The God Squad: Tim Tebow, Jeremy Lin, And Religiosity Of Sports

 Eva: Great point.  As a Lakers’ fan, I can’t believe I thought about AC Green.  This is further evidence of the absurdity that Tebow is being contructed as some “pioneer”

 BayanIzumi: I actually wrote about this on others sites, but yes that is a class part of the narrative

As many have written within the NBA, race functions in ways that centers blackness.  Media representations juxtaposes whiteness, Asianness, and all international players in opposition to blackness (see work of grant farred).  The white “underdog narrative” is thus connected to “underestimation narrative.”  Model minority discourse operates within this space as well.  Wrote more on this elsewhere – http://newblackman.blogspot.com/2012/02/pride-and-prejudice-jeremy-lin-and.html

I agree with Wang’s assessment that Lin is being coded as closer to Tebow’s brand of spirituality and race than he is to the race that makes up the vast majority of the NBA. 

 I agree with Eva and David J Leonard that their are plenty of religious black players in the NBA whose style of play is a lot closer to Lin’s basketball skills  than Tebows.

Media is lazy and rarely makes comparisons that aren’t lazy. Cam Newton is almost always compared to Michael Vick   even though he’s 6 inches taller and plays like the amazing love child of Ben Rothlisberger and Aaron Rogers.

There aren’t any asian players for the media to reference that look like Lin, so instead of referencing players in the NBA who have similar beliefs and play basketball rather than football and who are possibly black, they immediately go to the tired and trite Tebow card

I thought Ricky Rubio would have been the person the media would try to elevate as the next star ( he has game, but he has an ethnic name even though he’s a white Spaniard). Every sport wants a Tebow, because it makes them and media tons of money

As Wang mentioned I wonder if the media really is trying to cast Wang as a version of a  Model Minority version of Tebow ( not white, but close enough). I hadn’t thought of this before, but it makes sense

Media rarely wants to hear about black and hispanic athletes who are more times than not, with or without the grand religiosity, great people and citizens. That narrative runs counter to the typical branding that  NBA players ( and to a lesser extent NFL players)  are all “THUGS” which is something  I hear in almost every sports bar

Point in fact: On the CBS list of 2012′s most hated athlete list you have get to number ten before the first non-person of color
http://miami.cbslocal.com/2012/02/09/lebron-6th-most-disliked-athlete/

Exactly, this meme Leonard is tacitly promoting that “Jeremy Lin is basically White” downplays how Asian folks have taken to Lin because he is ASIAN–and neither White nor Black.

This Lin- is-White meme denies agency to Asian Americans and reiterates America’s tired Black/White racial binarism, where one must choose between only these two points of identifications.

With the increasing demographic changes of America, this Black-White straightjacket is not tenable to not only Asians but other non-Black minorities like Latino, Indigineous, Arab, etc. 

It’s archaic racial paradigm that cannot address the interests of these “other* groups living in a country that will only grow more MULTI-racial and cultural in the future.

I believe you make several poignant statements in your
reflection about Tebow and Lin and how the “religious revival within America’s
sports world” is being attributed to Tebow at times and how sports figures of
other colors who are vocal Christians about their faith and are being
overshadowed by the media hype of Tebow and Lin. I agree with the point that is
being made Lin’s story being made about Tebow and believe that Lin’s story
should stand on its own (and I believe that it will) without comparison to
Tebow;  however, I have to disagree with
you about it being about a “testament to the wages of Whiteness.” While I’m just
now beginning to know about Lin and his history, you also have to consider what
has contributed to the narrative surrounding Tebowmania who came from a
missionary family who chose to not to abort him despite a life-threatening
condition, his public and firm stance on several Christian values, and
continued public affirmation of the Christ as Savior and Lord. These are all
factors that have fed into the new phenomenon. Yes, Tebow is white but when a
comment is made about him being white while excluding these other elements,
part of the story is being majorly overlooked. My guess is if these weren’t
part of his story, Tebowmania, the current media sensationalism, and the “religious
revival within America’s sports world” wouldn’t exist as it does now.
 

David, I have no problem with your analysis of race centering on blackness in the N.B.A., which I think is valid insofar as dominant media representations, model minority figurations, etc. are  concerned. However, when you say “Tebow defines him”, you forget to ask “according to whom?” and “for whom?”. In other words, you neglect Asian American narratives which are neither “white” nor  ”colorblind” racial underdog narratives. If you read what “everyday Asian Americans” are posting on their blogs or facebooks, it has nothing to do with TeBow and only sometimes to do with religion. Most of it has to do with the distinctiveness and challenges of growing up Asian and American at the same time. There are other points of comparison than U.S. blacks and whites in this distinctive discourse, including Asians from Asia. I just read a few comments by an Asian American male about why Jeremy Lin is easier to identify with than Yao Ming. So I stand by my original critique. You need to incorporate more Asian American voice and opinion in this piece.

 Rather than respond to your mischaracterization of my argument (no where to I argue Lin is white and this is not a meme), I will simply quote from the article: “Through the comparison, we witness the profound ways that the media erases race by denying Tebow’s whiteness
all concretizing Lin’s whiteness (of a different color). Represented
through a dominant white racial frame despite his being subjected to
racist taunts throughout his career, the comparison denies the power of
race. It erases the ways in which whiteness serves as an anchor for the
media sensationalism and celebration of Tebow; it erases the ways in
which race and identity functions with the source of pride Lin’s has
delivered for Asian American community” — the article argues against the claims you make above

Well, I think you have to put the whole Tebow phenomenom and attempts to pull Lin into it into the context of the recently reignited culture wars. Gingrich, Romney and Santorum are trying to force their version of Christianity down people’s throats, the Catholic church is trying to hold government policy hostage by threatening to go out of business if we tell them their tax-exempt status requires them not to be bigots, evangelicals don’t want insurance to pay for contraception, even though they’re paying the salaries that are already paying for contraception anyway, and so on, and so on. The stories about Tebow and Lin fit the narrative (especially Tebow, who’s oh so bravely breaking the rules to evangelize  – not affirm – his religion inappropriately).

I still find it amazing to think that anyone would believe a god worth the name could possibly care about the outcome of a game.

Eva has a good point… many black NBA players are evangelical Christians. Maybe it’s because so many in the American black culture are evangelicals with a long historical tradition that we tend to overlook those religious blacks in the NBA or other sports – as just being a part of “that” culture.