Battle cry of the un-woke!
Some Americans delight when they see other Americans face defeat.
“It’s not often that I’m happy a U.S. team loses in the Olympics,” said conservative Newsmax host Grant Stinchfield. “But I found myself rooting against Megan Rapinoe and her merry band of America-hating female soccer players; they lost one game.”
Mr. Stinchfield was celebrating the loss by a team of people he believes are un-American. Frankly, by rooting against America’s Olympians, he was, by definition, being un-American.
That’s dumb.
By the way, the U.S. women’s soccer team came home with a bronze medal – better than they did at the 2016 Olympics when they failed to medal.
Stinchfield was hardly alone in expressing joy by rooting against Americans in Tokyo.
Donald Trump must have thought he was speaking for every American, when he said “Americans were happy” because the women’s soccer team lost a game to Sweden.
Then, when they did secure their bronze medal: “Woke means you lose, everything that is woke goes bad, and our soccer team certainly has,” said the bronze medalist of the 2020 presidential election.
Conservatives can’t be this dumb, can they?
Conservative Fox News flamethrower Tomi Lahren decided that because Americans hadn’t yet won any medals – after just one day of events – they were destined to crumble under the weight of their wokeness.
“Go woke and go broke or in the case of the Summer Olympics, get woke and lose,” she beamed as if her turn of phrase was poetic and prophetic.
In the end, it was neither.
The U.S. Olympic team won more medals than any other team (113), and more gold, too (39).
I’m still confused about who determines what is “woke,” or what is not “woke.”
Is there a “woke-meter” somewhere?
How did the word “woke” become an insult?
Meanwhile, Stinchfield went extremely un-American when he blasted the U.S. men’s basketball team after they lost an early game to France.
“The collection of whiny, overpaid social justice warriors are very hard to root for. The team is filled with anthem kneelers, and I find it ironic (that0 they are willing to put (the) USA across their chest,” he said.
What did those guys ever do to him?
But Stinchfield wasn’t finished.
He suggested somebody should get physical with people who’re probably a foot taller than him.
“Somebody ought to go up to them and rip (the) USA off their chest. I don’t want ’em wearing it, personally.”
Kevin Durant, the team’s unquestioned leader, stands 6 feet 10. Stinchfield might need a ladder to reach Durant’s chest. I’d pay to watch him try it. Especially after the team won its fourth gold medal in a row.
I’ve heard this silliness about people not watching Olympians – or any athletes – who become “social warriors.”
That’s fine.
Burn their jerseys?
That’s OK with me.
Make silly statements about their lack of allegiance to the country that values free expression – when they engage in free expression?
Cue Dinesh D’Souza: “The Canadians aren’t American. But neither are they anti-American. That’s why we’re cheering their defeat of the U.S. women’s soccer squad. Go Canada,” says D’Souza, a native of Mumbai, India.
This was a departure for a guy who’s better known for attacking Kamala Harris, calling Rosa Parks “overrated,” or calling Barack Obama a “boy” from “the ghetto.”
Not all of the conservative venom was aimed at athletes who didn’t wear their patriotism on the sleeves.
Renowned gymnast Simone Biles has won a total of 32 Olympic and world medals. She became the source of conservative’s wrath when she backed out of several Olympic events.
Ultra-conservative Charlie Kirk called Biles a “selfish sociopath,” while Fox News personality Will Cain claimed “we are celebrating quitting,” without knowing exactly why Biles took the steps to keep herself safe – after she was having a serious mental crisis.
To folks on the right, what’s really important is having athletes bow to their authority and live within the confines of their sense of patriotism.
It simply doesn’t work that way.
Edward A. Owens is a multi-Emmy Award winner, former reporter, and anchor for Entertainment Tonight, and 40-year TV news and newspaper veteran. E-mail him at freedoms@bellatlantic.net.