And one essential to the eventual resolution, on the part of the team, of the issue.
Obviously, guys get drunk all of the time, and often there are embarrassing behaviors involved. In those cases, the "boys will be boys" theme is invoked (in ironic contrast to the "we're all grown adults here" mantra,) and any further arm-flapping is an inappropriate manifestation of our current overly-judgmental social climate.
On the other hand, some guys get drunk, truly drunk, ALL of the time, and the "behaviors" tend to morph from "embarrassing" to "outrageous, dangerous, and altogether totally unacceptable."
In those cases, when a professional sports team is involved, a mere shrug of the shoulders will not suffice, at least not for long, because not only does the team need to consider the direction to which the pattern is leading, the issue of "tacit approval" becomes relevant, and highly so.
The Yankees of the 1930's didn't need to fret over a few sportswriters and bartenders witnessing some drunkenness & ass-grabbing on the part of their charges. Today, if Derek Jeter forgets to provide his latest Trollop of the Day with a Gift-Basket on her way out, and she complains to a limo driver who is pals with some sports-media guys, we may know, via Twitter, of the Jete's Miscarriage of Socio-sexual Justice even before Derek's enchanted vesicles begin to refill with a fresh load of magical, cosmically-anointed semen.
So, even while the concept of "representing the organization" may be unnecessarily burdensome and the concept of "being a role-model" may be as ridiculous as ever, still a team must protect its image (especially today, when the importance of image-- absurd as this truth may be-- has not only matched the importance of reality, but has, in some ways, over-taken it.)
And, of course, the fact is that one guy is not equal to the other guy, and what the Migster can get away with far exceeds what Delmon can get away with. Cabrera could be found to have been bankrolling a meth lab and possibly, after a bit of wrangling and spin-control, retain his job with the Tigers. Delmon Young, if he becomes a problem, will be invited to pack up his 15 HR's, 70 RBI, and .285 BA and get the fuck out of town.

As to the incident, we don't know just how much molestation occurred. "Shut up and get the fuck away from me, you kike asshole" may be unmannerable, but it's much different from a scene wherein some actual physicality and a full minute's worth of anti-Semitic ragings were witnessed.

Still, the entire "hate speech" bit frosts my ass, because it's splitting a hair that shouldn't even be found on one's scalp. A barrage of mean-spirited insults or threats is inherently hateful, and I don't see how a crack about one's racial identity is any more hateful than a crack about one's physical appearance. Is there an Anti-Defamation League for "Gingers?"
Sometimes, we act as though the Jews took so much abuse 80 years ago that they now have some kind of ticket, one which bars any further distress, even so little as a personal insult.
I think our society is guilt-ridden over its failure to act sooner, back then, to prevent the "Holocaust," and the same guilt applies to slavery and racial oppression of blacks, even though it is only fair to point out that the former is over and the latter, arguably, is not.
And really, I think we should be always on-guard against certain types of hatred being acted out. Gays, for instance, are a relatively small group that encounters a relatively high (to put it mildly) level of intolerance & hatred. We just can't allow that to become "OK," but goddam, there's gotta be a reasonable limit to these hair-splitting definitions & guidelines.
I hate loud, ignorant people. If I verbally accost one of them and fire off a volley of insults aimed at their loudness and ignorance, it seems to me that the offense is in my attack, not in my base-line emotional response to them as loud, ignorant people.
It may seem wrong to say that I reserve my right to hate them, but I do, in fact, feel that way, and I insist that my hatred is an entirely separate issue from any assault upon them.

I mean, I get the whole "hate crime" thing; harming someone for no other reason than hate for "their kind" is, truly, an act very different from harming them because you have an ax to grind with them personally. But, the concept of "hate speech" seems like bullshit, to me. We either have Free Speech, or we don't. Either the sensitivities and feelings of Jews & blacks are more important than those of the average American, or they're not.

Hammering again on the same point, when one-- even when "one" is an entire society-- feels guilty about past events and acts out that guilt with over-compensating behavior, one opens a door to a room that somehow seems to become larger by the minute. We parents do that very thing with our kids. Does it truly repair the things over which we feel guilty? No. Does it help them, make them better people? No. Does it make us feel better? Only superficially.
Similarly, is there an end-game to our campaign of compensation toward Jews and blacks? Is there a point at which we will be able to comfortably say, "OK, that's it, now we're even?" No. Not at all, never.

Which brings us back to the young Young.
As far as I'm concerned, if all that happened was that he got drunk and hollered a bunch of shit-- any kind of shit, because I'm not aware of any kind that doesn't stink-- at a panhandler, I really don't much care, beyond my concern that his inebriation could impair his ability to help my goddam baseball team to win the following evening's game.
On the other hand, if he is progressively becoming a Problem Child whose virulent sociopathologies are becoming an unmanageable disturbance to the Detroit Tigers, then fuck him, he's a lazy, plodding Left-Fielder whose bat is good but not great.

As our information-rich society becomes more invasive and judgmental, and that "information" becomes not only more immediate but, simultaneously, the dispensation of it becomes more selective, I am all the more jealously guarding the door to my sports-enjoyment against the intrusion of a whole pile of bullshit that has nothing to do with the games.
Either Delmon Young is helping my beloved Tigers to win, or he's not.
Either this recent incident is proof of an on-going problem that will become harmful to the Tigers, or it's not.
Either he did some actual harm to the yarmulke-wearing panhandler, or he didn't.
Beyond that, as they say, "not a single fuck was given."

gullycanyon wrote:What I'm feeling about Delmon Young:

I think we are in another one of those situations where we sort of know what happened, but we probably don't know what's really going on. Obviously, we know the basic outline:

"Entree" of Drunk Delmon in altercation with panhandler outside of New York hotel.
"Side Dish" of allegations of racial (Jewish) epithets.

We don't know anything else, and the facts unknown to us may weigh more heavily into the over-all disposition of the matter than will the ones known.

How drunk? Blood-alcohol readings tell us little, as we know. Due to various factors, I could be 3X over the legal limit and barely seem to have been drinking, at all.
We don't know if Young was just noticeably drunk & disorderly or totally snockered & completely out of control.

We also don't know the back-story. This could be one of those situations where a pattern of behavior has been developing and has been one of on-going concern to those close to Young.
It would be telling, in that regard, to know Leyland's internal reaction to the initial notification. Maybe he was taken by surprise. That would be a Good Sign. Or, maybe he was not surprised, at all, and reflected thusly: "Well, I've been seeing THIS comin'." That would be a Bad Sign. And one essential to the eventual resolution, on the part of the team, of the issue.
Obviously, guys get drunk all of the time, and often there are embarrassing behaviors involved. In those cases, the "boys will be boys" theme is invoked (in ironic contrast to the "we're all grown adults here" mantra,) and any further arm-flapping is an inappropriate manifestation of our current overly-judgmental social climate.
On the other hand, some guys get drunk, truly drunk, ALL of the time, and the "behaviors" tend to morph from "embarrassing" to "outrageous, dangerous, and altogether totally unacceptable."
In those cases, when a professional sports team is involved, a mere shrug of the shoulders will not suffice, at least not for long, because not only does the team need to consider the direction to which the pattern is leading, the issue of "tacit approval" becomes relevant, and highly so.
The Yankees of the 1930's didn't need to fret over a few sportswriters and bartenders witnessing some drunkenness & ass-grabbing on the part of their charges. Today, if Derek Jeter forgets to provide his latest Trollop of the Day with a Gift-Basket on her way out, and she complains to a limo driver who is pals with some sports-media guys, we may know, via Twitter, of the Jete's Miscarriage of Socio-sexual Justice even before Derek's enchanted vesicles begin to refill with a fresh load of magical, cosmically-anointed semen.
So, even while the concept of "representing the organization" may be unnecessarily burdensome and the concept of "being a role-model" may be as ridiculous as ever, still a team must protect its image (especially today, when the importance of image-- absurd as this truth may be-- has not only matched the importance of reality, but has, in some ways, over-taken it.)
And, of course, the fact is that one guy is not equal to the other guy, and what the Migster can get away with far exceeds what Delmon can get away with. Cabrera could be found to have been bankrolling a meth lab and possibly, after a bit of wrangling and spin-control, retain his job with the Tigers. Delmon Young, if he becomes a problem, will be invited to pack up his 15 HR's, 70 RBI, and .285 BA and get the fuck out of town.

As to the incident, we don't know just how much molestation occurred. "Shut up and get the fuck away from me, you kike asshole" may be unmannerable, but it's much different from a scene wherein some actual physicality and a full minute's worth of anti-Semitic ragings were witnessed.

Still, the entire "hate speech" bit frosts my ass, because it's splitting a hair that shouldn't even be found on one's scalp. A barrage of mean-spirited insults or threats is inherently hateful, and I don't see how a crack about one's racial identity is any more hateful than a crack about one's physical appearance. Is there an Anti-Defamation League for "Gingers?"
Sometimes, we act as though the Jews took so much abuse 80 years ago that they now have some kind of ticket, one which bars any further distress, even so little as a personal insult.
I think our society is guilt-ridden over its failure to act sooner, back then, to prevent the "Holocaust," and the same guilt applies to slavery and racial oppression of blacks, even though it is only fair to point out that the former is over and the latter, arguably, is not.
And really, I think we should be always on-guard against certain types of hatred being acted out. Gays, for instance, are a relatively small group that encounters a relatively high (to put it mildly) level of intolerance & hatred. We just can't allow that to become "OK," but goddam, there's gotta be a reasonable limit to these hair-splitting definitions & guidelines.
I hate loud, ignorant people. If I verbally accost one of them and fire off a volley of insults aimed at their loudness and ignorance, it seems to me that the offense is in my attack, not in my base-line emotional response to them as loud, ignorant people.
It may seem wrong to say that I reserve my right to hate them, but I do, in fact, feel that way, and I insist that my hatred is an entirely separate issue from any assault upon them.

I mean, I get the whole "hate crime" thing; harming someone for no other reason than hate for "their kind" is, truly, an act very different from harming them because you have an ax to grind with them personally. But, the concept of "hate speech" seems like bullshit, to me. We either have Free Speech, or we don't. Either the sensitivities and feelings of Jews & blacks are more important than those of the average American, or they're not.

Hammering again on the same point, when one-- even when "one" is an entire society-- feels guilty about past events and acts out that guilt with over-compensating behavior, one opens a door to a room that somehow seems to become larger by the minute. We parents do that very thing with our kids. Does it truly repair the things over which we feel guilty? No. Does it help them, make them better people? No. Does it make us feel better? Only superficially.
Similarly, is there an end-game to our campaign of compensation toward Jews and blacks? Is there a point at which we will be able to comfortably say, "OK, that's it, now we're even?" No. Not at all, never.

Which brings us back to the young Young.
As far as I'm concerned, if all that happened was that he got drunk and hollered a bunch of shit-- any kind of shit, because I'm not aware of any kind that doesn't stink-- at a panhandler, I really don't much care, beyond my concern that his inebriation could impair his ability to help my goddam baseball team to win the following evening's game.
On the other hand, if he is progressively becoming a Problem Child whose virulent sociopathologies are becoming an unmanageable disturbance to the Detroit Tigers, then fuck him, he's a lazy, plodding Left-Fielder whose bat is good but not great.

As our information-rich society becomes more invasive and judgmental, and that "information" becomes not only more immediate but, simultaneously, the dispensation of it becomes more selective, I am all the more jealously guarding the door to my sports-enjoyment against the intrusion of a whole pile of bullshit that has nothing to do with the games.
Either Delmon Young is helping my beloved Tigers to win, or he's not.
Either this recent incident is proof of an on-going problem that will become harmful to the Tigers, or it's not.
Either he did some actual harm to the yarmulke-wearing panhandler, or he didn't.
Beyond that, as they say, "not a single fuck was given."

gullycanyon wrote:What's SMT?

But, yeah. Unless there's some runaway train zooming backward, here, and this incident is a manifestation of it, screw it, let's move along.

Roquefort Robert wrote:The only thing I care less about than the All-Star game: voting for the All-Star game.

gullycanyon wrote:I'm dividing a hearty Fuck You by 2 and cheerfully conveying a half of it to each of you.

D-Day wrote:

gullycanyon wrote:I'm dividing a hearty Fuck You by 2 and cheerfully conveying a half of it to each of you.

All in good fun

The Beav wrote:

D-Day wrote:

gullycanyon wrote:I'm dividing a hearty Fuck You by 2 and cheerfully conveying a half of it to each of you.

All in good fun

Fixed that for ya.

D-Day wrote:

gullycanyon wrote:I'm dividing a hearty Fuck You by 2 and cheerfully conveying a half of it to each of you.

[img]http://i298.photobucket.com/albums/mm262/mkiewicz/Facebook-1.jpg[/img

All in good fun