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Donald Sterling has not owned the L. A. Clippers for a decade; on Tuesday, his story is back in the spotlight with the introduction of FX’s new Hulu miniseries, “Clipped. “
Sterling, born Donald Tokowitz to Ashkenazi Jewish immigrant parents, owned the Clippers from 1981 to 2014, when he was suspended for life and fined $2. 5 million by the NBA after personal records revealed he made racist comments about black people.
“Clipped,” starring Ed O’Neill as Sterling, Jacki Weaver as his wife Shelly Sterling and Laurence Fishburne as Clippers coach Doc Rivers, chronicles this scandal. The six-episode presentation is found in “The Sterling Affairs,” a five-part podcast. series through ESPN reporter Ramona Shelburne, who is Jewish and is also an executive producer of “Clipped. “
Sterling, 90, is now away from the spotlight. But for the vast majority of his time as owner of the Clippers, the team’s ineptitude was infamous. In his 33 seasons at the helm, the Clippers compiled the worst overall winning percentage of any team in the NBA, MLB, NFL or NHL. In that span, the team went a decade or more without a winning season — it wasted 70 of 82 games at one point.
Sterling was also prosecuted for sexual harassment and discrimination in the late 1990s and early 2000s and had been fined several times through the league in the past. He was almost forced to sell the team a year into his tenure because of a suggestion he made. He was looking for the team to lose.
The final straw came on April 25, 2014, when TMZ released a recording of a verbal exchange between Sterling and his lover V. Stiviano in which Sterling was racist toward black people.
After Stiviano, played in the series via Cleopatra Coleman, posted a photo with NBA legend Magic Johnson on Instagram, Sterling filmed telling Stiviano, who is a Black component, “It really bothers me that you have to convey that you’re associating with black people. “people.
Sterling said, “You can sleep with them. You can bring them, you can do whatever you want. The little I ask of you is that you advertise them in this and bring them to my games. “
In a lengthy tape released a short time later via the online sports site Deadspin, Sterling also referred to Israel’s remedy for black Jews as an obvious justification for his own views on race.
“It’s the world! You go to Israel, the other blacks are treated like dogs,” Sterling said in the recording.
When asked by Stiviano if that remedy was acceptable, Sterling replied, “There are white Jews and black Jews, you understand?”
Stiviano then asked if black Jews were “less than white Jews,” to which Sterling replied, “One hundred percent, 50, one hundred percent. “
Later in the film, Stiviano mentions the Holocaust, comparing Sterling’s views on blacks to Nazi anti-Semitism.
“Wasn’t it then? With the Holocaust?” he says. And you are Jewish, you perceive discrimination. “
Sterling responded, “You’re an intellectual case, you’re an intellectual case. The Holocaust, we compare it to. . . “
“Racism! Discrimination,” Stiviano said.
The tapes set off a firestorm in the NBA and beyond, culminating in the NBA’s decision, days later, to ban Sterling from the league for life, forcing him to sell the franchise, and impose a $2. 5 million fine.
Sterling had already cared about Jewish causes: In 1991, he invited the Maccabi Tel Aviv basketball team to play two exhibition games against the Clippers and said he would put the proceeds toward the Israeli team’s youth sports program. He was inducted into the California Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in 2006 and has donated to Jewish domain organizations, according to the Forward.
But when the tapes were released, Jewish leaders condemned Sterling.
“The comments attributed to Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling are reprehensible,” Abraham Foxman, then national director of the Anti-Defamation League, said in a statement. “If the National Basketball Association’s investigation shows that Mr. Sterling has indeed made those racist comments and illiberal statements, we expect and anticipate a swift and forceful response. “
In its own statement, the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism called Sterling’s comments “horribly racist” and noted that the controversy took place in the days leading up to Yom HaShoah, Israel’s Holocaust Remembrance Day.
At the news conference announcing the NBA’s ban and fine against Sterling, league commissioner Adam Silver, who is Jewish, asked him if he “feels any duty within the Jewish community” to respond to Sterling’s comments, adding Sterling’s references to his own Jewish identity. . .
Silver said his reaction was “as a human being,” adding that the scenario was “incredibly painful,” regardless of religion.
Sterling’s Jewish identity was also addressed a few weeks later, in an explosive interview he gave to CNN’s Anderson Cooper.
In the interview, Sterling apologized for his comments, saying, “I can’t understand some of the stupid, meaningless, unpolite words I said. “He also blamed the controversy on the media and said he was “encouraged” to make the comments. He continually attacked Johnson, who had called for the NBA to be banned.
Sterling said that after learning of Johnson’s HIV diagnosis, he “went to my synagogue and prayed” for him. And on two occasions he has implied that Jews do more for their own network than blacks, invoking Jewish flexible lending teams that were created for those in need.
“Jews have a business, and it’s for other people who need to borrow money interest-free,” Sterling said. “They want to give them a fishing rod. We need to help other people. If they don’t have cash, we’re going to lend it to you. You have no interest. One day you will return it to us.
When Cooper asked if Sterling said that “African Americans don’t contribute as much to African American communities as Jews,” Sterling began to reply, “There are no African Americans,” before pausing.
(Cindy Rogoway, who at the time was vice president of the International Free Jewish Lending Association, did not appreciate this question. “I’m sorry he talked about us,” he said. I think it’s a shame for himself. . »)
Later in the interview, Sterling again exchanged words with the Jewish community.
“The Jews, when they succeed, will help their people,” he told Cooper. “And some African Americans (I’ll get in trouble) don’t need to help anybody. “
In an interview with TMZ after the tape aired, Johnson said Sterling’s attempts to “pit two opposing communities against each other” would fail.
“The wonderful thing about the African American and Jewish communities is that they have worked well together over the years, and we will continue to work with the Jewish community,” Johnson said.
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