Thursday on Fox Sports 1’s “Speak for Yourself,” co-host Jason Whitlock blamed “hyper-progressive” sports media for the decline in NFL ratings this year.
Whitlock explained that while sports culture is conservative, progressivism in the media is “leading the conversation” in sports, thus “turning people off.”
“I think there’s larger narrative going on that the media is just not looking at,” Whitlock said. “If the media took a step back and looked at all of 2016 and understood what was going on globally and here domestically in America, the upheaval and the unrest that’s going on in America, and this hyper-progressive movement that has lurched into sports and changed the conversation about sports. If you just take your eyes off NFL and look what’s going on in sports TV, so much of the conversation is inconsistent with the values of sports culture. I’m going to say it until I’m blue in the face, sports culture is conservative and religious and we’ve turned conservative into a curse word in this country and it’s just not.”
“The conversation about sports, all of [2016] — been long before then, but it’s starting to have ramifications now — inconsistent with the values of sports culture and we’re turning off our base. Our base of support, the people that coach Peewee football, the people that participate in Peewee football all the way through, we’re making them uncomfortable by inviting in all these people that really don’t care about sports, don’t love sports, they have a political agenda and they’re leading the conversation about sports and it’s turning people off.”
Follow Trent Baker on Twitter @MagnifiTrent
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