Controversial Serena Williams Cartoon Ruled 'Non-Racist' By Australia's Press Council
Serena Williams (left) and Naomi Osaka during the trophy ceremony after Osaka defeated Williams in the U.S. Open final on Sept. 8, 2018, that inspired a controversial cartoon mocking Williams.
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Nearly six months after a cartoon mocking Serena Williams unleashed immediate international rebuke, with critics calling it a racist Jim-Crow-era-like rendering of the sports star, the Australian Press Council weighed in on Monday, defending the image.
The cartoon, published last September in Australia’s The Herald Sun following Serena Williams’ stinging U.S. Open loss to Naomi Osaka of Japan, shows Williams in mid-tantrum and stamping on her tennis racket. The umpire is shown asking Osaka, “Can you just let her win?”
The Council said the cartoon “uses exaggeration and absurdity to make its point but accepts the publisher’s claim that it does not depict Ms Williams as an ape, rather showing her as ‘spitting the dummy’, a non-racist caricature familiar to most Australian readers.” (A “dummy” is an Australian term for a pacifier, which was drawn lying alongside Williams’ racket on the ground.)
@Knightcartoons cartoon is not racist or sexist …. it rightly mocks poor behavior by a tennis legend … Mark has the full support of everyone @theheraldsun pic.twitter.com/KWMT3QahJh
— damon johnston (@damonheraldsun) September 11, 2018
The Council, a watchdog group responsible for promoting good media practice standards in Australia, said it “accepts that the cartoon was illustrated in response to the events that occurred at the US Open final.”
On Sept. 8, 2018, Williams was playing the Grand Slam final against an opponent 16 years her junior, when in the second set, the chair umpire determined Williams’ coach was directing her from the sidelines and called a code violation.
Williams protested. “I don’t cheat to win,” she told the ump, Carlos Ramos. “I’d rather lose.”
As the game continued and Williams grew more frustrated, she slammed her racket onto the court, bending it. It was her second violation, and Osaka automatically got a point.
Visibly upset, Williams went on to confront Ramos and demand an apology, calling him a “liar” and a “thief.”
“You will never, ever, ever be on another court of mine as long as you live,” she told him. Williams was given a third code violation.
Osaka ultimately won — becoming the first Japanese player to win a Grand Slam title — but there was little joy evinced at a game that saw both players in tears at points and the crowd jeering the trophy ceremony. Williams was fined $17,000.
Williams, a winner of nearly two dozen Grand Slam titles, and her defenders have pointed to what they say is a double standard, whereby male players can get away with on-court outbursts for which female players are likelier to be called out. Williams’ coach later said he was trying to guide her from the sidelines, but said it is a common practice that is rarely penalized.
London-based writer Tobi Oredein told NPR’s Rachel Martin that what happened was not only about sexism but also racism.
“At the heart of ‘misogynoir’ — because it only affects black women — is a caricature of the angry, black woman,” she said. “And it dehumanizes us, and it stops us showing emotion.”
Well done on reducing one of the greatest sportswomen alive to racist and sexist tropes and turning a second great sportswoman into a faceless prop. https://t.co/YOxVMuTXEC
— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) September 10, 2018
Mark Knight, who penned the cartoon, told the Herald Sun, he was inspired to draw the cartoon when he saw “the world’s best tennis player have a tantrum and thought that was interesting.”
The Herald Sun has stood by Knight, even as critics have said there is no getting around the stereotypical depictions in the drawing.
The National Association of Black Journalists called the cartoon “repugnant on many levels. The Sept. 10 cartoon not only exudes racist, sexist caricatures of both women, but Williams’ depiction is unnecessarily sambo-like,” a reference to the racist Jim Crow caricatures popularized in the 19th century.
.@heraldsun cartoonist Mark Knight reflects on how he should have drawn Serena Williams #USOpenFinal pic.twitter.com/zG8zqqkGVH
— Herald Sun (@theheraldsun) September 16, 2018
Knight defended his rendering of Williams. “I drew her as an African American woman,” he said in a video published on the Herald Sun’s web site. “She’s powerfully built. She wears these outrageous costumes when she plays tennis. She is interesting to draw.”
“This whole business that I’m some sort of racist calling on racial cartoons from the past — it’s just made up,” Knight said. “The cartoon was about her behavior on the day.”
Knight said he had to suspend his Twitter account because of the onslaught he faced after the cartoon was published.
He was also criticized for his rendering of Osaka. Oredein said he “whitewashed” the player, who is of Japanese and Haitian descent. Osaka “was seen as heroic and good and within her place,” Oredein said. “And she had blonde hair, and it was straight.”
In its ruling, the Australian Press Council said it had considered complaints about how the women were depicted and “that the cartoon should be considered in the context of the history of caricatures based on race and historical racist depictions of African Americans. “
Nevertheless, the Council said it found the publication did not fail “to take reasonable steps to avoid causing substantial offence, distress or prejudice, without sufficient justification in the public interest,” and so it did not breach the Council’s standards of practice.
Oredein said the cartoon embodies a wider problem in the industry, “that black women and their talents, especially in sports, are treated with suspicion.”
New Mexico Eyes A 'Medicaid Buy-In' Plan To Insure More Residents
Leah Steimel (center) says she would consider buying insurance through a Medicaid-style plan that the New Mexico Legislature is considering. Her family includes (from left) her husband, Wellington Guzman; their daughter, Amelia; and sons Daniel and Jonathan.
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Courtesy of Leah Steimel
Laura Lucero Y Ruiz De Gutierrez has a heart condition and fibromyalgia and is at high risk of developing diabetes. She has health insurance through her husband’s job. But between the $800 monthly premium for the couple’s coverage and the $2,100 deductible she has to pay down before insurance starts picking up the tab, she doesn’t feel she can afford to go to the doctor when she needs to.
She hopes that this may soon change. Identical bills proposed in recent weeks in the New Mexico House and Senate would make Gutierrez eligible to buy into a public health plan modeled on the Medicaid program, with funding support from the state of New Mexico. She could receive state-funded assistance via the program that would save her hundreds of dollars a month on premiums.
Laura Lucero Y Ruiz De Gutierrez has health insurance but says she still can’t afford to go to the doctor when she’s sick. She hopes the public health plan New Mexico is considering will change that.
Courtesy of Laura Lucero Y Ruiz De Gutierrez
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Courtesy of Laura Lucero Y Ruiz De Gutierrez
“Medicare for all” – often described as a national, single-payer health system built on the Medicare model — has become a rallying cry for some progressive Democrats. Meanwhile, New Mexico is one of several states looking at offering consumers a different type of government-sponsored plan to provide a health care option that’s more affordable than current options.
These states’ proposals are often referred to as “Medicaid buy-in” plans because, typically, they would offer benefits similar to what is available through Medicaid, the state-federal health plan for people who have low incomes.
The proposals under consideration vary from state to state. Variables include eligibility criteria, how they might be funded and whether they would be offered on the Affordable Care Act’s insurance exchange.
And depending on how they structure their plan, states may have to get approval from the federal government to move ahead.
States that are interested in a buy-in plan typically are considering taking advantage of the Medicaid program’s provider networks and reimbursement rates. Those payment rates generally are lower than for Medicare and for commercial plans.
That may help keep costs down, though in some states it also means the network of doctors would likely not be as large as that found with Medicare or some commercial plans.
“Medicare-for-all is not going to happen legislatively in the next couple years,” says Heather Howard, who directs Princeton University’s State Health and Value Strategies program and is working closely with some of the states. “In the meantime, states are saying, ‘What about “Medicaid-for-more”?’ “
In New Mexico, the buy-in plan would be similar to the state’s Medicaid program. It would be offered outside the exchange and would not require federal approval to implement. The state would provide financial assistance to help people with lower incomes buy into it.
A report commissioned by New Mexico projected that up to 16,000 people would enroll in a program like the one originally proposed in the state’s bills and that their premiums would be 15 to 28 percent lower than plans sold on the individual market.
New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham favors a Medicaid buy-in option. She doesn’t have a position on the current bill, but she is following it closely, says Nora Sackett, the governor’s deputy press secretary.
In addition to the governor’s and lawmakers’ interest, other stakeholders have been deeply involved, increasing the odds of success, Howard says.
Lawmakers in Colorado, Oregon, Washington and Minnesota are among others exploring similar options, says Howard. Nevada lawmakers passed a bill last year that would have set up a Medicaid buy-in plan, but the Republican governor vetoed it.
“The proposals take on different flavors depending on the state” and what officials are trying to accomplish, she says, whether it’s increasing the number of people with insurance, making coverage more affordable or helping states avoid having “bare” counties where no marketplace plans are offered.
New Mexico’s bill would target individuals who aren’t eligible for Medicaid or Medicare and those who can’t get the Affordable Care Act’s premium subsidies because their incomes are above 400 percent of the federal poverty level (about $50,000 for one person or $103,000 for a family of four). The plan would also be available to state residents whose immigration status in the U.S. is undocumented.
And the measure would help people like Gutierrez who are vulnerable to the ACA’s so-called family glitch. Her husband’s $100 monthly premium for single coverage through his employer plan is considered affordable under the law because it costs less than 9.86 percent of their family’s income of about $46,000 a year. That makes her ineligible for premium subsidies on the exchange, even though the $800 premium for the two of them through her husband’s employer plan far exceeds that affordability percentage. Their three children already have Medicaid coverage.
“Right now, I pay to have the health care, but I can’t afford to use it,” says Gutierrez.
The bill would provide financial assistance from the state, with premiums and cost sharing for people whose incomes are less than 200 percent of the federal poverty level, or $60,340 for a family of five. The new coverage would take effect by January 2021.
Gutierrez, whose family lives in Albuquerque, would be eligible for financial assistance to help her buy into the Medicaid-like plan, while her husband stays on his employer plan. Because their $46,000 annual income is just above 150 percent of the federal poverty level, her monthly premium would likely be about $160 per month for a comprehensive plan with a $150 deductible, according to estimates by Manatt Health, which did the original state analyses of buy-in options that were published before the bills were introduced in January.
New Mexico has high levels of poverty, and 40 percent of New Mexico residents are already enrolled in the state’s Medicaid program, compared with about 23 percent nationwide.
“It’s the cornerstone” of our health care system, says Colin Baillio, director of policy and communication at Health Action New Mexico, an advocacy group. The legislation would use “those levers that Medicaid has to provide comprehensive coverage and a comprehensive provider network.”
The bills were passed by two legislative committees this month, with instructions for further study to examine expanding the buy-in plan to more groups. They now move to two other legislative committees for consideration, Baillio says.
And though hospitals and other health care providers would be reimbursed at Medicaid rates — typically lower than those for commercial plans — to the extent that people who are uninsured enroll in the new plan, some providers say they stand to gain financially.
“We’re obviously very supportive of anything that expands coverage,” says Jeff Dye, president of the New Mexico Hospital Association. “It’s the issue of getting some payment versus no payment for services rendered.”
If the Medicaid buy-in bill passes, Blanca and her husband, Hugo, could have health insurance for the first time since they moved to New Mexico 14 years ago. The couple and their oldest son, now 18, are undocumented immigrants from Mexico. (NPR is not using their last names, to protect the family’s privacy.) Their two younger children, who were born in the United States, are enrolled in Medicaid.
Hugo works as a plumber, and Blanca is studying early childhood development at a community college near their home in Albuquerque. Because they are unauthorized immigrants, they’re not permitted to buy health insurance on the ACA exchanges, even if they’re willing to pay the full price.
So like many people without insurance, they wait until they’re really sick before seeking help. When Blanca developed pneumonia a few years ago, the waiting lists for an appointment at community clinics that would see her without insurance were long. Finally, when she could no longer breathe comfortably, she went to the emergency department.
“It would bring us peace of mind not having to worry about our health care situation,” Blanca says through an interpreter.
Providing health care for residents who lack proper immigration status is “an underlying issue with many states that are considering a Medicaid buy-in,” said Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, managing director at Manatt Health, who co-authored the reports evaluating Medicaid buy-in options for New Mexico.
The New Mexico bill also would provide some relief for Leah Steimel’s family. Neither she nor her husband has employer-sponsored coverage, and with a family income of about $100,000, they don’t qualify for tax credits that would reduce their ACA premiums. They now pay more than $1,900 per month for a silver-level plan with a $10,000 deductible to cover themselves and two of their kids (the third is older than 26).
Buying into a Medicaid-like plan would be tempting, says Steimel, who works as a community health consultant with some of the groups advocating for the buy-in. Sure, she says, she does wonder if the Medicaid plan would be as easy to use as a regular commercial plan and if it would give the family access to as many providers.
“But being able to pay into something that would reduce by even a third what I’m paying now — I’d love that,” she says.
Kaiser Health News is an editorially independent news service that is part of the nonpartisan Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation and is not affiliated with Kaiser Permanente. Michelle Andrews is on Twitter: @mandrews110.
Trump Suspends China Tariff Hike, Citing Progress In Trade Talks
U.S. and Chinese trade negotiators meeting in Washington, D.C. last week. Citing progress in the talks, President Trump said he would suspend a planning increase in tariffs on Chinese goods due to take effect on March 1.
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President Trump will hold off raising tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars in Chinese imports, after what he called “very productive” trade talks in Washington this weekend.
Tariffs had been scheduled to jump from 10 to 25 percent next Saturday. But Trump agreed to postpone that increase in hopes of negotiating a more comprehensive trade agreement.
Trump tweeted that the two sides had made “substantial progress” on structural issues, including protection of intellectual property and an end to the forced transfer of U.S. technology. The president hopes to finalize a deal during a face-to-face meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping at Trump’s Florida vacation home.
I am pleased to report that the U.S. has made substantial progress in our trade talks with China on important structural issues including intellectual property protection, technology transfer, agriculture, services, currency, and many other issues. As a result of these very……
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 24, 2019
“Assuming both sides make additional progress, we will be planning a Summit for President Xi and myself, at Mar-a-Lago, to conclude an agreement,” Trump wrote, celebrating what he called “a very good weekend for U.S. & China!”
Trade talks were initially expected to wrap up Friday but had been extended through the weekend in a sign of positive momentum. Negotiators cautioned, however, that a final deal was still uncertain.
“It’s a little early for Champagne,” Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said Friday.
U.S. businesses will welcome the decision to delay higher tariffs. Even at the existing, 10 percent rate, Trump’s China duties are costing American businesses and consumers upwards of $2 billion per month.
Planned Parenthood President Leana Wen On Trump Administration Title X Changes
NPR’s Lulu Garcia-Navarro talks with Leana Wen, a physician and the president of Planned Parenthood, about how a rule change from the Trump administration on Title X will affect her organization.
LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, HOST:
Planned Parenthood, long the target of social conservatives, could lose a significant portion of its funding under a new Trump administration rule released on Friday. The rule will cut federal funding from organizations that make referrals for abortions or provide the procedure. This is a win for anti-abortion activists who pressured lawmakers to defund organizations with ties to abortion.
But critics say it will hurt lower-income women who depend upon family planning centers that receive what are known as Title X funds. Leana Wen is a physician and the president of Planned Parenthood, and she joins us now.
Welcome to WEEKEND EDITION.
LEANA WEN: Thank you, Lulu – good to be with you.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: You call these changes to the Title X program a gag rule. Explain.
WEN: This is a gag rule because what President Trump is doing is to put a gag on doctors like me to prevent us from providing our patients with full and accurate medical information. So if you are a woman who goes to a health center that receives public funding, you cannot be referred to abortion care, even if your life depends on it. This gag rule is unethical and unconscionable.
I mean, imagine if the Trump administration issued a rule that forbid doctors from telling our patients about their options for any other aspect of health care. It’s a direct interference with the practice of medicine and with our ethical obligation to our patients. And this is why over 100 medical and public health organizations oppose the gag rule, including the American Medical Association, the American Nurses Association and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: I’ve read that you won’t accept funds under the new rules.
WEN: Planned Parenthood will never force our doctors and nurses to compromise their ethics. We will never let politicians censor our health care providers and erode the trust that our patients have placed in us, which is to provide them with compassionate, judgment-free and comprehensive care. That’s our promise to our patients.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: But you could receive federal funds if you separated abortion services from family planning centers. The new rules say there needs to be clear physical and financial separation between government-funded services and abortion-related services.
WEN: This Title X gag rule isn’t about providing good medical care. It only does one thing, which is to restrict patients’ access to reproductive health care. It has no basis in medicine or science. And the only effect is going to be preventing 4 million Americans from receiving basic health care, including breast and cervical cancer screenings, affordable birth control and STI tests.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: Religiously affiliated groups are hoping to get the money instead. Conservatives say this provides good alternatives to women.
WEN: We should talk about what is evidence-based, science-based methods for ensuring that all people have access to the health care that they need. Title X is our nation’s program for affordable birth control and health care. And this program is intended to ensure that people with low incomes who live in rural areas or who don’t have health insurance still have access to cancer screenings and preventive care.
And I think it’s important to talk about the individuals who it will affect the most. It will disproportionately affect those who already face the greatest barriers to care. It’s women of color and families of low income. And we need to talk about the discrimination involved here because if you are wealthy and you have private insurance, you can still get the best medical care.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: But religious groups say they could provide those alternatives, that they feel like they too deserve these funds so that there isn’t a monopoly on care.
WEN: Look. I’m a doctor and a scientist. And I need to do what’s best for my patients based on medicine and science. And what we have done for nearly 50 years through Title X is to follow the best available medicine and science. Title X is recognized to be one of the most successful public health programs in reducing sexually transmitted infections and reducing unintended pregnancies. This is what works.
GARCIA-NAVARRO: Leana Wen is the president of Planned Parenthood. Thank you very much.
WEN: Thanks so much, Lulu. And thank you for your time.
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Against The Odds, A Pro Soccer Team In Kashmir Is Close To Winning India's Top Title
Snowflakes began accumulating on the turf by halftime during a Feb. 6 game at Real Kashmir’s home stadium in Srinagar. The coach of the visiting team said later that some members of his team, from southern India, had never seen snow.
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They play soccer in a disputed Himalayan valley prone to car bombs, strikes and heavy snow. Soldiers with machine guns patrol their home stadium. Players sometimes have to arrive at practice three hours early to avoid police curfews. Their team is less than three years old, with a budget that’s one-tenth that of some of their competitors.
Now, against all odds, Real Kashmir Football Club, from Indian-controlled Kashmir, is tantalizingly close to winning India’s top professional soccer title. They’ve been flitting back and forth between first, second and third place, and the season ends in early March.
“We’re the only club in India that has sold-out stadiums at almost every game,” says the team’s co-founder Shamim Mehraj. “What we have done is give people some hope in a place that has actually been taken down by conflict and violence for the past 60 years. It’s helping this place heal.”
Kashmir’s recent history has been chaotic. It has seen three wars between India and Pakistan and is the site of a decades-long separatist insurgency that Indian forces have often dealt with violently. The valley is part of Hindu-majority India’s only Muslim-majority state, Jammu and Kashmir.
A natural disaster helped give birth to this soccer team. In 2014, the Kashmir Valley suffered devastating floods. Hundreds of people were killed. Schools were closed, and young people spilled out onto the streets of Mehraj’s hometown Srinagar, the summer capital of Jammu and Kashmir and one of the largest cities in the valley.
One evening, Mehraj and a friend had an idea.
“We used to go for evening walks. We would see a lot of kids hanging around doing nothing, and I had been a footballer myself. That’s when I thought, ‘Why don’t I get some balls and at least give these kids something to do?'” recalls Mehraj, 38. He had played for his college team in New Delhi, and for his state in amateur soccer tournaments.
Mehraj, who is Muslim, and his Hindu friend Sandeep Chattoo, 52, got friends and neighbors to pitch in and buy 1,000 soccer balls, which they handed out to flood victims. But why stop there? In March 2016, they started a team.
Mahak Farooq (center), 24, watches her brother Danish Farooq, who plays midfield for Real Kashmir, alongside 12-year-old Urooj Ayyub Bhat (left), a local boy who’s one of the team’s most loyal fans and a fixture at home games.
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Furkan Latif Khan/NPR
They applied for the team to compete in India’s I-League 2nd Division — the pro soccer equivalent of baseball’s minor leagues. Mehraj and Chattoo invested their own money to pay players’ salaries. They also hired a Scottish former player, David Robertson, who had been coaching a professional soccer team in Phoenix, Arizona, to coach Real Kashmir, a.k.a. the “Snow Leopards.”
Robertson had never been to India, and admits he probably couldn’t have placed Kashmir on a map.
“All I ever saw was TV shows that showed it’s 90 degrees — it’s hot in India! But I arrived here and the next day, it was snowing,” says Robertson, 50, now in his third season as Real Kashmir’s coach. “There was no Internet, the electricity was out, and I just thought, ‘I want to go home.'”
Mehraj invited Robertson over to his family’s house, gave him a hot water bottle and some home-cooked Kashmiri food — and convinced him to stay. Since then, Robertson has recruited his own son, Mason Robertson, 24, to play for Real Kashmir. By the end of the 2017-2018 season, several Robertson relatives were in the stands at the team’s home stadium in Srinagar, to watch Real Kashmir win the 2nd Division title.
This season, the team was promoted to the I-League’s top division, the first soccer team from Kashmir ever to qualify. (There is one other Kashmiri pro soccer team, Lone Star Kashmir FC, which plays in the I-League’s 2nd Division). In October, Real Kashmir signed a lucrative sponsorship deal with the sports giant Adidas. The brand features prominently on team uniforms and advertisements, and helps pay the salaries Mehraj and Chattoo had initially paid from their own pockets.
Now the team is neck-and-neck with Chennai City FC and East Bengal FC for the top title in Indian professional soccer. (Besides the I-League, India also has another pro soccer league called the Indian Super League, or ISL, but the I-League’s top division is considered the most competitive.)
Fans braved sleet and snow to watch Real Kashmir play a home game on Feb. 6 in Srinagar.
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Furkan Latif Khan/NPR
“I never did think we would go this far,” Mehraj tells NPR, as he looks out over the turf at Real Kashmir’s home stadium.
There are constant reminders of the violence. On Feb. 14, a suicide car bomber killed dozens of Indian security forces on a main highway on the outskirts of Srinagar, where Real Kashmir plays home games. Curfews were imposed in the aftermath. The I-League Division 1 reigning champions Minerva Punjab FC, who were supposed to travel to Srinagar for a match four days later, refused to show up, citing safety concerns.
In Srinagar’s old quarter, the Muslim call to prayer reverberates through a warren of lanes sprayed with militant graffiti saying “India Go Home” and “Free Kashmir,” with the names of Kashmiri militants who have been killed in fighting. Kashmir’s 21 percent unemployment rate is triple that of the rest of India and militant groups recruit from the ranks of young, idle Kashmiri men.
Soccer “keeps him away from that,” says Ishfaq Hussain, 52, a former professional cricket player whose son Muhammad Hammad plays center-back for Real Kashmir. “He thinks always about when to play, when to practice. He’s got no time to join politics or go shouting or pelleting stones.”
Hammad, 21, often has to circumvent police curfews to make it to morning soccer practice.
Muhammad Hammad, 21, kicks a soccer ball outside his family home in Srinagar. Hammad plays center-back for Real Kashmir as it vies for the top title in Indian professional soccer.
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Furkan Latif Khan/NPR
“If the practice is at 11 o’clock, I have to leave home at 8 or 7 a.m. because there will be curfew around the city and you are not able to move around,” says Hammad. “The conditions here, you get much more motivation to achieve something. I have struggled a lot. These things also motivate you.”
When NPR visited Hammad at his parents’ home, his mother Mahjabeen, 46, got choked up describing how proud she is to watch her son play professional soccer. She has a giant flat-screen TV mounted on the wall of her living room to watch all of her son’s games. She describes how neighborhood children constantly ring their doorbell, hoping for a chance to kick around a soccer ball with Hammad.
His teammates include fellow Kashmiris and recruits from Africa, Europe and across India — including Muslims, Hindus, Christians and atheists.
Mehraj says he can’t manufacture T-shirts, stickers and banners fast enough to keep up with fans’ demand.
Muhammad Hammad (right), 21, who plays center-back for Real Kashmir, sits at home with his mother Mahjabeen.
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Furkan Latif Khan/NPR
At a Feb. 6 home game, fat snowflakes began accumulating on the turf at a scoreless halftime. Drenched fans huddled in the bleachers under long plastic tarps, screaming. Schoolgirls in headscarves swooned.
Real Kashmir scored the winning goal against Gokulam Kerala FC, from southern India, in the 51st minute. As the referee’s whistle sounded and the home team moved one match closer to India’s top soccer title, the crowd of shivering, ecstatic Kashmiris erupted in cheers.
“You’re always rooting for the underdog, and I think Kashmir are that,” observes Sumedh Bilgi, an Indian sports journalist who’s watched the team’s improbable rise. “Ultimately, money rules the world. But you always want your fairy tale, don’t you?”
Team photo after Real Kashmir won India’s I-League 2nd Division title in May 2018.
Courtesy of Umar Amin
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Courtesy of Umar Amin
NPR Producer Furkan Latif Khan contributed to this report.
Hollywood Culture Post-Weinstein
Just in time for Oscar weekend, NPR’s Michel Martin speaks with Kim Masters, editor-at-large of The Hollywood Reporter, about the culture in Hollywood post-Harvey Weinstein.
MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
It’s hard to imagine, but it’s been less than a year since Harvey Weinstein, the former powerhouse Hollywood producer, was arrested in New York City on rape charges. With that arrest, he became both criminal defendant and cultural symbol – catalyst for the #MeToo movement and the symbol of a culture of harassment and abuse in Hollywood and beyond.
But on this Oscar weekend, we wanted to check in to see what, if anything, has changed in Hollywood since the beginning of Me Too, so we’ve called Kim Masters. She’s an editor-at-large at the Hollywood Reporter who broke a different story about misconduct by the former head of Amazon Studios, Roy Price. Mr. Price resigned a week after her story was published. Kim Masters, welcome back. Thanks so much for joining us.
KIM MASTERS: Oh, thank you for having me.
MARTIN: So as somebody who’s covered Hollywood for a long time, have any tangible things changed since the Me Too movement?
MASTERS: You know, I wrestle with this because there is a lot of lip service paid and, you know, there is going to be, you know, agencies like ICM say we’re going to have more women, and it’s going to be 50/50 by 2020. And we all heard about the idea of an inclusion rider, or efforts to achieve greater parity – not just for women. But then we see things that are quite disheartening if you’re looking for signs of progress.
And, you know, another story I broke involved John Lasseter, who was the head of Disney Animation and Pixar Animation. And he had allegations of inappropriate conduct, and Disney ultimately moved him out. And he was rehired by – not a public company, a private company – Skydance, which is run by David Ellison. He’s the billionaire son of multibillionaire Larry Ellison.
So he can do more or less what he wants, and it feels like, with various people, there’s just an attempt to try to sort of slip back in and test the waters and see if it works. We saw it with Louis C.K. We saw it with Leslie Moonves. There’s a feeling that – are we going back to status quo ante, or are we actually seeing a change?
MARTIN: You know, people have thought that having more women in leadership roles would be one answer to this pattern.
MASTERS: That’s the hope, yeah.
MARTIN: And so are there more women in leadership roles, and is it the answer to this problem given what you just told us?
MASTERS: It is so slow, honestly. It is so slow. But we see a lot of men, white men – and every year, the statistics don’t change. And I’m not sure we’ll see after, you know, they have a chance to assess the year of Time’s Up or two years out or how long. I just feel that the culture is so entrenched. I think that progress is going to be extremely slow.
I mean, we did see Roy Price was out as the head of Amazon Studios, and Jenn Salke now runs it. She is a woman. It is a new day. Amazon very deliberately decided to give that job to a woman, so that’s one. You know, and again, when Disney replaced John Lasseter, they did put some women in more power, which had been a really big problem at Disney and Pixar Animation under John Lasseter. So, you know, there’s an attempt to say OK, well, let’s at least fix the optics. And in some cases, it’s more than that, but I’m just saying it’s really slow.
MARTIN: OK, no, you’ve given us a lot to think about, and you’ve already sort of told us a little bit about this, but is there any sort of checklist that anybody can point to in terms of looking for accountability? For example, I mean, there’s a Time’s Up organization that was founded by Hollywood women like Shonda Rhimes and Reese Witherspoon, so is there any entity that’s keeping track of progress here, or is there any way that the public can be – can hold these people accountable if they want to think about this as part of thinking about what culture they want to consume?
MASTERS: You know, I would love to end on a note of hope, but the head of Time’s Up that they hired, Lisa Borders, just left because her son has been accused of misconduct, and she is absorbed in helping to figure out what he’s going to do with this allegation. So Time’s Up has struggled a lot to figure out leadership. You know, they wanted to be very non-hierarchical, but in the end of the day, somebody needs to be in charge.
So I think we’re still, unfortunately, a ways away from having any kind of group. I mean, the unions could be helpful, but then again, they don’t necessarily address this. I mean, I think we’re – Hollywood is decentralized. Each movie is its own world – each TV show, so it’s not like we have the department of making sure that people don’t do bad things.
MARTIN: That’s Kim Masters, editor-at-large for the Hollywood Reporter. She was kind of to join us from Houston, Texas, via Skype. Kim Masters, thanks so much for talking to us.
MASTERS: Thank you for having me.
Copyright © 2019 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
Big Pharma Heads To Capitol Hill
The heads of the largest pharmaceutical companies will defend their pricing before the Senate next week. STAT reporter Nicholas Florko tells NPR’s Scott Simon that this will be a televised crucible.
SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
Criticism of America’s major drug companies is one of the few areas of bipartisan agreement of the U.S. Congress. Lawmakers in both parties profess to be outraged about price increases for life-saving drugs and treatments. Next Tuesday, the executives of some of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the country will go before the Senate Finance Committee. It’s expected to be a rough day for them. Nicholas Florko is the Washington correspondent for STAT, a news organization that covers health and the life sciences. He joins us in our studios. Thanks so much for being with us.
NICHOLAS FLORKO: Thanks for having me.
SIMON: Is it a little surprising they even agreed to come in?
FLORKO: Well, they really didn’t have a choice, quite frankly. If a congressional hearing – congressional committee wants to hear from you, either you come in voluntarily, or they can issue you a subpoena. And, frankly, they’re a lot nicer when you come in voluntarily.
SIMON: Can we assume the PR firms that are of counsel to all these major corporations have been working overtime to try and help them?
FLORKO: Yes, absolutely – not only PR firms but probably law firms that specialize in this as well.
SIMON: What kind of reception do you think they’re going to get?
FLORKO: It’s probably not likely that they’re going to get a friendly reception. I mean, these hearings are just as much about getting information from the drug companies as it is an opportunity for the lawmakers to make a public stand about this issue.
SIMON: I imagine no legislator thinks he or she will look very good if they say, by the way, I think price increases are great. Thank you.
FLORKO: Exactly. They realize that they are going to be on TV, the nightly news. And they want to make a point about this issue to their constituents.
SIMON: Tell us about some of the figures we’re going to be seeing – for example, Richard Gonzalez.
FLORKO: Yeah. They’re a really interesting group. So Richard Gonzalez is the CEO of the company AbbVie. Interesting company because they are not a household name, but they make a drug that’s a household name, which is Humira. You’ve probably seen the TV ads for them.
SIMON: An expensive household name.
FLORKO: Very expensive household name and on pace to be the most lucrative drug in pharmaceutical history. He is a college dropout. But he has worked his way up to CEO at AbbVie. But he’s going to face some really tough questions about these strategies the company’s used to protect this drug for so long from competition that would lower the price.
SIMON: The producer of the top-selling insulin in this country is Sanofi. I hope I’m pronouncing that correctly.
FLORKO: Yes.
SIMON: And Olivier Brandicourt.
FLORKO: That’s correct. So I call him the heel of the group because he is the one who’s going to probably face some of the toughest questions. There is bipartisan anger over the issue of insulin prices. And he is sort of No. 1 target for asking questions about why the price of insulin is so high.
SIMON: It’s essentially quadrupled for a lot of people, right?
FLORKO: That’s correct.
SIMON: Pascal Soriot of AstraZeneca.
FLORKO: So he’s my favorite of the group. My guess is if you’re going to have somebody who’s going to have a slightly embarrassing soundbite on the nightly news, it might be him. He’s kind of known for being the outspoken one, grew up in the suburbs of Paris, has talked a lot about how he used to be in fistfights as a kid. He’s actually groused to the media about how he’s the lowest paid CEO in the group, even though he makes over $12 million a year. It’s going to be interesting to see how he handles the questions that he gets.
SIMON: Whatever speeches lawmakers are going to deliver, is it a little too simplistic to hold the pharmaceutical companies responsible in and of themselves for drug prices? Because, of course, there’s a third-party payment system.
FLORKO: Yeah. I mean, it’s a super complicated area – no doubt that’s going to be the line that a lot of these companies use is you have to look at others in the supply chain. But my guess is that – obviously, the members of Congress want to hear from the drugmakers. But my guess is they want to hear from others, too. So I’d stay tuned in that round to see if there’s other hearings where we might hear from others in the supply chain.
SIMON: Pharmaceutical companies, I imagine, will also argue that you have to have, let’s say, an increasing price for insulin so they have the money to develop whatever eventually replaces insulin.
FLORKO: Of course. The issue with that argument, though – somebody like Richard Gonzalez is going to have some trouble with that because that’s a drug – his drug Humira as a reminder – that drug has been – was supposed to be eligible for generic competition a long time ago. And they’ve been accused of essentially gaming the system to keep their protection longer and longer. So the argument from lawmakers is you had your time to recoup your investment. Now it’s time to let cheaper drugs come on the market.
SIMON: Do your reportorial instincts tell you the hearing will be fair and real in attempt to discover something or just an opportunity for politicians to get soundbites?
FLORKO: It’s a little bit of both, honestly. It’s definitely going to be a show. I mean, we’ve looked at the hearings that have happened previously. You know, you had the Martin Shkreli pharma bro hearing a few years ago. And you had the EpiPen hearing about the price of that drug. There’s definitely going to be a fair bit of just grandstanding and opportunities to slam drug companies. But between the lines, these lawmakers are interested in figuring out how to legislate here. So there’ll be some interesting questions, too, that can inform legislation.
SIMON: Nicholas Florko, reporter for STAT news, thanks so much for being with us.
FLORKO: Thank you so much for having me.
Copyright © 2019 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
Jack Davidson On Breaking An NCAA Free Throw Record
NPR’s Scott Simon talks to Jack Davidson, a student at Wabash College. He broke the NCAA record for all-time consecutive free throws. He made 95 consecutive free throws, breaking a 22-year-old record.
SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
Jack Davidson is in the record books. The sophomore at Wabash College in Indiana hit his 95th free throw in a row last Saturday in a 13-point win over Oberlin, and he established a new all-time, all-divisions NCAA record for consecutive free throws. And then he missed his next free throw. Jack Davidson joins us now from the team bus. Thanks very much for being with us, Mr. Davidson.
JACK DAVIDSON: For sure. Thanks for having me on.
SIMON: Well, congratulations. What did it feel like to make that shot?
DAVIDSON: Yeah, it was a great feeling. Just to have the crowd’s support behind you and my teammates and coaches supporting me, it was a great feeling.
SIMON: So you must have known it was coming up, right?
DAVIDSON: Yeah. We knew before the game I was at 92, and we knew it was just three more to get the record. My parents were definitely really nervous about that. And my mom actually said she had some trouble sleeping the night before because how nervous she was.
SIMON: Yeah.
DAVIDSON: But I tried to stay calm and just try to win the game and let the record take care of itself.
SIMON: So I have to ask, what happened on the next shot?
DAVIDSON: Yeah, that’s what everyone keeps asking. But honestly, I just missed it. I left it short. It is what it is. And I’m glad I could make the 95th and just miss the next one.
SIMON: I gather your record – 22-year-old record that was set by Paul Cluxton of Northern Kentucky.
DAVIDSON: Yeah.
SIMON: Have you heard from Mr. Cluxton?
DAVIDSON: Yeah. He did – he actually reached out to me the other day and texted me and congratulated me, which was pretty awesome. And also, Darnell Archey, who had the Division 1 record at Butler, gave me a call, and then we had a nice conversation. So it’s been really nice – the outreach of everyone congratulating me. And that’s been really cool.
SIMON: I did a little research. Paul Cluxton is now running a car dealership.
DAVIDSON: Is that right?
SIMON: Yeah. So what do you see in your future?
DAVIDSON: It’s hard to tell right now. I’m just trying to get a good education and see where that takes me.
SIMON: Want to play basketball in the pros?
DAVIDSON: Yeah, that’s definitely a dream of mine. To play overseas somewhere would be pretty awesome. And so I’m always going to work towards that. But for right now, I’m just not really sure what I’m going to do after college. But just trying to live each day and then try to get better in every aspect.
SIMON: There are people all over America – well, all over the world – who practice free throw shots in gyms and backyards. Any tips, since you’re kind of the ranking expert?
DAVIDSON: Yeah. I’d just say try to keep your routine simple. Don’t do anything too crazy to distract you from just making the shot.
SIMON: What do you think about those people that do it underhand?
DAVIDSON: If that works for them – you know, Rick Barry obviously had a lot of success with that.
SIMON: Yeah.
DAVIDSON: But it’s definitely, I think, probably more difficult. But if you can master that, then do what you please. But it’s definitely been easy for me shooting overhand.
SIMON: Yeah. You do have two more years to break your own record, you know?
DAVIDSON: Yeah. It would be tough to make that many in a row again, but it sure is something I could strive for to do the next two years. And that’d be pretty crazy if I got that done.
SIMON: Yeah. How many consecutive do you have now?
DAVIDSON: I think it’s just seven or eight. I missed one last game…
SIMON: Oh.
DAVIDSON: …In the middle of the game, and then I finished by making seven or eight in a row.
SIMON: OK. Well, we’ll keep an eye on it, all right?
DAVIDSON: Sounds good.
SIMON: Jack Davidson, Wabash College basketball player, thanks so much for being with us.
DAVIDSON: Yeah, thanks for having me on.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
Copyright © 2019 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by Verb8tm, Inc., an NPR contractor, and produced using a proprietary transcription process developed with NPR. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
The Month in Movies: What's in Theaters This March
Movies.com, the ultimate source for everything movies, is your destination for new movie trailers, reviews, photos, times, tickets + more! Stay in the know with the latest movie news and cast interviews at Movies.com.
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Unsung Economists #1: Sadie Alexander
Creative Commons/ University of Pennsylvania
In 1921, Sadie Alexander became the first African-American to earn a PhD in economics. A few years later, she went to law school and became a celebrated civil rights attorney. But she never abandoned her focus on economic issues. In speech after speech, she argued that full employment — when everyone who wants a job can get one — was absolutely necessary to achieve racial equality. Today on The Indicator, episode 1 in our multi-part series about overlooked economists from the past.
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