The politburo of the Women’s National Basketball Association continues to be mired in controversy after an excessively hard foul by Chicago Sky player Dijonai Carrington on the Indiana Fever’s Sophie Cunningham during a game over the weekend. Carrington’s contact drew the ire of Cunningham supporters everywhere, as it was vicious (and arguably intentional). As malevolent as Carrington’s foul was, basketball history is rife with such fouls — including some committed by Cunningham herself. Nevertheless, the problem wasn’t Carrington’s foul; the problem was Carrington blaming white privilege for being held accountable for the foul. It’s indicative of the black entitlement problem corroding the WNBA.
After the Fever’s Monique Billings recovered a loose ball during the game Saturday, she passed it to Cunningham, who was running for a breakaway layup before Carrington leaped in the air and slashed Cunningham around the face and neck, causing her to tumble hard to the court. Referees initially called a Flagrant 1 foul on Carrington, but it was upgraded to a more serious Flagrant 2. After a review, the referee felt that Carrington performed a windup and follow-through on the contact while Cunningham was in a vulnerable position for an injury.
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Carrington appeared shocked that the foul was escalated to the more serious Flagrant 2 and that she was ejected. She’s not the first athlete to disagree with a referee’s assessment, and she definitely won’t be the last. However, she is the first to be ejected from a game and then moments later posts on social media “white privilege” and tags her opponent, the Indiana Fever, in the middle of the game. Carrington was the aggressor and committed the violent foul. It was quite obvious she was in the wrong and had violated the rules. Carrington, instead, blamed racism for being held accountable.
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This is an example of black entitlement in the WNBA. It’s a failure to accept responsibility for ill-advised actions and then blame white people when accountability is issued. Black entitlement is a weaponization of racial, left-wing cultural values, the kind embraced by today’s socialists and communists winning primary elections. It’s an entitlement philosophy that is predicated on one ideal: Blame white people for the bad decisions and poor choices of black people. There was no legitimate reason for Carrington to bring race into the physical exchange between her and Cunningham. It was done so because blaming white people has become socially and politically acceptable in the country’s culture. This is especially true when there is an interaction between a white person and a black person.
It’s the ignoring of the reality of a bad action committed by a black person and the shifting of blame to a white person or white society, usually accompanied by references to previous racial injustices committed in the nation’s history, but unrelated in any way to the current situation. It’s a corrosive practice of entitlement that has been widely preferred and accepted in left-wing socio-cultural circles and has emanated into mainstream society. Race had nothing to do with Carrington’s Flagrant 2 foul classification and subsequent ejection. The only person or thing responsible for that was Dijonai Carrington. Blaming white people has become somewhat of a default response in American society. It shouldn’t be.
Any objective person knows Carrington was in the wrong. I would even bet that Carrington knew so, too. For her to say she was ejected due to “white privilege” is quite preposterous. The hit was so egregious that even the game’s commentators, WNBA legend Rebecca Lobo and ABC play-by-play announcer Ryan Ruocco, said during the broadcast that Carrington’s foul warranted a Flagrant 2 classification.
“But that is just a hard hit,” Lobo said while watching a replay of Carrington’s hit on Cunningham. “That’s definitely going to be upgraded to a Flagrant 2, Ryan.”
“I think that is going to be a Flagrant 2,” Ruocco said. “There is windup, there is follow-through. There’s potential for injury. There’s Sophie Cunningham in a vulnerable position in the air.”
“Without question,” Lobo said.
“There’s no question why Sophie Cunningham got up and took exception to that hit from Dijonai Carrington,” Ruocco added.
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To her credit, even Cunningham dismissed Carrington’s absurd claim and had the courage to speak out against the “white privilege” claim. She acknowledged that it was a hard foul, but one worthy of an ejection. She even referenced one time her own hard foul led to an ejection. The difference is that Cunningham accepted responsibility for her actions and agreed that she should have been ejected. She didn’t blame fanciful myths such as racism or privilege due to a particular skin color.
“I think the league is taking care of that,” Cunningham said when asked about Carrington’s absurd attempt to stoke racial tensions. “This has nothing to do with race. Last year, I did the same thing and I got kicked out, and I deserved to be kicked out. There’s no reason even to play that card.”
Cunningham is right. There wasn’t any reason to play that card. However, Carrington played it because she knew she could. She played it because she knows the WNBA’s politburo is sympathetic and embraces social justice warrior fallacies, inaccuracies, revisions, and cultural myths. Carrington knows she can physically violate Cunningham, blame racism and white people, and not suffer any legitimate accountability for doing so because the WNBA is rife with black entitlement.
Hopefully, one day, the WNBA will prioritize judging players by the content of their character, not by the content on social media aligned with left-wing political ideologies that is dishonest and unjust. Hopefully, the WNBA will take steps to eliminate this black entitlement and judge people solely based on their actions instead of the color of their skin. And hopefully, more than anything, the WNBA will champion individual responsibility instead of anti-white racism and its toxic collective aggrievance culture.
