Boston Celtics star Jaylen Brown has cast his own personal doubts on whether or not NBA owners will follow through with the various social justice pledges made in the wake of the NBA boycott and meetings over the last few days.
Speaking on an online conference call yesterday, Brown was quick to call into question the promises that have been made.
“I think promises are made year after year. We’ve heard a lot of these terms and words before. We heard them in 2014, ‘reform,’ Brown said.
” [And] We’re still hearing them now. A lot of them are just reshaping the same ideas and nothing is actually taking place. Long-term goals are one thing, but I think there’s stuff in our wheelhouse as athletes with our resources and the people that we’re connected to that short-term effect is possible as well.”
Brown has long been touted as one of the most intelligent and thoughtful players in the NBA when it comes to social issues, and it was reported that during Wednesday night’s emotional meeting of players and league officials in the bubble, he was one of the players who asked the group whether they would actually go and protest and try and force change when they got home, or whether they would sit from afar and simply observe.
“Everybody keeps saying, ‘Change is going to take this, change is going to take that.’ That’s the incrementalism idea that keeps stringing you along to make you feel like something’s going to happen, something’s going to happen,” Brown said.
“People were dying in 2014, and it’s 2020 and people are still dying the same way. They keep saying ‘reform, reform, reform,’ and ain’t nothing being reformed. I’m not as confident as I would like to be,” Brown continued.
