.edgeofsports: Athletes deserve absolute freedom of speech, but that doesn't mean NBA anti-vaxxers are exempt from criticism.
Oct. 5, 2021, 9:30 AM UTCNinety-five percent of NBA players are vaccinated, according to the league, a higher rate than even front-line health care workers. The NBA’s numbers are good. Amidst a tsunami of media coverage and scrutiny focused on the very wrong 5 percent, the truth about the NBA’s high vaccination should be shouted from the mountaintops.
I think they are terribly wrongheaded about this. But the point here is not to point out the renunciation of public health and community solidarity that NBA anti-vaxxers and their defenders represent. It’s not even to point out that the same people — hello, Ted Cruz — who excoriated them or told them to “shut up and dribble” when they stood up to racist police violence last year are now singing their praises.
Athletes deserve absolute freedom of speech. They don’t sign away their freedom of expression when they sign sports contracts. If this is the way that Beal, Irving and James feel, then they shouldn’t feel stymied from saying so. But freedom of speech should never mean freedom from debate about what you are saying. This small minority of NBA anti-vaxxers and their much larger group of hooping comrades are not exempt from people pushing back.
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