This is an abbreviated version of our weekly Patreon show. To access the full-episode and support the pod, head on over to http://www.patreon.com/muckrakepodcast
Co-hosts Jared Yates Sexton and Nick Hauselman host a live show discussing Enes Kanter Freedom and his stand as an NBA player against China and how that reflects our own unwillingness to do something about tyranny across the world. Plus, they take a number of questions from the Muckrake community.
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Welcome to the Weekend Edition of the Buckering Podcast.
I'm Jared Yates Sexton.
I'm here with Nick Alseman.
Sprung it on me.
We're going live.
That's the way we apparently do around here is we just improvise.
That's right.
Nothing is scripted in case you're wondering.
We did not get on beforehand and write anything out.
One of the enjoyable things that I got to say in terms of tone and tenor of the podcast, Nick and I want this to sound like we're having a spontaneous conversation as this stuff is happening.
So we're living that forward and tonight we're going to do that for those who are not here right now.
This is a Patreon-exclusive live recording of The Weekender.
That means dozens of our closest patrons and Muckrake community members are hanging out tonight.
They've got a good chat going on over here.
They're debating the Muckrake merchandise that we still need to get out there into the world, particularly into my closet.
You, too, can join in these things if you're listening to the preview.
All you got to do is go over to patreon.com slash muckrakepodcast We have a lot to talk about tonight.
We're taking questions from the audience.
We have a developing situation right now where it seems like Vladimir Putin was pulling troops out.
Well, it started out it looked like there was going to be war.
He pulled some troops out.
It sounded like maybe things had calmed down.
Now it appears that the possible war is back on.
We've got all kinds of things.
We're going to cover this as it emerges, but tonight we're going to do these questions and we're going to talk about an article that I found really interesting and fascinating.
And there's not much of this stuff out there that is actually thought-provoking and actually brings up subjects that need to be discussed in America.
But I will say, when those things do come out, Every now and then you'll have somebody like a George Packer, and for people who don't know, George Packer is a journalist and a writer who's written some pretty incredible stuff.
He wrote a book called The Unwinding.
Did you ever read that book, Nick?
No, I was trying to figure out why I know his name so well, because I'm sure I've seen other articles by him, right?
Yeah, he's been an Atlantic guy.
And he wrote The Unwinding, which is basically, it was the story of America and the American dream and the American promise sort of coming apart, is what it was.
It's a really good book.
And I gotta tell you, when it came out a few years back, it was one of the first books that I read that actually started to put things into perspective a little bit.
And George Packer is a really insightful, really intelligent guy.
He suffers a little bit, Nick.
And he suffers a little bit because he is an entrenched, Affluent journalist.
And so sometimes he misses the mark on some stuff.
He's not really sure why things are sort of falling apart.
He knows it has something to do with neoliberal globalism.
He'll hit that every now and then.
But I got to tell you, I think this article that we're getting ready to discuss is one of the first times I've seen somebody in mainstream media really nailed this thing dead to rights or even begin a conversation that seems pertinent and relevant.
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, the article deals with a central question that we all probably have, and when you want to discuss, how do you deal with things that don't feel like you have any direct influence over, right?
And so as a result, most of us will just sort of like, I can't figure out how I'm supposed to deal with that, I just ignore it.
And it's a lot of different issues, like that could be the homeless issues you might see in major cities, where you simply just want to Just get them away, right?
I don't want to see it.
It doesn't exist if I don't see it.
But he expands it out into the world and what we're dealing with now, and that it's going to touch upon all the things we're talking about in this show, like the Olympics in China.
And it's interesting when he calls us out on it, too.
He does, and appropriately so.
We're going to get into this, and we have to admit sometimes the role that we play in this.
It's not necessarily a role that we always consciously play.
In fact, a lot of the roles that we play are both unconscious or unseen, but there are moments of Doubt about this moment.
You know what I mean?
There are moments where all of a sudden you look up and you're like, I think something's really screwed up.
I think shit has really turned sideways and really need to take a look at it.
And what Packard does in this article, it's called We're All Realists Now, and this was in the Atlantic.
It focused on, and I want to go ahead and get people up to speed so they understand some of this conversation.
It involves an NBA player, which of course is Coach Nick Halseman's realm.
It involves an NBA player named Enos Kanter, who has recently become Enos Kanter Freedom.
And he is a professional basketball player from Turkey who has made a decision in recent months.
How long has he been doing this?
How long has this been going on for?
I'm sorry, how long has Enes been like really speaking out on these things?
Actually, it's only been, I think, in the last like three or four years when he started out and they talked about it in the article.
And I remember even, you know, interacting about it was with Turkey, where he's from.
And an interesting tidbit in the article that was that was funny was that when he first gets to America and someone criticizes Obama in 2009, he's like, dude, you're to get arrested for saying that.
And the guy's like, no, no, this is America.
We don't that doesn't happen.
So he started doing it and was getting menaced and getting chased by, you know, Turkish thugs and whoever and people from the government and from Erdogan's government, like trying to intimidate him and even get him arrested.
Um, so this was, you know, there's no question him speaking out on that stage, uh, was a threat to him and his, and his family, um, and his family back home in Turkey.
So, but yeah, I would say it was probably around 2016 is when it started happening and he, he got into the league around 2010 is when he was a rookie.
So.
Yeah, so Enos Kanter Freedom, he gets in the league and he starts using his platform to speak out about the situation in Turkey with people like Erdogan.
And of course it costs him some of, you know, his family's freedom.
He doesn't get to talk to his family anymore.
And most of the country was pretty okay with that.
The problem was when Enos Kanter, who decided, you know what, I'm against authoritarianism.
He then says, you know, we have this problem in China that everybody is ignoring, which is of course the mistreatment, and mistreatment is like such a small word when we're really talking about this, of the Uyghur population, which of course is a minority population in China that has been routinely discriminated against, harassed.
They've been put in concentration camps.
They've been induced into forced labor.
Reports have come out of forced sterilization and rampant violence and sexual abuse, like really gnarly, awful stuff that is happening.
The problem that happens here is when Inez starts talking about the Uyghurs and China.
Here's a problem, which is that the NBA relies on China quite a bit for money, audience, markets, all of it.
And And what Enos finds immediately is that everybody in the NBA, and some of them support him, but others start coming out and saying, you can't talk about this, you can't get into it.
He starts feeling pressure from the league.
And the problem here isn't necessarily that people disagree with it.
The problem here is that China as a market, And as an economic power means that people feel like they can't step on their toes.
And so what has happened here is that the idea of morality or ethics or feelings about human rights have, of course, been stopped in their tracks because you have a bunch of people who are relying on China for money.
Well, this gets into the whole, like, LeBron thing and what happened a couple of years ago where the general manager of the Rockets, and the Rockets, if you might not know, they'd had Yao Ming on their team, which was the first, like, major Chinese player to come over to play.
So that was probably the beginning of the investment of China into the NBA back in, like, 2004, 2003.
And anyway, there's so much money now that, yes, it's like, it's really become a thing.
It's almost startling considering how much the NBA has encouraged expression and taking social stances.
And by the way, I'm glad I got two questions for you because those who don't know, Nick is very influential and very important.
Like they will, they will come down on you.
And by the way, I mean, I'm glad I got two questions for you because those who don't know, Nick is very influential and very important.
So I have two questions for him in just a second.
But in these leagues, particularly in the NBA, like as the BLM protests were happening, you know, people are wearing things on their jerseys.
There are things on the court.
Everybody is talking constantly about these social issues, right?
You know, you just watch the NFL, of course, and, you know, the NFL in the end zones have, like, end racism.
It takes all of us.
And meanwhile, they're telling, you know, Eminem, do not, you know, kneel on one knee.
Don't do it.
So here we have these corporations, and we've talked about this a lot on this podcast, who they know it's in their economic interest to pretend like they care about things, right?
But they don't really want to trouble anybody, and they don't really want to alienate anybody.
It's sort of a dance that they have to play.
And Nick, the two questions I have, one, Have you talked to people within the NBA about the China situation and how they feel about it?
And have you gotten a sense of like how people within the organization feel?
And two, I don't want to put you on the spot here, but you had mentioned before we started recording that you had actually talked to Enos Cantor, Freedom, about this issue.
So I was wondering if you could get into that.
Sure, sure.
I mean, listen, I've known Ennis since he was a rookie.
He used to, the guy who trained him was a guy who trained all my kids at the high school level.
So we would hang out.
And then I ran into him last summer while he was training.
And we had a nice courtship conversation reminiscing.
And I actually told him, I said, you know, I really do appreciate how out there you are and how willing you are to speak.
And I said that because it is so taboo and hardly anybody really wants to do it.
Even with the Black Lives Matter stuff, like people were, it was like, You know, pulling the back of the curtain, like, oh, I can dip my toe in that part of it.
There are a lot of NBA players who feel strongly about a lot of these issues.
But I think, you know, it was indicative of what we saw with LeBron when, so Daryl Morey, who was the general manager of the Rockets, where Cantor was sent and then cut.
But at the time, when he was the general manager of the Rockets, had said something that was on Twitter that was very, Sympathetic to the Hong Kong into one one China one or against no against one China rule and Like it just about cost him his job And I you know, and you know, I had I he appreciated people supporting him.
I you know, I take it I think he truly felt that he needed to say something but I think he probably would have maybe even took taking it back and he realized it was a it was a shitstorm and so as a result, I mean, I think I I think that the players, when they realize just how influential China is and how much money is involved, and remember, players go to China in the offseason and they get paid ridiculous amounts of money to do it, LeBron included.
And so they are, there isn't anybody that I know that besides Kanter, or besides freedom, that's been willing to step out of that now and risk losing all those dollars.
Now, China is vindictive in a way that maybe other countries wouldn't necessarily be.
So they do and would yank their money out.
And that's the legitimate fear.
I don't know if it would cause the downfall of the NBA, but it would certainly change the way the NBA has projected their revenue, let's just say, in a major way.
I don't want to talk about that motivation there, because this is something that I think people really need to understand, which is...
When we think about the world and we think about politics and when we think about how things work, a lot of the times it boils down into good and evil, right?
It boils down into, you know, sinister figures twirling their mustaches in the shadows and coming up with evil plans.
But really, a lot of this boils down to just both hard and soft pressures, right?
Like, the NBA and groups like it, and the NBA is a multi-billion dollar industry.
I mean, it's massive, right?
It's one of the most recognizable corporations in the world.
Global, yeah.
Global, period.
They still feel like they can't, you know, they have to tiptoe around this issue, and even they feel like that their morals or ethics have to be compromised to a certain extent.
And I want to lay my cards on the table and I want to be very clear that all of this is because of neoliberal globalization, right?
That we're all part of this system.
Uyghurs are being forced into forced labor.
They're creating products that many of us probably use.
I mean, again, lay my cards on the table.
I'm recording this right now.
Talking to you on a podcast from Apple.
And Apple does use forced labor shit.
And possibly Uyghur stuff.
You know, they'll come out and they'll say, we're against forced labor.
But meanwhile, they're lobbying the government not to put any sanctions in place.
Meanwhile, you have governments like the United States and Great Britain that says, hey, we condemn how the Uyghurs are being treated.
Meanwhile, they're buying products that were tested on Uyghurs.
including the security cameras that are being used in your towns that are going to be proliferated around the country.
I don't know it right now, but I have to assume that there are parts of, or there are clothes on my body that have been produced by people who are either being exploited or possibly part of forced labor, right?
Also, you can't forget there's forced abortions.
They're also controlling the population.
It's repulsive.
And what has happened, because we've been put in this system, is there's really not much of a choice.
And so what do we do, Nick?
Well, do you sit around and you think about it constantly, or do you do the cognitive dissonance in your brain where you're like, well, what are you going to do?
There's nothing we could possibly ever do.
What am I going to do?
Buy this from a corporation that also involves this exploitation.
And I think what Packard gets to at the heart of this is.
We have reached a point with globalization in which we have ethics and we have morals that we espouse in public, but it's almost impossible to live within them, which I have to admit, and I would love to hear what you have to say, I think is horrific.
I think that realization, when you actually look at it in the face, is actually something of like a modern horror.
You know, it's funny because my son, you know, who processes everything on the internet and on YouTube about, you know, the historical European political theory and all sorts of things.
And part of me thinks, you know, you should just be a kid and enjoy life and laugh and whatever.
And then I start to think about it.
I'm like, you know, there are people dying and starving and being oppressed across the world.
And that is a sad thing while we're sitting here in our nice, you know, things on our computers and just doing whatever we're doing.
It's a very, very difficult, you know, razor to stand on, right?
Because you're right.
These are atrocities that we need to try and do something about.
And what would you do?
Well, yeah, you'd be boycotting things that are made from there.
You'd be putting pressure on every politician to speak out and sanction China, maybe not have, you know, any kind of big events in China that would benefit them.
Like, oh, say.
Well, it's not like we have events in China.
Yeah.
You know, like, you know, maybe the Olympics, the Olympics probably shouldn't be held in China.
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