Apparently, racism runs rampant in the NHL, who knew?! It’s things like these that make me almost want to watch hockey… wait no I still don’t.
Thursday night at the Detroit Red Wings - Philadelphia Flyers preseason game at the Labatt Center in Ontario 3 full periods resulted in a tie and so the shoot out would begin. What is usually a pretty tense scenario at a hockey game quickly turned into a very awkward situation riddled with confusion. As Philadelphia forward Wayne Simmonds (one of the NHL’s few African-American players) was attempting what would turn out to be a successful shot on goal, a really intelligent fan threw a banana directly in his path. After the incident, Simmonds made some pretty defeated, yet realistic comments:
“I caught it from the side of my eye. It was a banana. Hopefully, that wasn’t directed towards me being black. Because if it was, that just somebody being ignorant.”
Later as the Associated Press asked him about the incident, Simmonds said that although the banana did shake him up that “you learn to deal with it.” And he added, “When you’re a black man playing in a predominantly white man’s sport, you’ve got to expect things like that.” Ummm… WHAT?? Why does he have to expect things like that because he plays hockey? But Lebron James can call himself King James and walk out onto his court every night knowing full well that he is one of America’s most celebrated athletes. Just because this guy plays hockey, and yeah hockey is the shittiest sport but that’s not his fault!, he has to expect bouts of racism to dot his career? Ridiculous.
And know this shit, this isn’t the first time a banana has been thrown at an African-American hockey player!!! In 2002, another really nice Canadian threw a banana at Carolina Hurricanes’ goal tender Kevin Weeks during the playoffs in Montreal.
I think it’s a little comforting to know that this shit happened in Canada, both times. A little, but not much. Maybe getting free healthcare really brings out the racism in people. BLAME CANADA!!! And to think, more than once, Canada has been chosen as the country with some of the nicest citizens. WHAT? First those crazy ass riots and now this? Chill the fuck out Canada.
And to add to the ridiculousity of this whole thing, as I was reading about this incident, it seems that this type of fan behavior is really common at European soccer games. Racism at soccer games seems to be the most rampant in Eastern European countries. Surprise, surprise, they’ve been practicing hate for as long as anyone can remember!! Umm WWII anyone?
