What social justice can learn from sports

Today's episode is an essay I wrote about what social justice can learn from sports. I'm highly critical of corporate sports. The industry is rife with misogyny, racism, and classism, encoding values into millions of viewers that keep them dissociated and passive, particularly for male-identifying folks. I've had debates with sports-loving friends on how I find it to be a red flag when someone's core identity is deeply tied to franchised sports, as if rooting for a team para-socially is as good as playing the game oneself. And yet, I noticed something amongst this NBA Finals and Knicks fever that took over the city I live in and love that social-justice minded people could learn from -- that marrying joy with any movement is the fastest path to justice.