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| Future Bulls star and White Sox prospect was a Tar Heel |
Several
government officials across the country have imposed travel bans restricting
their ability to do business with North Carolina companies, while Mayor Rahm
Emanuel has publicly said he’d like to urge a Carolina-based business to relocate
to Chicago – IF they wish to escape the restrictions of the state’s effort to
outlaw legal protections for gay people.
WHAT
DOES ANY of this have to do with the White Sox?
Just
that the Sout’ Side ball club has so much of its minor league operations based
in the Carolinas. Their top-level affiliate is the Charlotte Knights, while
they also deliberately located two lower-level affiliates in Winston-Salem and
Kannapolis.
The
idea being that a Chicago team official having to do business with the minor
league teams can catch a simple slight from O’Hare International Airport to
Charlotte, then rent a car for a short drive to one of the other cities if need
be.
Have
the White Sox been dragged into a potential political brawl because of the
cities they use to try to develop young ballplayers into major leaguers?
COMMON
SENSE OUGHT to say “No.” Then again, common sense rarely is used in such situations.
It would be too easy to drag the team into the situation to try to score
political points.
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| Sox' AAA, ... |
After
all, common sense ought to have kept North Carolina from taking on this issue
to begin with.
But
the idea that some places were passing local laws specifying that gay people
had the same legal protections and rights as everybody else strikes some
individuals as too radical a concept to tolerate.
Just
like those people who want to fight against local laws concerning gun ownership
and try to pass laws mandating that everybody own a firearm!
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| ... high A, and ... |
WHAT
MAKES THIS truly pathetic is the fact that North Carolina officials wound up
including provisions regarding restrooms in public schools (presumably, private
schools already are segregating). As in transgender people would be told their
thoughts about who they are is wrong, and they have to urinate and defecate
where they’re told.
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| ... low A affiliates. |
No
matter how squeamish and uncomfortable it might make them. Honestly, for all
the talk about perverts hanging around bathrooms, I’d think the bigger threat
is to some clown who thinks he’s acting in Jesus’ name in sticking some “guy’s”
head in a toilet bowl because he doesn’t act “manly enough.”
Particularly
if it winds up happening in one of the ballparks. Which would truly be a
disgraceful incident that would wind up drawing negative attention to the
Chicago team indirectly.
Now
I don’t know what the White Sox would, or could, do if this situation were to
wind up causing problems. I’d like to think that people attending ballgames do
so to escape nonsense like this.
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| Alabama could become point of common sense for White Sox |
BUT
ALL TOO often, the ideologues of our society insist on bringing their nonsense
to places where is truly doesn’t belong.
Although
perhaps it would be nice if at least one White Sox affiliate were to be
somewhere in the Midwest within range of Chicago (like the Chicago Cubs who
have minor league affiliates in Des Moines, Iowa, and South Bend, Ind. – both of
which, ironically enough, were once White Sox affiliates).
I
don’t know that such a move is in the works. Then again, perhaps we’ll have to
see if incidents arise once the Knights’ Opening Day is held April 14.
It
would be nice if calmer and cooler heads could prevail.
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