I’m sick of tired of patriotism from Americans, Canadians and in general everyone. Everybody needs a little criticism whether jokingly or not.
I’m sick of people referring to people who “disrespect” their national anthem and then “therefore” their country as to be bad people. It simply shouldn’t, it’s an opinion, a national anthem is usually an outdated song anyway that doesn’t compel people to what they truly care about.
This video DOES NOT depict the men involved in the video in a good light in any way. They are joking and I can’t even understand them until a few listens. However some people have decided to take this very seriously. (At least ESPN takes a much more unbiased approach but still point out Howard’s faults.
Here’s the video:
I can’t speak for the Americans as they may or may not experience a different culture but really I’m not entitled to speak for them. (Maybe one of you can comment? or more :P). Just remember I don’t criticize the American people because there are all types, dumb, smart, great, not so great etc.
The problem I have is an article being worded like this: “The battered reputation of Josh Howard took another hit this week when an online video surfaced showing the Dallas Mavericks forward disrespecting the national anthem.” I really haven’t heard of his poor reputation, he may have some “attitude” issues but tons of players have those problems, when was his reputation “battered” in my eyes? Just because an article starts this way? Celebrating a birthday after a loss is not that big of a deal… just because a coach doesn’t like that… if a coach did that to me I’d tell him to fuck off. Should you not be forced to celebrate your birthday if your company had a disappointing month or week? Fuck no. How about being honest and admit that you smoke marijuana? Yes it is illegal but at least he’s admitting it and is he killing any dogs? Drinking and driving? No. Still you can’t really judge someone’s character on these things, I don’t know him and I probably never will.
Josh Howard is implying that the USA is not very good toward people of his color. Is that not fair for him to imply? It definitely is fair! Just like when I say the voters of Ontario are stupid for not passing the Mixed Member Parliament, is that not a general statement I can make? I’m being critical and I feel as if I’m right, is it popular to call people stupid? No but it’s still a feeling and you can’t attack character for that especially when its political.
Do yourself a favor and stay away from the mob mentality, calling Howard “stupid” or even “retarded”. I think the only people who can be critical are blacks because they probably know more about what his feelings are. Even if it is mislead.
Even then the National anthem is a bunch of shit (Canada’s too). The USA Anthem is basically a song saying “through war we have great bravery, pride and we love coming out on top”. It’s paraphrasing.. I don’t know how important this is to Americans but there are more important things I care about rather then kicking ass (and America does a lot of ass kicking - most of which it seems that citizens aren’t proud of).
Even then the USA Anthem is about being Brave, and being brave is sometimes having an unpopular opinion and not being afraid to criticize, that’s how countries get better, by accepting inferiority and improving.
There are more important things to worry about in the end, so what if Josh Howard is frustrated? At some point we all are disappointed in our own country and it’s in your right to criticize because patriotism means you should give two shits and not blindly believing some dumb(!) writer at SI says or whatever other people say. (Sorry Associated Press you guys are douchebags).
I think you can still disagree with me on this (please feel free to share, I don’t know what Americans ultimately feel about this… but should they really be angry?)
There’s just no point in attacking someone’s character for such a dumb reason…
