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Comment by trowawee | Hacker News Reader

Hahahahaha. Ok. Sure. You loved watching Jordan, but you dislike "egos and attitudes"? C'mon, man. Gettin' a little dog-whistle-y there. And the idea that Steph (or Dray) doesn't/don't have an ego or an attitude - the man rains conscience-less bombs from 40 feet out, turns and runs after shots because he knows they'll hit, and talks shit to other teams' bench while his shot falls. And that's before we start talking about Iggy or Dray.

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It's one thing to have an ego, but it's another to back it up. Jordan backed it up. My point was a lot of players have the ego without the skills. Also, Jordan's ego was focused on winning. He never made stupid statements in public (that I heard of). I can't tell you how many times LeBron said or did really dumb things off the court. Of course, all driven by his massive ego.

LeBron's a two-time champion in what's probably the best NBA, talent-wise, in the league history. He has won multiple MVPs and you could legitimately argue for him as MVP virtually every year he has ever played. There is no legitimate argument that he has not "backed it up".

And the reason you can't tell me how many times he has said or done dumb things off the court is because he really doesn't. He's a dedicated family man and a savvy businessman. He doesn't get in trouble. He got flack for The Decision, but most of that flack was stupid. I hate him as a player; I'm a Bulls fan, and he's owned us forever. But your criticism of him doesn't make any sense.

> Gettin' a little dog-whistle-y there.

What are you talking about?

There's always at least a bit of racist motivation for complaints about NBA players' "egos and attitudes". In this case that's probably not even most of what OP was saying. But when white American racists read complaints like that, they accurately assume that racism is part of it. Those who don't think that way, don't make that assumption. It's like a dog whistle in that certain audiences hear the message, and others don't.

> There's always at least a bit of racist motivation for complaints about NBA players' "egos and attitudes".

First of all, you just called someone on here racist. That's very insulting if you're wrong about the person in question.

Second, you just said that I can never complain about NBA player egos and attitudes, otherwise I'm a racist no matter what. I'm sure your premise must equally apply to all sports then: complain about hockey player egos, you're a racist; complain about baseball player egos, you're a racist; complain about football player egos, you're a racist. No?

You're building a wall against any criticism by elaborately abusing the concept of racism. Is it racist to artificially shield one group of players from criticism based on race, while not shielding players of every of race from identical criticism across every other sport?

Read my reply above, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11397602 ... hopefully that clarifies.

Or it's the usual inference-sans-implication that makes for fun eggshell-walking discourse.

> There's always at least a bit of racist motivation for complaints about NBA players' "egos and attitudes".

Oh, is there? That's quite a harsh accusation -- it can get people instantly fired nowadays -- so I'm sure you can back it up.

> It's like a dog whistle in that certain audiences hear the message, and others don't.

You seem to be very good indeed at hearing this alleged dog whistle. Perhaps the problem is a little closer to home than you realize.

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