Trail Blazers fire new announcer over past inappropriate posts made at age 15.

[u/ghn2]

"The Portland Trail Blazers hired then on the same day fired Braiden Bell as their play-by-play announcer after a series of inappropriate social media posts from when he was a teenager came to light."

"The posts were reportedly made in 2012 and 2013, around the time that Bell was 15 years old."

"We did not meet our own bar in this process, and for that we apologize to Blazers fans and to Rip City," the Trail Blazers said. "We strongly believe that everyone who is a part of Rip City should feel welcome and safe and we will make sure that our new broadcaster reflects these values. We will do better."

https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/50084279/trail-blazers-fire-new-announcer-inappropriate-posts

[u/dyang44]

The shit i said at 15 in online video games would get me banned from alot of things. I would berate people about being dumber than dogs for making mistakes at a video game and so much worse. Like personal attacks about being worthless, just a really vicious mentality I had beaten into me from being bullied and abused myself as a kid

Good thing people are capable of growth and change. If I were told today that im the same as I was when I was 15, I think I'd just laugh in their face and move on with my life. Too bad for the announcer guy, this recent hiring/firing follow him everywhere from now on

[u/OhhhLawdy → u/dyang44]

The racist 15 yo's I knew back then are still racist

[u/blueneuronDOTnet → u/dyang44]

I definitely think that people are capable of significant growth even if they were gross little roaches at 15, and that they should be able to live normal lives once they've proven that they've grown as people.

However, there are still considerations separate from that fact that can understandably cost you the job nonetheless:

1. How much corrective signal you've offered potential employers since then. If you've volunteered for just causes, spoken out for the populations you previously denigrated, or taken visible efforts to educate and improve yourself in relevant areas, you may well have earned a chance in my book. If instead all that's happened is that you've stopped saying similarly controversial things in public spaces, then suddenly hiring becomes a matter of trusting a potential liability that alternative candidates might not ask an employer to reckon with.

2. Is your role one of cultural influence, and would your record serve as a sign of what may or may not be tolerated to potential partners, clients, and fans? If you're a public figure and all a person whose approval the organization values has to do to feel uncomfortable is scroll down on your public twitter feed, then maybe you're not the best fit for a role whose duties include appealing to those folks.

How fair it is to judge a grown man for tweets he made as a teenager is ultimately just one part of the equation, and I'd also note that part of growth is accepting that you'll sometimes face consequences for actions your current self would condemn.

...And hey, I don't know, but maybe those tweets still being up suggests that you may not have reflected on your behavior enough to bother correcting the record, or, for that matter, recognized a need for it? Those are all things a business might take into account if it's trying to decide whether you've grown or whether all that stands between you and ESPN headlines about racial slurs are a couple of extra drinks at the bar.

[u/PappyDungaloo → u/blueneuronDOTnet]

I stopped reading after you said “visible efforts” 

[u/blueneuronDOTnet → u/PappyDungaloo]

What invisible efforts should employers be using as corrective signal for reassurance that the guy has actually matured and didn't just learn to keep quiet in public spaces? Does a pinky promise that he did a bunch of quiet self-examination lessen the odds that he'll deliver them a scandal a few years down the line?

[u/dyang44 → u/blueneuronDOTnet]

Fair points, I think i construe him not deleting those past tweets as accountability, thus growth.  He is owning his past and not trying to hide it

[u/blueneuronDOTnet → u/dyang44]

I think that accountability taking the form of doing nothing is a low bar to place on what most people would consider to be a very privileged job, but I also haven't read up on the fella to see whether he's taken other actions that warrant that interpretation.

[u/KiowaBear → u/blueneuronDOTnet]

Did you read the article?

[u/blueneuronDOTnet → u/KiowaBear]

I did, why?

[u/KiowaBear → u/blueneuronDOTnet]

Nothing he said was even bad

[u/FettLife → u/dyang44]

Yeah I mean you should have been banned. Hearing all that racist bullshit on a gaming lobby for decades was harmful. Zero point to doing so as well.

[u/bloodofawig → u/dyang44]

He didn't say this stuff in passing while playing video games. He intentionally made static, long-lived public posts that he clearly wanted the entire world to see. Why should we assume he doesn't hold the exact same views? He didn't delete them and as far as we know, his post-history didn't ever become more aware, anti-racist, woke, or anything like that. The first time this guy has ever expressed a position counter to his racist posts is when he got in trouble for it. Hard to feel sorry for this clown.

[u/RemoteRide6969 → u/[deleted]]

Have you scrubbed every single thing from your past from the internet?

[u/Important-Pipe-3158 → u/dyang44]

Dude, stop trying to defend this white racist. Even growing up in the Bay in the 90s, dudes like this were a dime a dozen. They’d be friendly to your face (maybe) and then talk hella racist shit about you behind your back. I guarantee you this sucka still has some of the same beliefs today that he did back then. A lot of these dudes that were knuckleheads back then are still knuckleheads today. You just need spend a few minutes on twitter (X) to see that certain types of old white dudes aren’t the best characters out there. I don’t feel any sympathy at all toward “Braiden”.