Racist Spaniards?

Bill Plaschke, a LA Times sports writer, points a finger at Pau Gasol.  The photo above is of the Spanish National Basketball team competing in Bejing.  The photo was published a week ago, and hit mainstream media earlier this week.  It depicts the team using their fingers to create the "slanted eyes" or "chink eyes" look.  It's flat out racist, and it's not only the basketball team, other images have been found of Spanish sports teams posing in the same fashion.

I've just moved to the LA area, and I agree that Paul Gasol was a great addition to the Lakers organization, but to pull a stunt like this and not sincerely apologize or recognize the implications of his actions is irresponsible and disrespectful.  LA is obviously a big metropolis with many Asian Americans, and Pau probably lost all their respect.

The Spanish team had 5 players this past year and upcoming year in the NBA, and has a possible prospect: Pau Gasol, Juan Carlos Navarro, Jose Calderon, Jorge Garbajosa, and Ricky Rubio, and Marc Gasol.  I can't blame everyone or say all of them are racist, but they definitely have talent and have entered the NBA, so we're going to be seeing them around.  To know that players insult my ethnicity like that and not feel sorry, they're going to get booed by me no matter how good they are.

I wish the Chinese National Team had beat them early this week, but maybe Team USA will have better luck.  Pau Gasol is soft power forward, and I hope Dwight Howard shuts him up.  I'll be the first to admit that I'm disappointed that the US isn't beating China in the race for gold medals, and they're sports training policy is too harsh and unethical, but don't hate on someone based on how they look.  Sorry, Pau, we don't all have turkey necks and nasty hair.