China Buys LeBron's Silence?

[00:00:16] Speaker A: Hello and welcome to an episode of call it like I see it presented by disruption. Now, I'm James Keys, and today we discuss what we see with LeBron James'apparent desire to shut up and dribble with respect to the issue of the ongoing protests in Hong Kong related to the efforts to be more free from chinese influence and control. Joining me today is the man, the myth, the legend, Rob Richardson. [00:00:42] Speaker B: What's up, bro? Hey, what's going on? All right. [00:00:45] Speaker A: Also joining me today is the real Mr. T. Toonday. Ogunlana, tell me the good news. [00:00:51] Speaker B: Toonday, what's up, brother? I appreciate the A team shout out, for sure. [00:00:58] Speaker A: All right, so all this began back on October 4, when Darryl Mori, the GM of the Houston Rockets in the NBA, published and then almost immediately deleted a tweet in support of the Hong Kong protesters. This happened right before LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers were to play a few exhibition games in China. Over the course of about a week. The chinese government demonstrated very quickly and swiftly that they were very displeased with the tweet, even that it was deleted, or even with it being deleted. And the fallout has included lots of immediate and prospective financial harm for the Rockets, the NBA, and potentially even the players in the NBA. So now, once LeBron got backstage side, he weighed in to the controversy, and he said in relevant part that I quote, I just think that when you're misinformed or you're not educated about something, and I'm just talking about the tweet itself, you never know the ramifications that could happen. We all seen what that did, not only for our league, but for all of us in America, for the people in China as well. Needless to say, this has caused a lot of people have an opinion on this. A lot of people are talking about this, people are calling them out. Other people are offering some level of support. So my question for you guys is, what do you see here? Does LeBron have an obligation to give us more than this? What do you see? Let me hear, Rob. What you got, man? [00:02:24] Speaker C: Well, I don't think LeBron has an obligation to give more. You make a choice if you want to be a social justice warrior, if you want to put yourself in the middle of a controversy. That being said, as LeBron said himself, look, when you put yourself in the middle of something, you need to be informed and think about it before you say it. I don't think he did that with this statement because he seems surprised that people are mad that he took this position. He took a position that he has a right to take it, and I can understand from a business perspective why he took it. But in the age of social media, in the age where people are never going to let you live down what you said, particularly when you have the brand that LeBron has, I think LeBron wants to have and be known as more than a basketball player. He wants to be known as a social justice warrior. He wants to align himself with the likes of Muhammad Ali and people like, you know, I'm pretty comfortable. Muhammad Ali wouldn't have said this statement because he would have probably wanted to be on the side of those who were protesting in Hong Kong, who are protesting, which I think rightly so, for the right to be free, for the right to have independent thought. LeBron James understands how important this is. And he said, yes, I believe in free speech. This is what he said regarding the China comments. This is what he said, you know, yes, do we have free speech and all that? But there are consequences to that. Taking that same logic, he's mad about the NFL being slave owners and talking about Kaepernick and know we, I support his right and they're denying his right to have free speech. Same thing's happening in Hong Kong. So people are saying, now what's the difference? And I say it's a good. [00:04:03] Speaker A: No, certainly, certainly. What do you think, Toonday? How did this strike you? [00:04:07] Speaker B: I think that just another example of us focusing too much on kind of people saying stuff off a whim. Look, the guy's first job is to be the best basketball player in the world. Second job is to be a businessman. Somewhere in there he's a dad and a husband. The three of us on the show are very into politics and geopolitics. We read a lot. We're constantly kind of up on that stuff. So I think a lot of us can get caught into criticizing someone who I don't think, and I'm going to give him the benefit of doubt that he knows all the nuances between the relationship between Taiwan, China, Hong Kong, all that. And I could see him as a regular guy that goes to China a lot for his business as a basketball player. He probably gets treated great. He probably thinks China is a cool country. [00:04:54] Speaker A: Sure he does. [00:04:55] Speaker B: You guys make a good point about the NFL comparison because think about someone from overseas coming to the United States getting the best treatment because they're maybe famous or something, getting invited to NFL games and all that, and then hearing certain Americans criticize the NFL. Right, as someone that is not american and understanding and viscerally gets the american culture and our history and everything else that we all know about America. They might have the same attitude, like, man, what are these guys kneeling, complaining, know they're getting paid, everything's good and not really understanding. Maybe the cultural nuances and the effect of maybe a statement like that might make. So the thing is that it's, again, another example of how social media is disrupting everything. [00:05:43] Speaker C: I think we all like LeBron, and I think there's a reason that you probably want to give him the benefit of the doubt because we like him. [00:05:49] Speaker B: For the stuff he's done. [00:05:50] Speaker C: But I think it's a little naive to believe that LeBron doesn't understand Hong Kong. Like, you have to be not paying attention at all, have blinders on for the last year to not understand because. [00:06:03] Speaker A: It'S been very prominent. It's been very prominent. [00:06:05] Speaker C: I think he knows and I think it was on his mind and I think it probably will affect his business. And look, he's right. You speak up. You are one of the most known figures in the world. I would say that. I would go with your argument, Tunday, if this was an athlete that's not politically inclined, but he literally responded to the right, like, I'm not going to be that type of athlete. I'm not going to shut up and dribble. I'm not going to do the things you said that he does. I'm going to be socially conscious. I'm going to use my voice. Now, he's not using his voice in something that seems to be aligned with everything he believes, and he seems to be going in the opposite direction. People are going to ask and look, that's the consequence of social media. Social media is probably why he's making a lot of money, too. So I can't, there's a benefit there. [00:06:53] Speaker A: Well, I'll say this, though. Let me tell you this, though. I think he gave away some of what his mindset is, and I'm not saying inadvertently this is probably intentional, just that he's weighing consequences. And in his mind, this is not close enough to home. It appears from his statement this is not close enough to home for him to put himself out there and deal with the consequences. Now, you have to acknowledge that this is someone who has been willing on some issues to put himself out there and deal with the consequences. Correct? So we can't say that the guy just is unwilling to do that. In general, he's not Michael Jordan, but at the same time, now he is balancing here and determining. [00:07:36] Speaker C: It sounds like a Michael Jordan. [00:07:37] Speaker A: This is a Michael Jordan. Well, but now I have a question for you. Like, does he have an obligation, he's signing contracts with companies. Well, NBA, obviously, and Nike, Warner brothers with space jam about to drop in a year or two. And does he have an obligation to not weigh in because all that money he's being paid is on him being able to deliver at the same level or a greater level than he is now. And if he starts doing this in a place like China where the speech is suppressed, there is no free speech there, Twitter is banned. People aren't going to get both sides. [00:08:12] Speaker C: Of the, there is no Google is ten c. That stuff doesn't exist. [00:08:15] Speaker A: Exactly. People are not going to get both sides of the issue. And so if he starts weighing in and angers the people who control all the information there. [00:08:23] Speaker B: But he has weighed in, though. [00:08:25] Speaker A: That's true. [00:08:26] Speaker C: That's the problem. I don't think he should have, this was a major, what he criticized the GM of the rockets of doing, he is doing. He said, look, you shouldn't weigh into something without knowing all the consequences or being uninformed. And then he backs out saying, well, I wasn't all the way informed and is surprised that he's getting backlash for what he been. I think he should have not weighed in if he didn't want any type of backlash, like, you're going to face it, he might not be facing it from China. Now he's facing it from all those fans in Hong Kong. And there's a lot of fans in Hong Kong that are avid basketball fans. [00:09:01] Speaker A: And he's getting it here, too, because it's his brand. [00:09:05] Speaker C: His brand is social justice. [00:09:06] Speaker B: Part of it is people just want to tear down the guy that hasn't really had any issues yet because he's been squeaky clean for 15 years of his career. And you make a good point, Rob. I'm a LeBron fan, so I'm sure there's a part of my brain, it's all mine to defend him and all this stuff. But when I saw this story, I was like, here we go again. A guy sends one thing out, and I guess maybe if I was a Hong Kong person, I'd be more sensitive for sure. But I think this is where our society is again, picking and choosing what we think we care about. Because, number one, I think we should care about everybody, including Hong Kong and China and all that. I'll give the benefit of the doubt because I've been around NBA players, NFL players, these guys aren't like scholarly guys reading freaking history books and shit. I'm sure LeBron understands there's stuff going on between China and Hong Kong. Does he really understand the reunification in 2000, that Hong Kong was a british asset for so many years, that they were independent? But before the British were in China 200 years ago, there was a chinese asset. You kind of got to be up on the game to really understand all that. And I don't expect a guy who I don't think spends a lot of time thinking about life in that sense to get it all. And then what I'm saying about we pick and choose what we're outraged about, I'm more upset, and you guys have heard me say this on other shows, I'm more upset that a guy like him isn't yelling at the top of his lungs about the child separation policy at the border, because, like, you guys have heard me tell you, he's a descendant of slaves. As an African American, he should be more upset about children being separated. [00:10:42] Speaker C: But he actually has attacked Trump on the border wall. He's been very specific. [00:10:45] Speaker B: I'm just saying that. [00:10:47] Speaker C: And about the border, too, there's other areas of injustice. [00:10:51] Speaker B: I mean, he could be talking about how he just screwed the Kurds last week by pulling out and these guys are on tv getting slaughtered. Right? [00:10:56] Speaker C: But he weighed into this. But he weighed into this. Toonday, he weighed different. [00:11:01] Speaker B: I think you're right, Rob. He's misinformed. He doesn't know much about the subject. He probably should have not done it. I agree. [00:11:07] Speaker C: And he's got power. [00:11:08] Speaker A: But Toonday, I think you're setting up a standard that's unnecessarily high, though. What do you need to know to weigh in on this, other than China is an authoritative state that is attempting to assert dominion over Hong Kong. And the people of Hong Kong are protesting because they would like more freedom. They would like freedom of speech. [00:11:29] Speaker B: They would like everything you just said. But if I said you don't need. [00:11:33] Speaker A: To understand reunification, for that, you don't need to understand what China is doing in Tibet or Taiwan. [00:11:38] Speaker B: Let's get into further detail. What does that mean? That's all I'm saying. And I'm not saying it as a challenge. I'm just saying that that's great that you can describe it that way. But what does that really mean in terms of my understanding? I'm saying if I didn't understand it, of my understanding of what the oppression is. Let's talk about that. [00:11:55] Speaker A: Because, yeah, I'll give you an example. I'll give you an example. If you go back 60 years in this country, certain artists, again, this is entertainers. Basketball players are entertainers. There are certain artists that when a venue wanted to book them and they had segregated facilities, the artists would decline. They would turn down that money because they did not want to patronize people who were doing segregated facilities or they wouldn't let black people in the room at all. Yeah, that was oftentimes there were black artists that did that, but there were, as you just point out, there were white artists that did that as well. And so now that's not everybody. But they don't have to understand the history of slavery in order to say, hey, you know what? That's not fair. That's not right. That's not in accordance with my beliefs. Now, I'm with you in terms of I like LeBron. I think LeBron is a decent guy. What I've seen over 15 years is I'm not going to change that based on this one incident. I agree. I think the questions are more interesting than the answers because he's in a pickle, bottom line. [00:13:00] Speaker C: Mad that he put himself in. [00:13:02] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. If he didn't say anything, then he gets to maintain the silence and say, hey, I'm not being inconsistent, so to speak, when he says something, and with a lot of things like this, not supporting freedom is a tacit endorsement of oppression. Correct. Then you wade into that situation where he's saying now, to his credit, he clarified later by Twitter and said that when I say misinformed, I'm speaking of the consequences. I'm speaking of what's going to happen to people. And that actually leads me to the next point I want to talk to you guys with. Do you think his mindset on this was framed or that is guided by the fact that he was in China when this blew up? If things go wrong, he could potentially worry if he's going to be able to make it back. China is not. This is not America. They can potentially lock you down. [00:13:52] Speaker B: You could disappear. [00:13:54] Speaker A: So do you think that plays a role into his mind? [00:13:56] Speaker B: I think he's going to be like, ASAP. What? The president has to prove something. He might use that as a chance to get back at him. You talk about me. You're going to stay over in China. [00:14:08] Speaker C: Go ahead. [00:14:09] Speaker B: Today? No, I was just going to say that I would be surprised if the fact that he was in China when it happened didn't affect something, because obviously he's in their country and he sees their reaction, their media. I'm sure that affects something, but I think I just want to agree with the point you make, which is kind of, I guess the way I feel, which is you got a guy that has been squeaky clean for 15 years. Most guys at the young age that he became famous at 18, out of high school, famous multimillionaire. [00:14:40] Speaker A: He was famous before that, he was on ESPN, all that. Yeah. [00:14:44] Speaker B: Me, you rob, everybody, all of us that we know would have probably done something stupid between then and age 34, 35, that we would have been in the paper for something, right? We'd have been busted with some weed. We'd have been cheating on the girl. Something would have happened for most guys at 18, being millionaires on tv with cameras. I respect that guy a lot, that not only has he kept himself clean in general, but like we've talked about, he's built a school, he's given back to the community. He hasn't been like other famous athletes that have not been conscious about things. [00:15:17] Speaker A: I think you can go broader. You can say entertainers or famous businessmen or famous or rich. He's the exception of a lot of. [00:15:26] Speaker B: He'S a great example. And so my thing, that's why I said, you're right, and I agree with your point, that in the way you say it, has kind of explained my feeling, which is I'm not going to let one of these tweet things and this social media outrage determine my view on the guy overall. Because now, if it's a pattern, if we see two or three more tweets like this, where he's kind of acting like this, but I'm sorry, I'll take it back. Then it might be like, hey, man, maybe the guy, he's now at another level, mentally. Maybe he's got grandiose. [00:15:53] Speaker A: You mean if he goes Kanye on us? [00:15:55] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. If we never see this again in two, three know, let's give the guy a chance type of thing, he's going to be fine. [00:16:05] Speaker C: Anyway, look, let me say this. He can do this over and over again with China, because do I think most of his base of young African American or people of color had that same connection to people in Hong Kong? Probably not, but that doesn't make it necessarily mean he doesn't have that same connection. And I think he did this weighing out the consequences. So I think he looked at the consequences as being, if I don't say something, I could be jeopardizing future potential to help a lot of people, help a lot more people. That's what I'm guessing, I'm totally speculating here because he has a lot of money at stake. You talk about China. We're talking about real money. We're talking about the difference between. He's worth 450,000,000. That's nothing compared to how much money he can make in China. He could be worth 10 billion. [00:16:52] Speaker A: Correct. [00:16:53] Speaker C: Before this is over. [00:16:54] Speaker A: Yeah. They have like, what, 300 million basketball fans. [00:16:58] Speaker C: That's what I'm saying. [00:16:58] Speaker A: That's as many people we have in the country. [00:17:01] Speaker C: They are avid, as I've told people I've been to China. They thought I was a basketball player, I could do whatever I wanted to. It's a different world. They are avid. And he does not want to piss off. [00:17:12] Speaker B: No, but that's what I'm saying is that, remember, when he goes there, he gets that kind of treatment on that. What I'm saying is he won't in. [00:17:18] Speaker C: Hong Kong for a while, but go ahead. [00:17:20] Speaker B: But I'm just saying, I don't know if he really contemplates that they are oppressing anyone there because he probably doesn't see that side of China because he. [00:17:27] Speaker C: Doesn'T have to see it. But that's my. [00:17:29] Speaker B: That. So I'm going to give him the benefit of that, that he made a stupid, naive statement. He waded into a topic that he had no business really getting into. And I also think part of it is, look, we all are more as human beings, more sensitive with what's in our backyard and what's at home. So you're right, he's a big proponent of fighting injustice here in the United States. But then when it's overseas, we might not feel that injustice in another country. [00:18:01] Speaker C: Is the same, but, yeah, I mean, look, that's actually a good point. I mean, the fact is he's not. [00:18:06] Speaker B: Close enough to it. He doesn't have to see it, but. [00:18:10] Speaker C: He has the ability to see it. And I think, James, some of that is willful ignorance at this. Like he's saying he's not informed and he's not. [00:18:19] Speaker B: I can buy that. [00:18:20] Speaker A: Yeah, I think it's willful. Unless you're going to extend that same courtesy to moderate or conservative or even liberal white Americans, then I don't think you're being fair at all. [00:18:32] Speaker C: That they're being willfully. Which part? [00:18:33] Speaker A: No, that people. Well, I don't see the discrimination. So then it doesn't exist. Or then they're willfully ignorant. I think it's willfully ignorant, but willful ignorance is not a compliment. That is an insult. I didn't say, if you're saying he's willfully ignorant, then you're saying he's purposefully turning a blind eye to the suffering of others or not caring the fact that seeing that people are in the streets for months and saying, oh, what's that about? Couldn't be that big of a deal. That's ridiculous. I don't think you need to make that. I mean, like, I think he's making a business decision. We don't know if this is a business decision. That's hard for him to come to. He thought about it and like I said, that's why I wonder. He spent a week in China while this was going on, or damn near a week in China while this was. [00:19:17] Speaker C: Oh, I'm sure they were bringing the heat on him, too. [00:19:19] Speaker A: Yeah, I think seeing that stuff and seeing how they can lock down something again, like those type of places, there's no unreasonable search and seizure prohibition. There's no prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. One of the things they're protesting in Hong Kong is camps that people are getting sent to. And so being there while this is going on, I think you would come back saying, whoa, whoa, whoa. You guys need to chill out. Like, yo, the people who are talking about this stuff are disappearing in China. And so we have freedom of speech in America, meaning the government won't come after you or shouldn't come after you if you say unpopular things or say things that the government doesn't like, but they don't have that in China. And so if you're there when that's happening, I think that's going to give you more pause. That may start you out on the, oh, I don't need to be involved in this. [00:20:11] Speaker B: Whereas if he was here when that. [00:20:13] Speaker A: Happened, he may have been more willing to, even if it would have been short sighted to weigh in and know why. But being there at the know and then actually I want to, like, do you think he had a point when he calls out Maury and says, hey, Daryl, Maury, you're on your way to Japan. You shoot this tweet off, five minutes later, you delete it, meaning either somebody talked to you incredibly fast or you knew you did something that you weren't willing to stand behind and deal with all the blowback from. You're going to Japan. Japan, they'll let you, like, that's not going to be a thing. You didn't do that when you're on your way to China, but I'm on my way to China being all the players and the NBA officials, we're going to be there. We're going to ask us about this. [00:20:52] Speaker C: And we say point James. And the answer to that is yes. But you don't make that announcement in public because that's the same thing he just did. Then you weigh in and cause another controversy on the other side of it. So yes, you're right. That's probably what I would have said to him. Maybe that's something you handle back channel offline, not in public, not in something so controversial without expecting that it come back and actually hurt you in some way. [00:21:18] Speaker A: Because I'll tell you this, if you look at it from that frame, though, then what happened makes 100% sense. If LeBron James gets on Monday, he gets back in the States and he's talking about Darryl Mori, put us in a really shitty situation and that's what he's really talking about. But we're interpreting because he's inartfully saying it for sure if that's what he's saying. But if that's what he's saying, it makes a lot more sense than him just getting out there and saying non statements that aren't going to really make the Chinese love him more, but they're not going to make anybody. Nobody's happy with what he said. But if he's trying to send a. [00:21:53] Speaker C: Message to born, I would actually disagree. I think China's happy with what he said because you're coming down on the GM that said a statement. He's basically saying don't say something like that because you weren't even thinking about that and you were uninformed, you were not educated. [00:22:07] Speaker A: But again, that's what he said. That's how it's been interpreted, though. But what I'm saying, though, is if he's misinformed and not educated about what will happen to people if he says that, what will happen to the NBA people if we project to saying that? LeBron is saying you're uninformed about what's going on in Hong Kong or going. [00:22:26] Speaker C: On in China, but he said more than that, James. He said about what's going to happen to people's family. He did say safety, but he went to money and things like that, too. [00:22:37] Speaker A: He did say money. [00:22:37] Speaker C: He did say he's. I think he was thinking about that and he probably underestimated some of the response he got here and some of the response he would get negative in Hong Kong. [00:22:51] Speaker A: He certainly did that. [00:22:52] Speaker C: Yeah, and I will agree with him. He was misinformed because by definition, if you have hundreds of thousands of people that are dedicated enough to go against an authoritarian government for months, enough to shut down, they're going to be, you know, you might want to think about even weighing in if you're not going. [00:23:10] Speaker A: To, like, my point's a little more nuanced than that. Okay, let's say what Lebron is saying that Darryl Morrie is misinformed about or not educated about, is how China will respond to something like that. I think that's fair if that's what he's complaining about. Now, granted, he did say the money piece, which makes it seem like he's also talking about, you're messing with everybody's money. But I wonder, and again, I don't know, but I wonder if LeBron, his biggest crime here was not being clear on what he was talking about and having a personal issue with Maury. Because from what I understand now, this has been reported sparsely, but on more NBA insider level, that the players had a confrontation with Adam Silver, the commissioner of the NBA, about this. As far as, like, why are you guys trying to put us out front and center to state the position of the NBA? Why are we the ones over here in China that's fair? The ones you're putting out front about this, we don't want to disappear. [00:24:04] Speaker C: And he's just like, they're players. [00:24:09] Speaker A: I wonder if he just said this in a way that made it seem like he was passing judgment on the content of what Maury was saying, because it does sound like he's passing judgment on the content of, like, I definitely acknowledge that. But if he was more so saying, dude, what in the world are you doing? I'm on a plane to China, and you set off an international incident. [00:24:27] Speaker C: And his second statement aligns more with that, with the tweet that was more. Yeah, the tweet aligned more with that. [00:24:34] Speaker A: I just wonder, because it's like. It's not like Maury stood behind his tweet. No five minutes. [00:24:41] Speaker C: That's a fair analysis. [00:24:42] Speaker B: All of that I remember, too, because I saw some footage on the news in the last few days, China made a pretty big deal about in terms of just visually and their actions. I was just watching big NBA signs being ripped off the side of buildings. So, like you said, if LeBron's there and he's seeing that with his own eyes, he's probably thinking like, holy crap, what just happened? That's kind of what I mean by just. I think all of them, most people that don't really pay attention to politics and all that. I don't think they really understand what an authoritarian country looks like. [00:25:15] Speaker A: That's what. [00:25:17] Speaker B: But I'm serious. I don't think he would have ever seen anything like that in China when he visits. No, he wouldn't. [00:25:23] Speaker C: Look, I've been to. Okay, I'm going to go back to my 110 day visit. China rolls out the red carpet. [00:25:30] Speaker B: Yeah, but that's what I'm saying. You're going to see if he saw NBA signs coming off the side of buildings and being. [00:25:37] Speaker C: They probably had LeBron's picture like this. [00:25:40] Speaker A: The king is here. Or if he saw the troops come out where there's, everywhere they go, there's troops, there's intimidating them. We don't know what happened because you know what? There's no free media in China. We don't know what they went through. [00:25:57] Speaker B: That's what I'm saying. It's just interesting. Obviously, I'm sure he could take it back. He would. But, yeah, we're here and everyone's talking about. [00:26:09] Speaker A: You know, on that note, I think we did flesh that out a little bit. I want to talk about actually back in the States here also, Rob, you kind of touched on this a bit earlier. There is no way to stay out of it when you have these social issues like that. Staying out of it is an endorsement of the oppressor over the oppressed. So I would say that we don't have to ask the question by trying to stay out of it. Is he taking a position? But my question is this. Is he showing like, is he basically, by adopting now the NBA we talked about last week or earlier this week, they are showing like they are saying, yes, we will shut up. Keep the money flowing. Now, LeBron hasn't always approached things like that. LeBron has taken positions that could potentially affect his income. Now, maybe not on this scale and maybe for issues that are closer to home, but is he showing weakness or is he being he, you know, playing the long game? Toonday, I got to get you out of front on this one, though, because I know you have some strong positions on this. [00:27:14] Speaker B: You're talking about the long game for his profitability. [00:27:17] Speaker A: Yeah. Is he being weak or is he being smart? [00:27:19] Speaker B: I don't know, man. Look, again, we're not in the guy's head, so I want to give him. [00:27:23] Speaker A: No, I'm not asking you what he thinks he's doing. I'm saying, what is happening? Is this weakness or is this. [00:27:30] Speaker B: That's what I'm saying. [00:27:31] Speaker A: Intelligent. [00:27:32] Speaker B: I'm not sure look, there's a hundred percent chance the guy could be thinking about his future, dollars and all that. And I mean, Rob and I were talking about it before the show, and look, he could be made up that way, that he's doing everything for money and the future of his brand and all that. But I said to Rob, just, my thing is, sometimes people are human beings, too. I mean, if you see people burning your jersey and you see the Chinese, you're in China and they're tearing down NBA signs. Maybe he just was like, holy man crap. What's going on here? I didn't realize I've set up this firestorm. Let me kind of walk this. [00:28:07] Speaker A: Gotta, I gotta say this, man. I'm not sure that was probably the most out on a limb take ever, is sometimes people are humans, too. Not even all the time. That's why I said it could be. [00:28:28] Speaker B: 100% all about the money and the business. I don't think so. A lot of people are like that. But then there's people that just don't like seeing people that are angry at, like, why are these people. I didn't realize know. People burning my. [00:28:42] Speaker A: But, but see, as Michael Jordan has told us, republicans buy shoes too. Yep. And so does those dollars. He doesn't seem to have too big of a problem of kind of antagonizing or let twist in the wind by taking certain social positions. So is the calculation different because it's closer to home? What do you see there? [00:29:02] Speaker B: Well, that's what I was saying, is that I think all of us, just as humans, right. We're more conscious, some of us, I'm sorry, some of us, but are more conscious about just things that happen in front of them. And I learned that viscerally by living overseas. I lived in another country for almost five years, and just being there, you see their culture and what they have, the same issues we have in America, but instead of black and whites and it's Asians and Arabs or some other group that feels encroached upon by the other group that's moving in, and it's always the same stuff in that way. So all I'm saying is that it's not a surprise that any of us will be more sensitive to things that are happening within close to home that affect us, our country, our culture, our quote unquote people, whatever that is, versus something that's going on 2000 miles away across borders and across oceans. [00:29:59] Speaker A: Which is natural. That's natural. If your house is on fire, you will be willing to go to greater extents to get that fire put out than if somebody told you that a house miles away was on fire in another state. [00:30:13] Speaker C: That's really what we're looking at. [00:30:14] Speaker B: Like, I was going to say, the house five houses down, I may show up because I kind of see the neighbor, the house 5 miles away, I may not. And you're right, five states away, I'll be like, yeah, somebody else. [00:30:27] Speaker C: The only difference, of course, is LeBron is a global icon, and so he's going to be connected some way. That is how he's making his money, essentially. So if it's weak or not, I can't tell. Perhaps he has some greater play in, because I will give LeBron credit for his entire career for being very consistent when it comes to social justice. So perhaps he has something in play in the long term for this. But as we said on our podcast, with disruption now, China might have power, but the NBA still holds the most power. NBA still. There's not a bunch of LeBron James. There's no LeBron James. I could say this in China, they're not there. Maybe they'll get there in a hundred years, but LeBron James, they're not have. They don't have a Yanis in China. Like, the product is here and it can't be import. Unlike a lot of things in America, you can't import negroes. We have them. [00:31:23] Speaker A: They're here. [00:31:23] Speaker C: They're playing like we are. [00:31:25] Speaker A: Hey, man, don't give people ideas, man. People throughout history have had that idea. [00:31:33] Speaker B: And acted on it. [00:31:35] Speaker A: Oh, you're right. I'm sorry. [00:31:36] Speaker C: Let me take that back. Yeah. [00:31:39] Speaker B: Remember all the investment that China's making in Africa, but for Nigerians that say, yeah, I'll take a couple million bucks to go to Beijing right now. [00:31:52] Speaker C: The point is, LeBron and the NBA have more leverage than they give themselves, and they don't have to, I don't think cowtow to China as much as they think to control their dollars. I don't think they do. Not at this point. The minute you give in the know, China knows and sees that, and they are going to leverage that. So I think he has to be very careful because you don't want to be subject to China's rule or subject to what they want you to say all the time. [00:32:21] Speaker A: Exactly. As you sit here in America, you're not in China. Granted, you want to go, and so that's what you have to keep in mind. But you're not there. You're not a citizen of China, and you are by rule under a different set of rules, different set of laws. [00:32:37] Speaker B: I want to say this, though, because I think this is coming in a greater context of the way that the paradigm is shifting of how we're being seen, dealt with and all that in the world on various levels because I'm not sure this would have happened under prior administrations, not just one. But it seems like, I think China is also using this as somewhat of a, they're trying to see if they can get any leverage, maybe with the trade negotiations, all that. And I think we saw, I know we have our group text on our chat. We have fun. [00:33:09] Speaker C: Do you think it's that, let me just interrupt you for a second, tunde, because I don't think it's just that, wait, really quick. They got on Apple and they got on lots of companies, got them to reverse course. So it's not, just, let me finish. [00:33:21] Speaker B: The point, because what I was going to say earlier today, we were just talking about how the president of Turkey now is bold enough to say to the vice president of the United States and the secretary of state, hey, don't come here. I'm not going to talk to you guys. [00:33:32] Speaker A: I won't meet with you. I won't take a meeting. [00:33:34] Speaker B: I'm not going to meet with you. So my point is, I think the world is kind of testing America now with the way that we've been behaving, which is saying you guys clearly aren't morally superior to us anymore, meaning even in rhetoric. [00:33:47] Speaker C: Well, we were never morally, I'll tell you this, man. Go ahead. [00:33:49] Speaker B: But let me finish the, it. We understand that we have had moral issues historically, but the rhetoric coming out of, let's say, the White House and presidents, right? Like I've read some Stuff Reagan said about immigrants and all that in the 80s. It's beautiful. The rhetoric was always about, this is the beacon of light for the world where everybody's welcome. I think now that we have abdicated that throne, the other countries are dealing with us straight up about money. And they know what we're about. They know that we care about money, number one. And I think this is another example of China flexing its muscle in a way it might not have because you're right, we do. [00:34:28] Speaker C: Because we have an incompetent president. [00:34:29] Speaker B: You're saying basically, well, I'm saying it's all part of the soup that you can stir up. And so because they've realized that we aren't, because remember, the news that came out was that Trump told Ji, I won't say anything about Hong Kong and the human rights stuff, as long as we can work out the deal. I don't think any other president was that blatant ever, with a chinese president saying, hey, we're not going to say anything in public about this as long as you do this for me, or. [00:34:57] Speaker A: They never got out. Basically correct. [00:35:00] Speaker B: My point is that this is a sloppy administration when it comes to that behind the scenes stuff. So I think that this is China flexing its muscles, saying, you know what? Should we pushing this guy around? Let's see about this NBA guy. Let's test him. Let's see if we make a big stink about a tweet that, like you said, deleted. [00:35:16] Speaker C: This is consistent with what, this is. [00:35:20] Speaker A: What'S happening to him day. Your mind is playing tricks on you. And this is a common trick because with our brains, we tend to see order where we think something is there, and then we see it in that way, like as Rob was insinuating and jumping at the bit to jump in on, this is how China does business. They've done this. They've done this all along. Like when you put together maps, they don't want Taiwan to be reflected as an independent country. Or when the new Top Gun movie, they changed the jacket in only one way, and that's to take the. I think it's the taiwanese flag off because China can't show it. In China, if you do that when they're making Marvel movies and this is pre Trump, they can't have. [00:36:07] Speaker B: What was it? [00:36:07] Speaker A: I think Dr. Strange, like the master that gets beat by, they can't have. They had to make that a non chinese person if they wanted to show that in China. So China exerts strict control over what their people see, and they will try to exert their market power to make other people bow to that. If they want access to their market, like you said, apple, google, they do it with Google and they've done it pre Trump. [00:36:34] Speaker B: The reason why we're in a trade spread is they're stealing intellectual property. [00:36:37] Speaker A: All that I get, I'm not talking about that. I'm saying they'll tell american companies. They'll tell Google or Google or whatever. If you want to design. Yeah, they won't even let them in. Twitter, they won't even let in. But the people they do let in, they say, look, if you want to do it here, you have to do it like we say. [00:36:54] Speaker C: Correct. [00:36:57] Speaker B: It's one thing if it was the commissioner or LeBron that sent that original tweet, like someone who's got some standing with doesn't matter. But I'm just saying that the fact that it was done and then deleted quickly and for them to react in this knee jerk way, to me, shows that. I think they're just poking around and testing. [00:37:14] Speaker C: I mean, I'm just trying to tell you, China operates like, this is why they put people in camp. They put people in camps for smaller things. If you get out of line in China, they don't play. And then obviously, let me just say this, too, Dave. If you have more power. So there's a guy in Taiwan who's a billionaire who's protesting against China. They haven't done that to him because he has too much power. It would be too obvious. But a small GM might be a good place to start because at least that sends a chilling effect, because, like, oh, that looks at somebody like LeBron said, these people are serious. They might take away some of our endorsements or money. [00:37:44] Speaker B: So here's what I'll say then. I'll grant you guys that I put thinking too much. [00:37:50] Speaker A: That's what we have you here for, man. [00:37:52] Speaker B: But what I'll say is, though, whatever their tactic or strategy is, what they did do is now expose again, like we're talking about. Oh, that's true. [00:38:01] Speaker C: They exposed our real value. [00:38:03] Speaker B: Exposed us as caring about money. Right. Like, you're saying that it's not that difficult to be on the side of human rights. And again, we're sitting profits over principle. Yeah. We're sitting here in our culture, him and Hanna. Oh, do we say this? Like you said, rob, no one has come out in the media that I've seen really and strongly said, who cares about China? We got the leverage. Like you just said. Are they making six foot eight black guys in China? No. That can run the length of a court like a freight train, like LeBron and dunk the ball in your face. No. So guess what? If they decide that they want to cut off all NBA tv, let their people be upset, and they would be upset. [00:38:38] Speaker C: They wouldn't do. [00:38:39] Speaker A: And that would be something for. That would be difficult for them to. [00:38:41] Speaker B: Deal with because that's not one of. [00:38:42] Speaker A: Those things that they can't make their people not have seen that before. Correct. [00:38:47] Speaker B: To our point that we're saying. That's what I'm saying. You make a good point, Rob, about that. It's kind of showing our weakness. And I guess that's why I said, I'll grant you guys. [00:38:55] Speaker C: And they're going to push further. This is just the beginning. They might have been testing the waters. To your point, tunde, I might give you that they're testing the waters and they've tested. They say. [00:39:06] Speaker A: The test though is against the NBA. That's why I don't think it's political related. They've tested our biggest companies for decades, but the NBA is uniquely situated. Google doesn't have the kind of leverage over China that LeBron James or the NBA does. [00:39:21] Speaker B: That's what I was going to say. What if last week Adam Silver just came out instead of trying know thread the needle and all that, which he did a half decent job at? I think what if we just came out bold and said, look, we're in America, we stand for human rights. If China got a problem with us, I'm sorry. And you know what, we got legal agreements and all that in place. So if they want to start messing around with the money and all know we got to go to court, I. [00:39:43] Speaker C: Guess I think he would have been respected more. [00:39:45] Speaker A: I'll tell you this. [00:39:46] Speaker B: I agree, Rob. [00:39:46] Speaker A: I think he better not do that until everybody's back. That part, don't do it when anybody's over there. [00:39:54] Speaker C: They're not going to do anything. Nobody else over there that start a world war, they're not going to do that. I mean, China's smart enough not to do China now. China still cares about because they still have, you have to understand that though they're a dictatorship and authoritarian, even they have limits because then authoritarians get taken over too. Because China has a history of people taking over the country to when they get too out of line, everybody knows that. They celebrate. So when you go to China, they talk about all the different revolutions. That is well known because that can't be hidden. [00:40:30] Speaker B: So people are, they're compliant till they're not. [00:40:34] Speaker C: And if you get them out of line, if you take away things that they're used to, I don't know, I think that could cause more instability in China. So I don't think they'd be willing to do that. [00:40:42] Speaker A: And there's actually one other point I wanted to add onto this, and this is to Tunde's point of the added sensitivity. I think there is added sensitivity. I'm not saying there isn't, but I think you're looking in the wrong place. They have this issue in Hong Kong that's been going on for months. They haven't been able to deal with it. If they're sensitive about something, that's what they're sensitive about. And then Maury poked right at that know, like you do you know, you, it's not a surprise that you get a response back that's very extreme because it's like, hey, this is something we've been dealing with unsuccessfully. People have, there have been murmurs about it. It's not front page news everywhere, but it's something people are aware of. They shut down the airport. And so that's the kind of stuff they can't have because the power of an authoritarian always resides in being able to control the flow of information. And so if these people in Hong Kong ever get a message out to China in general that all they want is freedom and they're not separatists and whatever else the story is, then China would have a bigger problem. So chinese to keep that as contained as possible. So fight for freedom related to Hong Kong is very harmful to them, even though, again, nobody in China has Twitter anyway, so nobody saw it in know, but it becomes something people talk know. So you got to always keep that in mind. There was one other thing about this that I wanted to ask you guys, and this came know, dealing with, as we see with LeBron, but also earlier with Steve Kerr, Greg Popovich, people who are generally outspoken in terms of social issues in America and are we being unfair to them? Are we being fair? I wonder what struck me about this was the ease in which people seem to believe that people weighing in on issues of domestic import under our existing legal framework, where we protect political speech, whether it's popular or not, is equivalent to weighing in international issues that one is less of, quote unquote, your problem. China doesn't espouse to be a freedom. Like, they're not saying all men are created equal in China, so they're doing what they say they are, hey, we run the government. We run the show. So are we being fair to these guys when we turn around and look at them, or when conservatives turn around and look at them and say, hey, shouldn't you guys, you speak out in America, shouldn't you be speaking out about China, too? [00:43:08] Speaker C: That's a great question. I will say, know, half the time conservatives aren't consistent with their own values either. [00:43:17] Speaker A: You're waiting for the limited government, right? Exactly. [00:43:22] Speaker C: So if they're saying that there's some hypocrisy in this, they're right, but you can't throw stones from a glass house. [00:43:30] Speaker A: Well, you can if you control your own news network. [00:43:34] Speaker C: Exactly. [00:43:35] Speaker B: But I think it's an interesting question you asked because, look, at some point you're right. And I think that's where we are too. With a lot of things in the country. Some people don't want to be police of the world. Some people do all that. And I think at what point do we export or not export our values as a country? That's an interesting question. [00:43:53] Speaker C: Is that what we're doing or we're just proclaiming them? Like, I'm not saying we should be a military, but if you believe in. [00:43:58] Speaker B: A value, you're going to say it, right? No. [00:44:00] Speaker A: Yeah, you're self censoring. [00:44:04] Speaker B: But James makes a good point, right? Our society is founded on a document that says all men are created equal. Some societies aren't. [00:44:12] Speaker A: Societies aren't. [00:44:13] Speaker B: But I'm just saying that that's their prerogative, right? I mean, like I'm saying if they're. [00:44:17] Speaker C: An independent country, I mean, sort of, it's their prerogative. It's not the people's prerogative. [00:44:23] Speaker B: And that's what I'm saying. I'm not here to get an answer. I'm saying that I guess that's the choice to ask. [00:44:27] Speaker A: It's the question. [00:44:28] Speaker C: It's the question. [00:44:31] Speaker B: Not you personally, but does one believe so strongly in human beings rights, right. That it's like, okay, there's no borders when it comes to certain human rights? [00:44:40] Speaker A: Well, that's what we believe in, Tunde. We believe in inalienable rights that are endowed upon us by our creator. [00:44:47] Speaker B: Correct? [00:44:47] Speaker A: That's in our documents. [00:44:48] Speaker B: But then that's all I'm saying is, so how does that work in a modern world of geopolitics and borders? How far can you impose that on someone else that's a sovereign nation? [00:44:58] Speaker C: Well, I think a better question is what James got to earlier Toonday, is the fact that is it fair to have equal consequence to something that's domestic, where we have these documents, where we're protected, than to say, you have to have the same type of consideration internationally. I say it's not fair. It's not equivalent. That's not apples to apples. [00:45:15] Speaker A: I agree. I don't think that's not fair to did. We immediately jumped to the juicy part of the question, goes beyond that and looks at, when you ask about apartheid for like, did we have an obligation to deal with South Africa in a certain way because of the way they ran their society, which we did. And I would say, actually, if you want to look at how we could potentially try to not necessarily force our values onto other countries, but reflect the fact that we believe that people have inalienable rights endowed upon them by their creator, oftentimes it's economic. That's what we did in South America. That's what we could do in China if we wanted to. Now we're not set up to do that in know they're funding our deficit. [00:46:02] Speaker C: Spending and we've only done tend to America has done it. They've been hypocritical about when and how they've done it. We've been fine with we were Jim. [00:46:10] Speaker A: Crow telling other people to free. Exactly. Let people. [00:46:14] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:46:15] Speaker C: And then we love China for most of the time. If we're being really honest, we look at Cuba like it's horrible. Cuba's right there. And then you look at the Saudis. We're cool with them and they murder journalists and worse. [00:46:30] Speaker A: I mean, they do. It's definitely, I'm with you. I don't think we're being fair. The ease in which people try to make it an equivalent that, oh, because you speak out here, you should speak out there. I think that's completely unfair. [00:46:46] Speaker C: That doesn't acknowledge that's just following the rights name. They're just looking for a reason to make LeBron look bad because he's pointed out or Kokovich. [00:46:55] Speaker A: Yeah, they're just trying to throw those guys under the bus. And that's a surface argument that doesn't hold up the scrutiny. But yeah, the question of how involved we should be because it doesn't have to be military. It could mean we do this. They're talking about right now with Turkey because of what Turkey is doing, economic sanctions. So we do this and we have done that. And obviously that's not on the table right now because we're doing anything we can to make sure that the money train from China keeps going. [00:47:23] Speaker C: And we're in this relationship where we're kind of stuck. We kind of are stuck. We talked about LeBron being the pickles. Not just LeBron. The United States is intertwined with China whether we like it or not at. [00:47:33] Speaker B: This point, but they're intertwined with us, too. [00:47:36] Speaker A: That goes both ways as well. Without our demand, without our market, they got a lot of people making a lot of stuff that they couldn't mean. We mentioned a show previously about people that America needs to get their head on straight as far as how they want to interact with China on a long term basis. That's part of it. That's part of it because eventually China's goal is to not need us anymore and they're working hard towards it. [00:48:03] Speaker C: We make it easy for them. [00:48:04] Speaker A: Exactly. If we don't at some point while we have some leverage, make sure that we're getting a fair deal here, then we put ourselves in a tough spot moving forward. It's an interesting discussion, though, because ultimately, inalienable rights are inalienable rights. Our government is based on that. And it's of the people, by the. [00:48:26] Speaker B: People, for the people. [00:48:27] Speaker A: The government doesn't give you your rights. The constitution doesn't give you your rights. You have those rights. And you, by the constitution, are giving the government power. You as the people. So that's how we view things here. That's not how they view things in most of the world. But that's why we value the american experiment. [00:48:43] Speaker C: That's not how some Americans view it right now either. So wake up, everybody. [00:48:51] Speaker A: No, you're right, though. You're right. I mean, we want to hold ourselves to it. And that's the other thing. We want to hold ourselves to a higher standard because that's what we have, those aspirational goals. I'll tell you this, guys. I think it's a good conversation and I enjoy having it with you. I think you guys are the guys to bring the right points out. So I definitely want to thank everybody for joining us here on call it like I see it presented by disruption now. We'll be back with you guys soon. Check the YouTube disruption now for our flagship program. We're putting out a couple of those every week, and we'll have more podcasts on this. Call it like I see it as well. [00:49:26] Speaker C: We have a show in China, actually, that talked about this. So we have another complimentary show on disruption now. [00:49:32] Speaker B: Correct. [00:49:32] Speaker C: So go check that out, which just. [00:49:34] Speaker A: Dropped yesterday, October 15, and that's a good one. Until the next time. I'm James Keys. [00:49:41] Speaker C: I'm Rob Richardson. [00:49:42] Speaker B: I'm Tunday of Atlanta. Boom.