The B Side

"If these games did anything, it’s remind us that the corporatised world of sports is a mess that should be fumigated from snout to tail. We all know that doping permeates our favourite events, that the exclusion of trans women from competitions is pure bigotry based on junk science, and capitalism has marginalized working class fans and athletes alike. We watch our beloved teams play even though we know they’re owned by sleazy billionaires who would sink their clubs’ legacies for an extra dollar. And despite it all, we still love the essence of competition, of community, and of watching people try their best. The Enhanced Games isn’t about the love of the game; it’s a smarmy exercise in profit over people."

"Music doesn’t have to win a majority of voters. It doesn’t need to appeal to the lowest common denominator or lay out a 10-point plan. It just has to be true enough for people to see themselves in it. It just has to remind people that they’re not alone in their fears and their struggles, their hopes and their dreams. Great music has a way of helping us feel seen; more than that, it helps us see others, enlarging our hearts and our moral imaginations. That’s how the spirituals preached emancipation before the Proclamation was signed, rock & roll encouraged integration before the Civil Rights Act was passed, and the protest songs got the wrongness of Vietnam long before the government could admit it."

"Similar to Iowa State star Audi Crooks, Bueckers is doing what she can in her role to help in a time of crisis. Athletes who use their platforms and reach to give back are always welcome and show that they are actively engaged and a real part of the community. It’s understandable to feel despair at this moment. The US government is making life worse for people around the world. At a time like this, we have to find community with each other. This donation from Bueckers will help Minnesotans and hopefully spur other athletes to follow her lead. When we come together, we win."

"CBA negotiations have been a frustrating, yet revealing saga. Throughout the process, we’ve seen the league office disrespect and belittle players. It’s been shocking to watch from the outside, and I can only imagine how it feels to be on the receiving end of it. The disrespect hasn’t gone unnoticed, either."

"It’s become evident that the NBA and WNBA want the Sun in Houston and have steered the process toward their desired outcome. If the sale occurs, it gives them more ownership group that is aligned with NBA interests as compared to independent WNBA owners who might not be.

"Players — not all, but a lot — are increasingly and intensely concerned with controlling their narrative. Also, with getting paid for it. Influencer culture has emphasised the belief that if there’s something interesting, worthwhile, or novel about you (even if there isn’t) then you have to be the one to make other people see it. For athletes, this has translated into the sense that if they’re not the ones explicitly telling fans who they are, preferably on a podcast, fans won’t know."

"In reading everything surrounding the CBA talks, I can’t help but feel that management has no respect for the players and their contributions to this league. WNBA players have sacrificed so much over the decades and played for less money than they could have elsewhere. In turn, players have been told they don’t “understand the business,” that sharing is the wrong way to look at things, they’re asking for too much, they should be grateful for the league, etc. That lack of respect manifests itself in what the league is offering the current players and the systematic ignoring of past eras of players. The WNBA historically hasn’t done a great job in honoring its history, and these negotiations continue that disappointing trend."

"For the league office, they don't need to be as married to NBA ownership groups as Cathy Engelbert seems to have been. Throughout the expansion process, the W has prioritized NBA ownership over independent groups that don’t have NBA affiliations, which limits the WNBA’s reach and gives the NBA even more control over the W.

"AI is a cruel technology. It replaces workers, devours millions of gallons of water, vomits CO2 into the atmosphere, propagandises exclusively for the worst ideologies, and fills the world with more ugliness and stupidity. Cruelty is the central tenet of right wing ideology. It is at the heart of everything they do. They are now quite willing to lose money or their lives in order to make the world a crueller place, and AI is a part of this – a mad rush to make a machine god that will liberate capital from labour for good. (This is no exaggeration: there is a lineage from OpenAI’s senior management back to the Lesswrong blog, originator of the concept of Roko’s Basilisk.) Moreso even than cryptocurrency, AI is entirely nihilistic, with zero redeeming qualities. It is a blight upon the world, and it will take decades to clear up the mountains of slop it has generated in the past two or three years."

"Racism isn’t a logical position, so you cannot defeat it with logic. Facts just don’t matter to a racist, especially not the tedious kind of racist who makes their home in video game culture. There will always be a new hair to split, a new way for this kind of person to object to a black man being in this video game. You can bring up the other fantabulous aspects of the Assassin’s Creed franchise that clash with history: the existence of the titular Creed and the Knights Templar; whatever the fuck was going on with the Apples of Eden; the series’ depiction of Karl Marx as a devotee of democracy rather than advocating for an armed revolution of the proletariat. It does not matter because the people who are mad about this have already made up their mind."

"This isn’t about an elaborate “I told you so”—I don’t need all that. What this is, is a reminder that we know con artists when we see them. And while we appear to be heading into an era where the government is led by a crew of three-card-monte enthusiasts, we have to also do the critical work of understanding ourselves, our bodies, and what it means to keep ourselves healthy and safe in a time where it is very clear that the people in power couldn’t care less.

"If we have any hope of getting through the next four years and beyond, it’s by calling balls and strikes as we see them—and not kowtowing to fascists hellbent on cloistering themselves away while general suffering metastasizes."

"For Black Americans, the implications of this power struggle are deeply troubling. History has shown that when powerful white men vie for dominance, Black communities often bear the consequences, enduring setbacks that reverberate across generations. From slavery to Jim Crow, from redlining to mass incarceration, power struggles among white elites have often resulted in policies and systems that disproportionately harm Black Americans, entrenching inequality and erasing progress. Each of these historical moments serves as a reminder of how vulnerable marginalized communities become when political battles prioritize dominance over justice. These historical lessons remind us that when powerful white men clash, the resulting policies and systems often deepen systemic inequities, disproportionately harming Black Americans. MAGA, rooted in white supremacist ideologies, has always gravitated toward leaders who push to roll back civil rights advancements. This is why figures like Trump, with his attacks on the Central Park Five, and Musk, with his attempts to delegitimize institutions like HBCUs, find such embrace within the movement."

"The commodification of everything is exhausting. Living within the smothering confines of late-stage capitalism is a total nightmare with no escape in sight. It’s understandable why you’d want to cash in on something as peurile and absurd as a sex joke, but then everything becomes about the money. Rising out one jokes means you will inevitably have to start talking about literally anything else, from politics to activism to whatever the hot take of the day is. And it’s all for sale, much in the same way our lives are. Every home is a potential AirBnb, every car a possible Uber, and every Tik Tok clip your route to millions. If you’re lucky, have a decent head on your shoulders and good people around you, you can get through it without falling into absolute mania. But the chances are you’ll most likely end up surrounded by creeps like the Paul brothers who see a quick buck to be made and string you along for the ride. Maybe you’ll get an agent or publicist but usually you’ll be the one trying to figure out the scam from the safe call, and when you’re young, dumb, and full of spit, why wouldn’t you pick the thing everyone says will make you more money? This is not to strip Welch away from the responsibility she bears for being part of a supposed scam, but it is a reminder that the addictive trauma of celebrity corrupts at a record pace."

"Though we all moved to these platforms for their convenience, over time they became less convenient. I don’t remember exactly when or why I stopped looking at Facebook, just that now it’s overrun with AI slop and has become barely usable. Twitter is experiencing the same “enshittification” process as we speak: After the election, users left the Elon Musk-owned platform in droves, unwilling to centralize the way they talk to people online around this one website. Not that it matters much—Musk and Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg have already made billions of dollars off of convincing everyone to invest their time into these websites, and if they had their way, you would spend even more time there, earning them even more money.

"In sports media, there is no such solidarity between writers of different beats, nor is there much insight into what the compensation is for these roles. New York, with its pay transparency requirements, is one of the few places with any visibility into that market. We aren’t represented in a way that would allow collective bargaining for a change to the compensation structure, and writers are often discouraged from revealing their salaries lest it get back to management as another writer negotiates a raise."

"We’re in a different climate now. A different era. Trump gives people permission to be the worst versions of themselves. And with him winning, we’re seeing that again on a much larger scale."