Security At The Minnesota Lynx Game Walked Off In Protest When The Players Came Out In These Super Appalling Shirts

Players for WNBA's Lynx wore these shirts and the cops working security walked off the job in protest pic.twitter.com/6zYj1arJcq

— Judd Legum (@JuddLegum) July 12, 2016

Dammit, I really had high hopes this time. We were finally starting to make a logical progression based on acceptance and understanding before these cops just had to overplay their hand and send us right back down to square one. The brotherhood of the badge strikes again. A bunch of thin skinned members of law enforcement that would rather make a scene defending the most indefensible of their profession rather than embrace a message that seems pretty damn all inclusive to me. Grown men stomping away from their responsibilities like children because the people they are sworn to protect wore t-shirts that were super...offensive? No, that's not the word. Aggressive? Nope, not it either. Accurate? Yup, that's the one. 

I guess I am the idiot. I was sitting here thinking that "justice" and "accountability" were two worthy causes. I was under the assumption that pieces of clothing stressing the word "US" were preaching a unifying goal for which we should all hope to attain, not making a statement that was inflammatory towards one particular group of people. That's on me. I suppose I should have researched these definitions a bit more, because semantically those shirts read about as assimilating as you could have hoped for shirts bearing a sociological message to read.

Now, do I think the players that wore all black and had a banner showing the names of two slain African Americans that met their demise at the hands of the law are leaning a particular way with this gesture? Absolutely. Look no further then the necessary inclusion of 'Black Lives Matter' - a positive message that also happens to be the name of an all-too-polarizing group - for proof of that. Don't quote me on this, but I would assume that's because this game in particular was taking place in a city where a police officer - who looked as comfortable with a firearm as I looked when I bought my first pack of condoms - shot an innocent man dead in broad day light during a routine traffic stop while his family watched. Maybe the thought that this could have been them traveling that very same road that someone senselessly lost their life on weighed into their slight bias towards one of the effected parties. 

Still, that banner features a pretty sizable badge with a 'D' in the middle symbolizing the members of the Dallas Police Department that unfortunately lost their lives at the hands of a couple psychopaths. It might be a tad bit pointed towards the boys in blue, but the fact that they perceive it that way and proceeded to react in such an immature fashion is more of an indictment of them than a well-intentioned display of togetherness by a couple basketball players standing up for what they believe in.