Scandalous Charge: Coach Dabo Swinney is ‘insensitive’
Counter charge: Woke, sanctimonious sports scribes are embarrassing themselves.
Creg Stephenson, a sports journalist for al.com, sought to earn another merit badge for being More-Virtuous-Than-Thou with a cheap shot at Clemson football coach Dabo Swinney.
What the writer really did was provide yet another example of how woke and ridiculous today’s sanctimonious mainstream journalists have become.
Here’s the first few paragraphs documenting Coach Swinney’s latest example of “insensitivity” (emphasis added).
“Clemson football coach Dabo Swinney has stuck his foot in his mouth once again.
“Following the Tigers’ 28-20 double-overtime loss to Miami … Swinney was asked if his team employed a ‘sports psychiatrist’ to help players cope with such difficult moments. Swinney’s response was ill-advised to say the least.
“We got him. He’s probably on suicide-watch right now,” Swinney said with a grin …”
“Swinney was obviously joking, but probably should have stayed away from that particular subject. Numerous student-athletes have spoken out in recent years about their mental health struggles, and suicide among teenagers and college-age people has been a particularly troubling trend of late.”
First Comment:
So a scathing op-ed was based on the fact Coach Swinney joked that the team’s mental health counselor is “probably on suicide watch right now.”
I’m having difficulty figuring out why I should be so offended by the way Swinney phrased his (witty) answer … to a question that was itself woke and stupid.
The charge must be that no football coach or authority figure should be allowed to make such a comment … because it might make some troubled person more likely to attempt suicide? Or maybe such a remark will be too painful to family members who have lost someone to the tragedy of suicide?
Apparently, one should never say, even in jest, that someone is on “suicide watch.”
I myself have used this expression. Until reading this column, I didn’t know this phrase made me an insensitive ogre.
What really motivated this rebuttal column is the hypocrisy of the scolder. What the author is really saying is that he’s more anti-suicide than Dabo Swinney.
What bothers me is that I know suicides and suicide attempts have increased dramatically in recent years, but one of the main reasons these statistics have increased is because of the policies of public health and government officials, policies universally championed by mainstream journalists like Mr. Stephenson.
Yes, suicides and suicide attempts have increased conspicuously, but no mainstream journalist has been honest or brave enough to identify the real reason for this spike, which has nothing to do with “insensitive” jokes by a football coach. (One can’t even broach possible reasons).
Example 2 of the Dangerous Dabo Swinney …
“It’s not the first time Swinney …has gotten into hot water over insensitive comments or actions. In 2019, he said in a radio interview that he was regarded as “Osama bin Dabo” in his home state after beating the Crimson Tide twice in three years for the national championship.”
Comment:
I live in Alabama and I’m not offended by this joke, which I thought was pretty clever. Dabo did become a villain for many Alabama fans by beating our team in two big games.
Memo to self: Don’t ever use Osama Bin Laden’s name if talking about history’s villains and don’t ever say a coach that beats your team might be unpopular for doing so.
The third example was also over the top …
“In 2020 during the height of the “Black Lives Matter” movement, photos surfaced of Swinney wearing a “Football Matters” t-shirt at a pool party.”
Comment:
My God! … I’d heard that Dabo was a fiend, but a football coach wearing a T-shirt that says, “football matters” is beyond the pale.
Per Stephenson’s “hot take,” what Dabo must have really been trying to say is that “Black Lives Matter” doesn’t matter … but Dabo never said this.
He simply made a statement (to a few friends at a pool party) that football also matters.
And, guess what? He’s exactly right.
Football matters to every black person who plays the sport and every white person …. and to every one of the tens of millions of fans who love the sport.
Football teachers corny lessons like teamwork, sacrifice, leadership and toughness. It brings people of different races and backgrounds together and keeps people who might otherwise get into trouble away from bad influences.
For thousands of athletes, it provides a free college education, which can change lives for the better and it allows a few athletes to earn large amounts of income to support themselves and their families.
It also gives millions of people something to look forward to on the weekend and economically supports thousands of businesses that sell products to fans.
So Dabo’s infamous T-shirt was …. 100-percent true.
If this wasn’t true, Dabo’s more moral-than-thou critics wouldn’t have their current jobs as sports journalists.
Example 4 - The Covid card …
“Later that same year, he accused Florida State of using COVID-19 protocols as an ‘excuse’ for canceling the game between the two teams, implying the struggling Seminoles simply didn’t want to lose badly on the field.”
Comment:
I don’t know if Dabo’s (alleged) charge is true or not, but I do know a lot of college football games were cancelled because of ridiculous Covid testing protocols.
This comment might be the closest thing we got from a coach who came close to saying what 75 percent of coaches must have really been thinking.
Back to suicide, which is growing among the young
There’s no telling how many college students attempted or committed suicide because their lives were turned upside down because of Covid protocols, or because of the false fear of a disease these students shouldn’t have feared.
If I said this or if Coach Swinney said this, we’d be leveled with the charge that we were … “insensitive” or much worse.
The fact is plenty of sports scribes thought all sports should be cancelled and that students shouldn’t be allowed to go to classes or participate in normal social and recreational activities. Many sports journalists also didn’t want fans to be able to go to games.
These are the same people who accuse Dabo Swinney of being “insensitive.”
What I really think is the pundit class, which is completely captured, despises and wants to punish independent thinkers who say what they really think.
More Power to Dabo …
I’ve always been a fan of Dabo Swinney and found his interviews refreshing because he’s not afraid of voicing a few non-authorized opinions.
Even in his “suicide watch” interview, he made a great point.
Swinney, addressing reporters, added: “I’m sure things have not gone the way ya’ll always want. Maybe in your professional career from time to time and you had a plan, worked hard and you did everything [and] didn’t go the way you want. You just got to keep moving. You got to keep going.”
Speaking for myself, I can relate to Coach Swinney’s apt “life lesson.”
As a contrarian journalist in woke New Normal times, I’ve been trying to write stories I think matter. I’ve worked hard and, still, many things are “not going the way I want.”
But I do try to keep going. The alternative - quitting - is repugnant to me.
This was the excellent point Coach Swinney was making. Football teams aren’t supposed to quit trying when they lose a few games. Dabo hasn’t changed and, as far as I can tell, he doesn’t think he’s guilty of the scandalous and character-impugning charge of “being insensitive.”
In my opinion, what many journalist want is for coaches like Swinney to think like they do and never challenge the authorized narratives.
To them, public figures who say such things, even if they are true or represent the thinking of millions of Americans, represent danger and such comments should be attacked at every opportunity. So they label such coaches as “insensitive” and use the excuse of a double overtime loss to send such coaches yet another message from the captured classes.
A Dabo admirer like myself can only hope these messages backfire and more Americans realize it’s the captured journalists who deserve our ire … not excellent and honest football coaches like Dabo Swinney.
***
UPDATE: And we’ve already gotten the requisite public apology from Coach Swinney. Sigh.
"...Swinney was asked if his team employed a ‘sports psychiatrist’ to help players cope with such difficult moments. "
Such difficult moments? Now they need a grieving room or something so they can go cry on the shoulder of a 'sports psychiatrist'. Whiskey tango foxtrot!
That one question alone wins the wokedom award.
Hey, I'm a Gamecock fan and I'm not afraid to say it. but, hats off to Dabo for pissing off the woketards out there. Doube down Dabo, double down.