Chinese broadcasters try to sensor tattoos and homosexuality on television but their European counterparts wont have it. The NFL has proven that it caters mainly to rich, white audiences and Ben Carson attempts to shelve a policy to eradicate segregation.

China’s regressive (Euro)vision

The annual extravagant Eurovision Song Contest which launched the careers of Abba and Celine Dion has its finale in Lisbon on 12 May. At its core, the programe has always been about pushing boundaries, celebrating the idea of multi-culture over mono-culture and being able to laugh at oneself.

However, this is precisely what has caused a clash with the Chinese broadcasting regulator. Viewers in China who watched the semi-finals earlier this week saw rainbow flags covered by clouds of pixels. Two songs—the Irish performance, which included two male dancers acting out a love-scene, and Albania’s performance by an artist with tattoos—were censored altogether, The Economist writes.

Following this the European Broadcasting Union has swiftly withdrawn broadcasting rights from Mango, a Chinese television channel, making it clear to the world that it won’t stand for ‘censorious cherrypicking’. “This is not in line with the EBU’s values of universality and inclusivity and our proud tradition of celebrating diversity through music,” the broadcaster said in a statement.

“Although homosexuality has been legal in China since 1997 (and ceased to be an official mental disorder in 2001), a 2016 law has banned the broadcasting of “abnormal sexual relationships and behaviours,” including same-sex relations. A recent crackdown on displaying tattoos is part of a broader effort to “clean up” subcultures. (Hip-hop is another target.)”

‘Take a knee’

A little more than a year ago, after NFL player Colin Kaepernick knelt for the national anthem to protest white police brutality against African Americans, 32 NFL teams suddenly insisted that he wasn’t good enough to play the sport anymore, the Washington Post writes.

A year later, Eric Reid seems to be nearing the same fate after being the first player to follow in Kaepernick’s footsteps. Two months into the offseason signing period and Reid who is 26 and healthy is still unsigned.

In a political atmosphere where President Trump had declared that NFL owners should respond to kneeling players by saying, “get that son of a bitch off the field right now, out. He’s fired. He’s fired!” this is quite simply, punitive behavior that has been brought down by a small group of rich, almost entirely white men on an African American who dared to step out of line.

“They don’t want the president yelling that they’re anti-American because they aren’t “firing the SOBs.” They’re also aware that most of their season ticket-holders are white, and many of them booed loudly when players took a knee last season.”

Ben Carson V. Segregation

Ben Carson’s contempt for the Fair Housing Act, 1968 has blinded him to policies that are in the nation’s best interest, and made him a prime target for lawsuits and court intervention, the New York Times editorialises.

Just last year, for instance, the housing and urban development secretary attempted to derail an Obama-era program that assisted low-income families in finding homes in middle-class communities with good schools, transportation and jobs. However, he was stopped by the Federal District Court in Washington from initiating any such move.

However, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) doesn’t give up easily and is attempting now to shelve another set of rules that require communities to analyse segregation and submit plans to remedy it as a condition for drawing down billions of dollars in federal aid.

“A new lawsuit filed by fair housing groups shows that HUD’s decision last January to suspend the segregation rule — in the absence of notice, public consultation or even plausible explanation — violates federal law. Freed from federal scrutiny, jurisdictions with proven histories of using federal money to confine low-income families in impoverished, racially isolated areas would be free to carry on business as usual.”