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A new contender for worst broadcaster of all time (Leah Hextall)

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HighNote said:
What I don't understand is that your solution to fight against discrimination is to simply default to choosing the "weaker and the less represented" people. Unless you mean differently, I assume the people you are talking about are minority groups and women, while white men are the "already strong and easily visible" people. Instead of leaving it to "human discrimination" as you say, we'd be creating a system of discrimination, where we're taking the decision making of people out of the equation and simply making it policy to, at least more often, select people for positions because they aren't white and they aren't male. It's just robbing Peter to pay Paul, is it not?
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No. Because Peter and Paul are not equal in the given society. (Also, nobody in a power position is getting "robbed".)

It's not complicated: The members of society who have historically been left behind and been oppressed need assistance in order that we can progress closer to a society where no particular groups need assistance. If we simply leave it all to human free choice, we will perpetuate the massive distinctions between haves and have-nots. Our goal as a society (in my view) should be to reduce those distinctions as much as we can.

(I am aware there are plenty of people who don't share my view, and who think society should be left alone so that the strong thrive and the weak get left behind.)
 
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SensontheRush said:
It's more like we would be living on the moon already if we were better at propping up quality leaders regardless of their background.
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Oh, undoubtedly. Imagine how much more advanced and progressive a nation state like the USA would be today if it had led the world not only in food production, technology, and militarism, but also in human rights and equitable education opportunities from, say, the early 19th century onward. The USA would today dominate the world in all areas and would have nothing to fear, economically, from states like China. Unfortunately, it didn't happen.
 
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The Panther said:
No. Because Peter and Paul are not equal in the given society. (Also, nobody in a power position is getting "robbed".)

It's not complicated: The members of society who have historically been left behind and been oppressed need assistance in order that we can progress closer to a society where no particular groups need assistance. If we simply leave it all to human free choice, we will perpetuate the massive distinctions between haves and have-nots. Our goal as a society (in my view) should be to reduce those distinctions as much as we can.

(I am aware there are plenty of people who don't share my view, and who think society should be left alone so that the strong thrive and the weak get left behind.)
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Ok, but the part I am getting caught up on is...let me use an example. Say there are two people born around the same time, they are both lower class, they both get good grades in school, they both go to college for the same degree (and are both the first person to attend and graduate college in their family). One graduates at the top of their class, the other just scrapes by but graduates nonetheless. They both get hired for a good job. The person that graduated at the top of their class works for that company for 15 years and then quits. The other person works at their company for 5 years, and then decides they want to travel, so they quit and live abroad for 10 years. Otherwise, their lives are very similar. Let's say in this example, the one that graduated at the top of their class is a white guy, and the one that just barely graduated is a black guy. Now they're both looking for a new job and they happen to apply for the same position.

Are you saying that, as the employer is looking over the applicants, the guy who just scraped by and only has 5 years of experience should be higher on the list than the guy who graduated at the top of their class and that has 15 years of experience (as well as likely many other applicants who are more qualified), solely because he belongs to a race that has historically been left behind.

I'm all for trying to help struggling people, but it just doesn't make sense if it's at the cost of other people who are also struggling. In my mind, race should be completely irrelevant in all situations. That is true equality. We shouldn't look at it in terms of white people and black people and asian people, or hispanic, etc., it should just be people. Their sex or appearance simply shouldn't matter. With your line of thinking, those things are what matter most. It's like the flip side of someone who's racist or sexist. A person's race or sex is the single biggest determining factor when a racist/sexist is hiring someone. But with someone who is trying to "equalize society," race or sex is also the most important factor, it's just going the opposite way and it's seen as righteous. It just doesn't make sense to me. Help me understand.
 
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A little reality: As a hockey play-by-play announcer, Leah Hextall is horrid regardless of gender considerations. If she had a voice like Casey Kasem, she'd still be horrid.
 
HighNote said:
Ok, but the part I am getting caught up on is...let me use an example. Say there are two people born around the same time, they are both lower class, they both get good grades in school, they both go to college for the same degree (and are both the first person to attend and graduate college in their family). One graduates at the top of their class, the other just scrapes by but graduates nonetheless. They both get hired for a good job. The person that graduated at the top of their class works for that company for 15 years and then quits. The other person works at their company for 5 years, and then decides they want to travel, so they quit and live abroad for 10 years. Otherwise, their lives are very similar. Let's say in this example, the one that graduated at the top of their class is a white guy, and the one that just barely graduated is a black guy. Now they're both looking for a new job and they happen to apply for the same position.

Are you saying that, as the employer is looking over the applicants, the guy who just scraped by and only has 5 years of experience should be higher on the list than the guy who graduated at the top of their class and that has 15 years of experience (as well as likely many other applicants who are more qualified), solely because he belongs to a race that has historically been left behind.

I'm all for trying to help struggling people, but it just doesn't make sense if it's at the cost of other people who are also struggling. In my mind, race should be completely irrelevant in all situations. That is true equality. We shouldn't look at it in terms of white people and black people and asian people, or hispanic, etc., it should just be people. Their sex or appearance simply shouldn't matter. With your line of thinking, those things are what matter most. It's like the flip side of someone who's racist or sexist. A person's race or sex is the single biggest determining factor when a racist/sexist is hiring someone. But with someone who is trying to "equalize society," race or sex is also the most important factor, it's just going the opposite way and it's seen as righteous. It just doesn't make sense to me. Help me understand.
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The flaw in your premise is that the two people in your example had similar experiences and faced the same challenges. On an individual basis - sure, that could be the case, but certain identifiable groups faced more challenges along the way. In the example, you point to grades. Biased standardized testing may have played a role in that, or various resources and opportunities afforded them as they went through school.

Specifically when it comes to female announcers, how many girls growing up even thought that it was a possibility that they could one day do play-by-play on an NHL broadcast? From that possibility - seeing someone like yourself on the screen - that is where the path starts. From there, kids listen closer, hone their skills, focus on communication, study the game, and for many, go to broadcasting school.

Was it more likely that the parents guided sons to follow that passion? If the girls make to it broadcasting school, who gets tapped for the opportunity to call the University's games? There is a series of events that go into being able land a job like that, and girls will face more obstacles the entire way, but it all starts with seeing someone like them on the screen. Leah Hextall may not be the best (which is being massively, and tellingly overblown in this thread), but maybe she'll inspire a generation of girls to pursue a career in sports broadcasting and result in some incredible female announcers in the future.
 
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One major argument I keep seeing used is “she will get better, this is her first time doing this and there ain’t anywhere else she could just go and practice”

Ummmm 62 major junior teams in Canada that broadcast their games, hundreds of other junior leagues in Canada also broadcast games, Canadian universities, American universities, ECHL, AHL. There is no less than multiple hundred other lower options in which a person could work their way up from. Why start someone at the top in the first place?
 
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Whattagame said:
The flaw in your premise is that the two people in your example had similar experiences and faced the same challenges. On an individual basis - sure, that could be the case, but certain identifiable groups faced more challenges along the way. In the example, you point to grades. Biased standardized testing may have played a role in that, or various resources and opportunities afforded them as they went through school.

Specifically when it comes to female announcers, how many girls growing up even thought that it was a possibility that they could one day do play-by-play on an NHL broadcast? From that possibility - seeing someone like yourself on the screen - that is where the path starts. From there, kids listen closer, hone their skills, focus on communication, study the game, and for many, go to broadcasting school.

Was it more likely that the parents guided sons to follow that passion? If the girls make to it broadcasting school, who gets tapped for the opportunity to call the University's games? There is a series of events that go into being able land a job like that, and girls will face more obstacles the entire way, but it all starts with seeing someone like them on the screen. Leah Hextall may not be the best (which is being massively, and tellingly overblown in this thread), but maybe she'll inspire a generation of girls to pursue a career in sports broadcasting and result in some incredible female announcers in the future.
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Then we should be fixing the things that are creating extra obstacles for those groups instead of handing them the job because they struggled more to get there. Equality of outcome should not be the goal here, we shouldn't try to have 50/50 men and women in every profession or have 1 of every different race on a panel. There wouldn't be anything wrong with it if it were to happen, it just shouldn't be forced because then you're almost certainly passing over better candidates for those jobs because you had to reach a diversity quota. Instead, we should be striving for equal opportunity, where every person has the same opportunities to reach their goals no matter the color of their skin or what's between their legs. Forcing diversity is trimming the leaves when we should be going for the roots.
 
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Voight said:
He's not a broadcaster, but Jeff O'Neill is probably the worst "analyst" or whatever his role is, ever. Guy is horrible.
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I am not going to sift through a 36 page thread, but if no one has mentioned Jack Edwards/the Boston pair, I'd be shocked - he is easily the worst announcer in hockey, possibly all of pro sports, and I've heard all of the crews for all 32 teams.
 
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HighNote said:
Then we should be fixing the things that are creating extra obstacles for those groups instead of handing them the job because they struggled more to get there. Equality of outcome should not be the goal here, we shouldn't try to have 50/50 men and women in every profession or have 1 of every different race on a panel. There wouldn't be anything wrong with it if it were to happen, it just shouldn't be forced because then you're almost certainly passing over better candidates for those jobs because you had to reach a diversity quota. Instead, we should be striving for equal opportunity, where every person has the same opportunities to reach their goals no matter the color of their skin or what's between their legs. Forcing diversity is trimming the leaves when we should be going for the roots.
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This response doesn't really have anything to do with what I posted. I didn't say anything about quotas or achieving a t 50/50 split between men and women. I was only talking about opening up the possibility for women - which currently is an obstacle. My post is open to criticism, but I don't think that you read it critically. This tells me that you're not interested in understanding as you'd previously requested.

Basically, it's self-defeating to say that you want equal opportunity without acknowledging that work needs to be done to overcome the centuries (and more) of structural and unconscious bias that prevents this.
 
Whattagame said:
This response doesn't really have anything to do with what I posted. I didn't say anything about quotas or achieving a t 50/50 split between men and women. I was only talking about opening up the possibility for women - which currently is an obstacle. My post is open to criticism, but I don't think that you read it critically. This tells me that you're not interested in understanding as you'd previously requested.
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It's partly directed at you and partly directed at the discussion going on earlier with The Panther, I thought we were continuing that line of discussion. Apologies if I confused you. To him it seems as though we should give priority to people that belong to a group that's been historically at a disadvantage when hiring. That would mean we're just trying to equalize the end results when instead we should be trying to equalize the path to that result, if that makes sense. By forcing equal outcomes you're discriminating against certain people, and two wrongs don't make a right. I believe you agree with me there. You talk about how the path each person takes to reach their goals can be easier or harder or have more obstacles. I think we both agree that we should be trying to remove those obstacles instead of simply acknowledging them and then trying to "make up for it" by giving them priority in the hiring process.

Whattagame said:
Basically, it's self-defeating to say that you want equal opportunity without acknowledging that work needs to be done to overcome the centuries (and more) of structural and unconscious bias that prevents this.
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But I am acknowledging it, I just disagree with the methods that people are putting forth to solve it. More discrimination to fight discrimination is self-defeating.
 
HighNote said:
Choosing the best candidate no matter what their sex or race is like the definition of being non-discriminatory. If you're skipping over candidates until you reach someone who is of the "weaker and less represented" group for the sake of "embracing diversity," it's discrimination because you're decision is being based on sex or race or both. Forced diversity isn't always the best idea.
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there was a tim horton's print ad a few years back that they had in their stores…..something about "come join our work team" (paraphrased)……

…couldn't help but notice the intentional inclusion of various people……ya, they had the white guy, the black girl, the asian person,…..someone of eastern indian decent…a balance of male and females….etc

couldnt help but think of the boardroom meeting conversation with the designers and the people at tim's ….."we need to get so and so into the ad because of (like you said) embracing diverisity"
 
HighNote said:
It's partly directed at you and partly directed at the discussion going on earlier with The Panther, I thought we were continuing that line of discussion. Apologies if I confused you. To him it seems as though we should give priority to people that belong to a group that's been historically at a disadvantage when hiring. That would mean we're just trying to equalize the end results when instead we should be trying to equalize the path to that result, if that makes sense. By forcing equal outcomes you're discriminating against certain people, and two wrongs don't make a right. I believe you agree with me there. You talk about how the path each person takes to reach their goals can be easier or harder or have more obstacles. I think we both agree that we should be trying to remove those obstacles instead of simply acknowledging them and then trying to "make up for it" by giving them priority in the hiring process.


But I am acknowledging it, I just disagree with the methods that people are putting forth to solve it. More discrimination to fight discrimination is self-defeating.
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Honestly, if we are going to give Chris Osgood a chance at a broadcasting job when he is clearly bad at it, I see no issue with giving a woman the same leeway.
 
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ArGarBarGar said:
Honestly, if we are going to give Chris Osgood a chance at a broadcasting job when he is clearly bad at it, I see no issue with giving a woman the same leeway.
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Not even a big fan of Ozzie as commentator, but he is nowhere near as bad as her.
 
Suntouchable13 said:
Jeff is funny, and he is like an everyman so I like him. You don't have to provide profound analysis to be good in my opinion. Different strokes for different folks, and that's fine.
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I think only Leafs fans are amused by him and most of what he says is hogwash.
 
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