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NBA Store OKed Black Lives Matter & Anti-Semitic Jerseys, But Not 'Free Hong Kong' (5 Cartoons)

Ever wonder why the phrase “All Lives Matter” sends liberals into a sputtering rage? There are several reasons, one of them being they ...

Ever wonder why the phrase “All Lives Matter” sends liberals into a sputtering rage?
There are several reasons, one of them being they don’t want genuine equality or color-blindness sharing the spotlight with the Black Lives Matter movement’s real objectives.
But perhaps the most-overlooked is the harsh but true fact that, to the Left, all lives don’t matter.
Case in point: Andrew Stiles at the Washington Free Beacon identified something deeply alarming about the NBA’s online store, specifically the option to print custom names or messages on apparel:
Typing “Free Hong Kong” into the text box on the NBA store’s custom jersey page returns the following message: “We are unable to customize this item with the text you have entered. Please try a different entry.”
Here are some of the phrases that don’t receive such a warning:
F—K HONG KONG
DEFUND POLICE
ABOLISH COPS
BEWARE OF JEWS
SNEAKY JEWS
BAN GYPSIES
XI FOR LIFE
CANCEL ISRAEL
NINE 11 HOAX
END TAIWAN
ENSLAVE TIBET
TRUMP HAS AIDS
PENCE IS GAY
UYGHURS LIE
Now, in the interest of fairness it must be pointed out that we here at TFPP were unable to reproduce the Free Beacon’s results; we typed in “FREEHONGKONG” and it went through without a hitch.
It seems that someone in the organization caught wind of the issue and quickly corrected it to stave off the inevitable bad press.
But the fact that the double-standard was ever there — and it’s hard to imagine any way an innocent technical error could have wound up banning “Free Hong Kong” while allowing the name accompanied by a different F-word — is scandalous enough, especially coming from an organization with a history of pro-China bias.
Remember last year, when the basketball establishment came down like a ton of bricks on Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey for tweeting “stand with Hong Kong”?
Team owner Tilman Fertitta quickly stated that the tweet did not represent the team, and the following Monday the NBA issued a statement in hopes of staving off Chinese broadcasters’ threats to suspend the airing of Rockets games.
“While Daryl has made it clear that his tweet does not represent the Rockets or the NBA, the values of the league support individuals educating themselves and sharing their views on matters important to them,” the English statement read. “We have great respect for the history and culture of China and hope that sports and the NBA can be used as a unifying force to bridge cultural divides and bring people together.”
USA Today reported that the NBA’s Chinese-language statement struck a noticeably different tone, opening with a matter-of-fact declaration that Morey’s tweet was “inappropriate” and “regrettable,” and demoting individual expression from one of the “values of the league” to merely something “people can be interested in.”
On the Left, the only lives that matter are the ones from which something can be gained. Right now, pretending to speak for black Americans is useful for amassing power and stirring up emotion for specific policies (never mind whether those policies are actually in the best interests of blacks).
By contrast, there’s no percentage for the social justice warriors of the NBA in showing any particular regard for lives on the other side of the world — especially when doing so is frowned upon by the tyrannical, yet highly lucrative, regime they’re currently doing business with.
“Progressive,” indeed.