No Safe Spaces for the Wealthy and Powerful

Steve Kerr and Andre Iguodala (SI Photo)

Golden State Warriors veteran Andre Iguodala was fined $10,000 for the following comment: [bold added]

Asked in Minnesota if he had known before the game whether he would rest Saturday against San Antonio, Iguodala said, “Nope, no clue. I do what master say.”

To longtime followers of the Warriors Andre Iguodala clearly was not speaking maliciously; by all reports coach Steve Kerr has a great relationship with the players, and Mr. Iguodala was making a lighthearted reference to the historical white-black power relationship. (By the way, Steve Kerr makes $5 million a year, while Andre Iguodala's salary for the current season is $11 million.)

In the modern era everything one says can be put under a microscope (or be captured by a super-sensitive listening device). Close friends of different racial, religious, etc. groups can make joshing comments to each other that, taken out of context, sound inflammatory to those who become outraged at the drop of a bad-sounding syllable.

Your humble blogger has been on the giving and receiving end of these interactions in high school and college with people who are still friends; thank goodness he went to school then, for he and they would be suspended today.

Steve Kerr's reaction:

“I wasn’t the slightest bit offended. He’s got a very cryptic sense of humor. The only thing I would say is there’s certain humorous things you should say in the sanctity of the locker room and certain humorous things you might want to keep from the media. That was one of them, and he knows it.”

People who are wealthy and powerful deserve safe spaces, too.