Tag: NBA

WNBA Rules Mandate that Enes Freedom and Royce White Be Let In

Enes Kanter Freedom and Royce White just threw their hats into the 2027 WNBA Draft

Under the basketball league’s own eligibility language, the two former NBA first-round picks are currently identifying as women.

Freedom and White’s declaration of gender has the WNBA dribbling across the cultural court to schedule an emergency task-force meeting of team presidents and general managers in order to discuss “transgender athlete participation.”

In a world of logic, reason, and ethics, the league has an obligation to apply its own set of rules consistently.

If the WNBA’s current framework treats self-identification as sufficient grounds for acceptance into the league, then Freedom and White currently meet every stated requirement.

Therefore, the league has a duty to afford both of them the opportunity to try out, or it must concede that the definition of the word “woman” refers to an individual’s chromosomal composition and attendant physiological characteristics.

On its face, Article XIII, Section 1(a) of the WNBA’s collective bargaining agreement (CBA) is unambiguous. It states the following: “Only players who are women are eligible to play in the WNBA.”

It offers no further definition of the term “women.” There are no hormone thresholds, no standards regarding surgical modifications, and no explicit self-identification policy. The document is completely silent on the subject of gender identity.

Freedom reviewed the stated guidelines and said, “If simply declaring who you are is all that’s required, then I meet every single requirement necessary to compete in the WNBA.”

White followed with his own announcement that he is “transgender” and “a woman,” as it pertains to his eligibility to gain admittance into the league.

Under the text that the league itself negotiated and signed, the logic of the two former NBA players is airtight. Freedom has also officially penned a letter to the league and shared the content in a social media post, saying “rules are rules!” in the caption. White is likely to follow suit.

It turns out that these two athletes are prompting the WNBA, as well as society at large, to engage in honest discussions about divisive and highly emotional issues in hopes that we arrive at mutually satisfying rational conclusions.

For years women’s sports organizations have embraced expansive inclusive rhetoric, while leaving the foundational categories of “woman” and “transgender” undefined. This ambiguity was sustainable only as long as no high-profile male athletes tested the boundaries.

Freedom (6’10” tall, 11-year NBA veteran) and White (6’ 8” tall, first-round pick of the Houston Rockets in 2012 ) are now attempting to hold the WNBA to its own stated standard.

The reaction of the league suggests that its standard was never meant to be taken literally or expected to be challenged.

Star WNBA player Sophie Cunningham is the catalyst who brought the biological males in female sports debate to a boiling point, setting the stage for the declarations by Freedom and White.

Cunningham’s stated desire is to “protect young girls in a locker room, or young girls in sports who shouldn’t have to go against biological men.”

The remarks predictably ignited immediate as well as sustained controversy. The female athlete’s willingness to utter aloud a biological sex-based view of women’s sports eligibility turned a simmering cultural issue into an all-out WNBA crisis.

Despite the shrill language from those on the far-left, the issue is resolvable by simply applying the principles of scientific knowledge, civil rights law, and common sense reasoning.

The biology of the human body is not a relative construct. Generally speaking, puberty actually produces distinct advantages in biological males in terms of height, muscle mass, bone density, lung capacity, and upper-body strength.

These differences are part of the reason why sex-segregated categories came into being in our society in the first place. Likewise with federal civil rights legislation, specifically Title IX, which prohibits sex discrimination and protects individuals (in the initial legislation, more often than not, girls) against sexual harassment and/or assault.

The WNBA was created so that elite female athletes could compete on a fair playing field. Allowing intact male physiology into the category undermines the very purpose of the league.

Still, the current collective bargaining agreement of the WNBA does not address or codify this biological firewall, thus creating the open door that Freedom and White are walking through.

Consistency demands one of two outcomes. The WNBA must either allow for self-declaration of gender, or it must rewrite its rules to explicitly state that eligibility is based on biology.

The players’ union has responded so far with language about diversity. This is an evasion of the issue. It is also an apparent attempt to divert discussion onto an emotional track as opposed to a fact-based one.

Freedom and White have essentially become a stress test for the league. If the planned emergency meeting of leaders produces more nuance, the league will have earned the “hypocrisy” label.

The reasoned outcomes are clear. The draft must be open to individuals who simply declare themselves to be women. Or the CBA must be amended to specify that the “W” in WNBA stands for “Women,” i.e., biologically female individuals.

Let the rules mean what they say, or change them so that they protect the athletes that the league was built to serve.

Here’s hoping science and logic rule the day.

China Attempts to Censor the World

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The People’s Republic of China has been busy stopping its own people from seeing, listening to, and otherwise engaging in informational and entertainment media of all sorts, including movies, television, books, newspapers, magazines, music, video games, and the Internet.

The Communist Party of China, the nation’s single ruling party, heavy-handedly mandates so. Notably, since 2012, when Xi Jinping became the General Secretary of the Communist Party, censorship has increased significantly.

A Hollywood case in point. Richard Gere, by all measures, had in the past been considered to be a bona-fide superstar. But something curious happened after he made a pro-Dalai Lama speech at the 1993 Academy Awards.

In what he likely assumed was a free speech prerogative, the actor went about sharing with others that he was a follower and even a defender of someone the Chinese government abhors. He soon found himself being shunned by the major studios, and he has been noticeably absent from Oscar ceremonies ever since.

“There are definitely movies that I can’t be in because the Chinese will say, ‘Not with him,’” Gere told the Hollywood Reporter.

Apparently, tech giants Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Yahoo have been voluntarily self-censoring their content for Chinese markets in order to continue conducting business with the country. Other companies and individuals have not been afforded the same opportunity.

China has banned a host of musical artists over time including Maroon 5, Lady Gaga, Guns N’ Roses, and Kylie Minogue.

Zedd, the international Grammy-winning DJ, found himself permanently banished from China. The mistake he made was that he “liked” a tweet posted on the “South Park” Twitter account. The tweet in question referred to the 300th episode of the successful animated television program. Perhaps surprisingly for Zedd, the government of China had just banned “South Park” over an episode that lampooned China along with the NBA.

The Chinese state broadcaster CCTV made the decision to ban NBA pre-season games after a tweet was posted by Daryl Morey, general manager of the Houston Rockets, which lent support to the anti-government demonstrations in Hong Kong.

Using their show to poke China, “South Park” creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone aired an episode titled “Band in China,” which sent a delightfully satiric message to tech, entertainment, and sports institutions about some of the current practices of dutifully complying with China’s censors.

In the episode, one of the “South Park” characters is arrested in China and subsequently observes the brutal treatment that some of the Chinese prisoners are forced to endure.

Which prisoners suffer the abuse? Two banned characters from one of the world’s most beloved literary faves – Winnie the Pooh and his best friend Piglet, who were eliminated because Chinese dictator Xi was said to resemble Pooh in online memes.

A cartoon version of an entertainment executive who appears in the episode states that Pooh cannot be the subject of a film because the literary and Disney character is “illegal,” due to the fact that “some Chinese students said he looked like the Chinese president.”

Real life entertainment executives have been bending to China’s will for years. Disney’s movie “Christopher Robin” was not shown in the communist nation because Winnie the Pooh had a starring role in the film.

Brad Pitt’s “World War Z” had to be altered because the plot originally had the zombie outbreak originating in China and subsequently spreading throughout the world.

The remake of “Red Dawn” was re-shot and digitally altered to switch the ancestral heritage of the invaders of the U.S. from Chinese to North Korean. Despite the modifications, it still ended up not being released in China.

The James Bond movie “Skyfall” could only be shown in China after scenes were edited out, ones that depicted the existence of prostitutes in a part of China known as Macau. Additionally, references to torture that was being carried out by Chinese police had to be eliminated.

The film “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End” had footage taken out, which featured Hong Kong actor Chow Yun-fat’s character, in order to please the Chinese powers that be.

“Mission Impossible III” edited out a car chase that took place in Shanghai because underwear could be seen hanging on clotheslines.

“The Departed” was banned because of an implication that the Chinese communists planned to use nuclear weapons on Taiwan.

The Bond film “Casino Royale” could only be screened after references to the Cold War were removed.

Parker and Stone issued a biting “official apology” panning China’s ban of “South Park” and jabbing the NBA while they were at it.

“Like the NBA, we welcome the Chinese censors into our homes and into our hearts. We too love money more than freedom and democracy. Xi doesn’t look just like Winnie the Pooh at all. Tune into our 300th episode this Wednesday at 10! Long live the Great Communist Party of China! May this autumn’s sorghum harvest be bountiful! We good now China?”

As slippery slopes would have it, the stifling of free speech is not being confined within China’s borders. Rather, it looks as if the freedom-denying activity has become one of China’s biggest exports.