Thank You Commissioner Manfred for reminding me racism can be tolerated and Asians don’t matter much in this country.
I thought my first Medium post would be about traveling or something existential, but I’m glad it’s this instead.
When I first saw Gurriel’s “mistake,” I felt the same thing I’ve felt hundreds of times before — a surge of anger, resentment and WTF disgust — but it only lasted a few seconds before I started to calm myself down with “it’s not that big of a deal” thoughts and “maybe he didn’t mean it” rationale. Then I recognized the defense mechanism I learned in junior high and snapped my teenage self out of it.
Over the next few days, I tracked the news to see how the media would respond and took temp checks on how I felt about it all. Then I watched the most amazing baseball game I’ve ever seen in my life on Sunday, but at the end all I could think about was that Gurriel’s 3-run homer never should’ve happened b/c he never should’ve been playing.
Darvish’s initial response was anger, but that soon gave way to a gracious and forgiving statement about love and understanding our human flaws. For all its dignity, I couldn’t help but think that he mirrored the same patterns I’d been taught and wonder what would’ve happened if the people involved were of different races.
Growing up in NYC I fielded racist slurs and was mocked for being Chinese/looking Asian on the regular. The first time I was called “chink,” it sent a huge shock to my system even before I understood the word b/c I felt the malice from the human being staring me down. It was vitriolic and hateful, delivered with the intent to hurt.
But the model minority thing is real. Culturally, I was taught and validated for being obedient, seen but not heard and accepting of racial injustices as the way of the world. The only way forward was to ignore it and focus on realizing your own success. Society reinforced that by showing me racism towards Asians isn’t that big of a deal. Over time all these inputs subconsciously affected what I told myself. I started to believe that it’s not that big of a deal, that other minorities experience far worse things and each act of racism was a small slight that I could bear.
But relative racism is bullshit and useless. Actions and words either are or aren’t racist and it’s exhausting to measure injustices against each other to confirm whether we have a right to be offended. Racism’s boundaries are clear no matter the size of the offense and I’m so saddened by obvious racism falling in the realm of grey. When someone’s race is used as a target, it’s not fucking ok.
It’s not a mistake to act like a racist, it’s brute ignorance. It’s not a political issue to address racism, it’s a human one. Racism is increasingly empowered by those in power like Trump and Gurriel is no different. We have higher standards for people and organizations who have the platform to influence others whether they want it or not, and we need to hold them to those standards.
Gurriel plays a global game and is currently on the most prominent stage of the sport, which is supposed to stand for so many integral values, not just of baseball, but of the United States of America. Five games next season, six months from now means nothing. To hide behind the timing of where we are in the season sends the message that the MLB is ok with racism in certain situations and marginalizing the Asian population depending on the context.
But Manfred, because these reminders are important to temp check where we are as society, shows us how far we have to go and reinforce what it is we value.
A heartfelt thank you to Michael Baumann/The Ringer, Ken Rosenthal/The Athletic, Bill Plaschke/LA Times, R. McHale/Boston Sports Extra and the other columnists who unequivocally landed on one side of the debate about Manfred’s decision. Jessica Mendoza, thank you so much for speaking your mind on ESPN, a network that doesn’t appreciate their talent saying what they actually think, especially against the leagues (see: Bill Simmons). You did it not just once, but twice on National TV.
I sincerely appreciate you all. It means the world to feel seen and considered, especially by those who have voices that stretch beyond the water cooler.
ESPN, I used to work for you and was so disappointed and hurt that you removed all the video clips of Jessica’s comments, but I was able to find her Mike&Mike clip on Twitter. (Can someone with more reach write about ESPN’s editing please?!)
We talk about zero tolerance policies, as recently as a few months ago with Adam Jones dealing with racist fans, but how can we count on the MLB to issue appropriate punishments for fans if it won’t appropriately punish their own players. I’d respect the MLB more if they just admitted that business comes first and values, integrity, etc. come after.
They release statements with quotes like, “There is no place in our game for the behavior — or any behavior like the behavior we witnessed last night. There is no excuse or explanation that makes that type of behavior acceptable.”
But, there is a place in our game for the behavior that we witnessed and there is an excuse or explanation that makes that type of behavior acceptable.
It’s called the World Series and all the money that comes with it. And that’s simply more important.
