And now hockey is problematic

Rock added, “As soon as they make a heated hockey rink, we’re going to take that sh*t, too.”

The crowd, which was predominately black, roared with laughter and applause.

THE NHL WANTS TO STOP HIRING WHITE PEOPLE

Like all good jokes, there’s a kernel of truth in it. Not a lot of black Americans play professional hockey. There are several possible explanations for this, including cultural and socioeconomic conditions. However, if Rock’s joke and the warm reception it received are to be understood correctly, there is another possible reason: The black community itself is largely uninterested in playing a winter sport professionally.

Someone should tell this to the National Hockey League and the American press, both of which lamented the lack of workforce diversity in U.S. hockey’s governing body following the release of the NHL’s first-ever internal demographic study this week.

The report is a “good start,” said NHL Executive Vice President of Social Impact, Growth, and Legislative Affairs Kim Davis, who is black, “but nobody is taking a victory lap.”

“We did this [study] because we wanted to put a stake in the ground,” she added. “Being transparent and being held accountable isn’t as scary as it may have felt three years ago.”

The report found that 83.6% of employees across the NHL and its 32 teams are white, while a much smaller 4.2% are Asian, 3.7% are black, 3.7% are Hispanic/Latino, and 0.5% are indigenous. The report also found roughly 62% of NHL employees are men, while an estimated 36.8% are women. For the NHL, the latter figure should be heartening: It mirrors the NHL’s fan base. Roughly 37% of all NHL fans are women, according to the organization’s own data.

Davis continued: “There’s an old saying that ‘if you know better, you do better.’ When you give that kind of focus to this kind of work, it helps people get comfortable with what’s often uncomfortable.”

“And it’s uncomfortable because it’s not something that they’ve experienced,” she added. “Some people are embarrassed to say that. I think the last two years, in the wake of George Floyd’s murder, have allowed all of us to become more open and vulnerable about the things that we don’t know, and that’s certainly accelerated our work.”

Davis this week touted several “diversity and inclusivity” initiatives the NHL launched since she was appointed five years ago, including funneling $500,000 into Zoom-based “intensive learning” sessions for league employees and encouraging teams to establish “diversity and inclusion councils.” Teams have also been warned about participating in law enforcement appreciation nights.

“I think [law enforcement appreciation nights are], for so many of us, a blind spot around how one part of the community can admire the group and another can fear the group, and the two can both be true according to their vantage point,” she said.

She added, “As we’ve talked to clubs about this, they have listened and many of them have learned to do better. It’s a complicated [issue], but people are open to hearing and understanding how perceptions can be reality for those who we’re trying to make comfortable and feel welcome in our sport.”

Nearly as interesting as Davis’s posture is the press’s framing of the issue.

“The NHL’s first internal demographic study found its workforce to be overwhelmingly white,” the Associated Press reported. “[Davis] says seeing the numbers is a first step toward fixing the problem.”

AP hockey writer Stephen Whyno said elsewhere the NHL’s new study gives “the league a baseline from which to improve on.”

ESPN, meanwhile, reported the survey highlights the NHL’s “democratic challenges.”

“The problem.” “Improve upon.” “Challenges.”

What, exactly, is the “problem”? Is it really a “problem” that a winter sport most popular in overwhelmingly white countries is served by an overwhelmingly white staff? This doesn’t seem so much a “problem” (or a moral failure, as Davis suggests) as a natural and reasonable course of events.

Consider the facts.

The countries where hockey is the most popular are Canada (obviously), the United States, the Czech Republic, Russia, Finland, Sweden, and Switzerland. More than half of Canada’s total population is of European descent. The U.S. is 60% white. The Czech Republic is approximately 64% Czech (i.e., caucasian). Russia is 80% ethnic Russian (i.e., caucasian). Finland is 86% ethnic Finnish (i.e., caucasian). Sweden is 80% ethnic Swedes (i.e., caucasian). Switzerland is 69% ethnic Swiss (i.e., caucasian).

Hockey is a cold-weather sport enjoyed most by the inhabitants of cold-climate countries. As it so happens, the inhabitants of these exceptionally chilly countries are nearly all white. You’ll be equally shocked to learn there’s not a great deal of cultural or generational interest in the Sub-Saharan regions, Latin America, etc., for a sport that requires freezing temperatures.

Yet, we are told it’s a “problem,” one which can be “improved upon,” for the NHL’s workforce to be mostly white.

It makes business sense for the NHL to go down this road. It has every financial incentive to expand its fan base. But why the morally tinged rhetoric from the AP, ESPN, Davis, and elsewhere? Why is it a “problem” or a “challenge” that a winter sport most popular among white people in predominately white countries should have an overwhelmingly white support staff? Why is this being presented as some sort of injustice?

Hockey is to Canada, the Czech Republic, Russia, etc., what soccer is to South America. It’s cultural. It’s generational among families. But few, if any, consider it a “problem” to be “improved upon” that the South American Football Confederation is staffed primarily with Latinos. Why should U.S. hockey be treated any differently?

Is it not enough for the NHL to want to expand the diversity of its teams and audience for the sake of business? Do we also need a lecture regarding the supposed injustice of a mostly white workforce?

Apparently!

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Becket Adams is the program director of the National Journalism Center.