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I am a huge sports fan, growing up I played baseball, football, basketball, soccer, deck hockey etc. As I have gotten older, I have slowed down, not as agile just too damn sore anymore. Over the course of this time I really got into sports and I think to myself wow would my life suck without having sports apart of it. Something caught my attention this past week involving sports that kind of makes me feel as a society I wonder if we will ever evolve.
For anyone who might read this(doubtful :p) and follows hockey you probably know what this is about. A player by the name of Simmonds, who plays for the Philadelphia Flyers was playing in an exhibition game at a neutral location in Canada(the arena slips my mind right now). Hockey about 5 years ago instituted shootouts to decide any tie games after an overtime period to make the game more exciting. Well the game went to a shoot out and Simmonds was at center ice to try and put his team ahead. As he was skating down the ice towards the goalie, a banana is tossed on the ice in his path; he avoids it and still manages to score. Now for those of you who dont know, Simmonds is a black man. The year is 2011, when will people wise up....
Fast forward to two nights ago; the Flyers are playing against the New York Rangers; a fight/scrum breaks out after a stoppage etc...Simmonds gets into it with Sean Avery. Simmonds calls Avery a faggot cocksucker etc...So now here we have a man who is put through a terrible thing with the banana go and turn on his bigotry on another person. Look I know Avery is a real dickhead, no denying that. The irony is that people will not change, and to me that is quite sad
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I don't think social advancement should be judged broadly over the action of 1 person. Also in sports personally I feel that social boundaries don't exist as they would in a normal setting. I doubt Simmonds would call anyone a faggot outside of a hockey game, and I highly doubt a fan would ever have the guts to throw a banana at anyone face to face. What I think shows that society is progressing is the overall disgust that was shown towards these actions.
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The response to the banana incident was pretty cool. The NHL and regular people offering rewards to people who point him out and now they know who he is and he will have minor charges against him and I think he is banned for life from NHL stuff.
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Yeah I'm happy that idiot got found and is now getting dealt with. However, there's plenty of dumb people who don't think it was racist. Check comments on any blogs, or even check this site's nhl thread sadly... (http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=237043¤tpage=13)
the actual on the ice stuff between players is a bit different. Obviously, calling someone a faggot isn't cool and entirely too pervasive in our culture (I think we've all been guilty at times). However, taking any kind of strong action on that kind of lends itself towards policing shit talking on the ice, which i'm not sure is something that should happen. I definitely don't think he should have been suspended (even though there's precedent for crude things. See: Wisnewski on Avery, Avery about Phaneuf and his ex). Fined, maybe. I'm at least glad that the league said that's none too cool though.
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@tails I do agree with you in some aspects. Although these are just 2 more highly publicized recent events 
@slaughter indeed it was, its a shame one idiot made the entire city look bad.
@hawk yea that thread kinda led me to writing this; people are morons but i applaud you for trying to point that out to them I dont have the patience haha..
That is true I just find it bizarre that that particular player who just went though something like that would have the gull to do that. I definitely have my share wtf was I thinking moments for sure. From my understanding the NHL is not going to do nothing about it
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EPT
