Jemele and Mike

Zoom in very closely on that photo. I chose it carefully and for a reason. There's a hidden message!

None of us know completely anyone's experiences and life on Earth. What makes them tick, think the way they do, and have valid opinions.

 

Sage Steele and Cari Champion come to mind. Steele, though tremendously EDIT: talented (don't want to think I don't think she's excellent because I disagree with her politics), is also rather outspokenly conservative (I believe she's a military brat).

 

You are responding to an imaginary post.

 

Lots of solid posts all the way around here.

Jemele's tweets on Hitler and saying that Trump is a bigot/racist speak to me that, perhaps, she is looking for a landing spot other than ESPN. Perhaps that she sees the future at Bristol and that may not be for her in five years.

Some have brought up Curt Schilling and why he got fired and Hill did not. I think Roger Goddell/Simmons is a more apt comparison. ESPN suspended Simmons for, what, three weeks during the NFL season? Will Jemele even get suspended over this?

I think this is an orchestrated move by Hill to get to CNN or MSNBC -- to be something "bigger than sports".

ESPN would be smart to just tolerate her until she moves on. No sense in getting into a public row with her over this. Take the small hits now and, eventually, she'll move on.

 

I don't know if you're right, but it's a very, very plausible scenario for all parties.

 

I'm asking this genuinely: Is there a difference between a white person who is racist and a white supremacist? Are all white racists by definition white supremacists?

Or are white supremacists somehow worse than racists? Does that term denote something particularly vile, like Nazism?

 

I can't think of a principled distinction. I guess white supremacist implies a more organized, thought-through approach, an ideology, and that someone has adopted it as part of their identity.

 

Back on the sports anchoring bit and how the SC6 became Jemele Hill and a guy with questionable comedic timing and delivery.

I was a sports anchor for a decade and, since leaving, I've been on the search team for other sports anchors -- both at my station and at other markets in the country. I have quite a few friends now in news management so they'll often send me a dozen reels and I'll offer feedback.

Here is what I look for when I view a reel:
- Knowledge of the subject/teams/athletes. That's first for me. As a former sports guy, I can tell within 15 seconds if a person knows the subject.
- Is the person reasonably attractive to look at (male or female)? Sorry... but this does matter. This is also not just about raw looks. Do they dress properly? Match a shirt/tie? Is the hair professional? All part of the package.
- Creative writer?
- Are they funny (in moderation) or high-energy in their delivery?
- Can they make boring high school softball/volleyball highlights remotely interesting?

Ideally, you want 4 of the 5. A good looking guy often gets a pass if he's a boring writer. A good looking woman often gets a pass on the writing/knowledge aspect. A fat, bald guy better be a world-class comedian to pass through. (We had a sports reporter a few years ago who asked me if he should apply for a Top 20 job. He's 50 pounds overweight and has a combover. I told him, "look at yourself in the mirror. Are you the best version of you right now? If not, become the best version as soon as you can." He never lost the weight. He's still here and never moved up.)

The job of the "highlight-driven monster" (of which I was one, straight out the Olbermann/Patrick Knockoff School of the late 90s) is becoming a carnival barker or a TV repairman. We just aren't needed as much anymore. Perhaps on the halftime shows for ESPN, Big Ten, FOX Regionals.

Now it's about issues and interviews and I don't think that's a bad thing.

Opinion matters in 2017. Bold matters. That's why Jemele got hired. (Still not sure why Michael Smith got hired -- he brings very little and struggles to enunciate his points.) We are also now on Page 32 of a thread about her. That says something. ESPN won't fire her because of the potential backlash. Just how far will she take the freedom that she has?

I don't think people watch specifically for her. She isn't Stephen A -- or even Van Pelt. She is a placeholder for buzz about a new SportsCenter product... for now. I imagine her agent is probably working backchannel to find a landing spot for her. (Comedy Central even could be a place? At least they'd hire someone without a distracting accent to talk about the issues of the day.)

News managers have these different "divisions" for how they hire sports people, almost all based on demographics:

- White male. He is most likely to be the main sports anchor in Small or Medium Market USA but moving up into a Top 20 market can be a bit of a challenge unless he's a hunk. Younger guys can move up quickly to a sports reporter job because they're less expensive.
- Black male. Often makes huge jumps from, say, Cheyenne to Milwaukee or Grand Junction to San Diego. Frequently assigned to do weekends (that way the station management feels good about themselves and diversity). Easier time getting into ESPN or big markets but a harder time getting the main sports anchor jobs in medium markets in the Midwest.
- White female. Usually gets to skip the first step on the ladder (Market 100+) and lands that sports reporter job out of college (usually the #3 in the department) where she anchors on Christmas and is the game-day reporter for the market's franchise team. Often assigned to high school beat. Jumps from, say, her first job in Toledo to a Fox Sports regional where she asks coach two questions at halftime and ponders how to parlay that into Access Hollywood.
- Black female. The rarest of all in the talent pool. News managers will do whatever they can to hire them. If they're decent to good, they have a national platform within 3 years. If they're not, they leave the business quickly.

For news managers, finding a sports anchor is no different than going on Auto Trader for a car. Pick your color, gender and price. Select from the results.

 

This is my guess at where the term is headed.

White supremacy denotes what some current thinkers - of all races - believe the bedrock ideology of the United States was, is and has always been. America was founded under racist terms, and thus it remains so. As in, if you're white, and you're in America, you benefit from white supremacy and white privilege.

If you deny or don't see that you have this privilege, or seek in some way to protect this privilege, you are either unwittingly contributing to white supremacy and need to pass the mic/get woke/be reeducated, or you are an active white supremacist.

 

In Boston TV, it's notable that two of the four major stations have had the same sports people for eons, and that said people are black and white men who were born and raised here and never worked anywhere else, and that the other two have had constant turnover of anchors, on-scene reporters, etc. I watch one the first two stations because that's where my wife worked as a producer back in the day, meaning the '80s and early '90s.