Well this sure is unsettling. Cincinnati native and
KIT212 favorite J.J. Wolf -- who should be high on life having reached the third round of his first Grand Slam event -- has found himself in hot water after the club where he trains posted a photo of the 21-year-old giving what some perceived to be a "white power" signal after winning at match at the U.S. Open. (
Kass Tennis Academy has since deleted the post.) Before I was able to figure out what exactly transpired, I had read various accounts -- including that Wolf had spelled out with his hands the Cincy 513 area code while celebrating a victory -- and my first thought (hope?) was that people had gotten it wrong.
But then I saw the photo. That's a very odd way to pose, one that has gained currency during this administration. For people who think liberals are "going out of their way" to see something that isn't there, my only response is why would I possibly want to come down on an American player I have been cheering on for the past year who was having a good run at the U.S. Open? (There is no reason.)
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People can try to explain it away all they want ("it started as a hoax"), but as Vanessa Swales
reported in The New York Times, the bottom line is this: Neo-Nazis, Ku Klux Klansmen and other white nationalists are now using it in public to signal their presence and to spot potential sympathizers and recruits. A number of high-profile figures on the far right have helped spread the gesture’s racist connotation by flashing it conspicuously in public, including Milo Yiannopolous, an outspoken former Breitbart editor, and Richard B. Spencer, one of the promoters of the white power rally in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017 that resulted in the death of a 32-year-old woman. And the gesture has also become an
extremist meme, according to the Anti-Defamation League.
On Instagram, Wolf addressed the issue head-on:
I learned that I was accused of making a racial hand gesture after winning my first grand slam match ever at thee US Open. I have never made a racial hand gesture in my life and I never will. I don't hve a racist bone in my body. I am not sure why someone accused me of this, but I would like to get back to focusing on my next match at the US Open tomorrow. #blm
But his denial only left me with more questions.
Let's take him at his word. Great, I'm glad he says he didn't make the white power sign. And the nod to Black Lives Matter was a nice touch. (The shirt looks great!) I did a little digging around and it's sweet to see that his club did a
BLM post before this happened, and that several players at KT are pictured wearing BLM shirts.
But it's what he's not addressing that's the issue: If he's not making a white power symbol, what is he doing Just give us an innocent explanation and I will update or delete this post. Instead it feels like he's gaslighting us by not even acknowledging why people might be concerned to begin with, like when
certain types do the Nazi salute and then act surprised when people call them out on it. If I'm reading his post correctly, what J.J. is saying is we're all just crazy and we didn't see his fingers in that odd position. But that's not what happened -- if it wasn't objectionable, why was it deleted? -- which until he offers a clearer explanation leaves us guessing.
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One possibility is that he didn't fully understand what the signal meant. If this is the case, he should just say that -- acknowledge that it has come to his attention now and that he wants nothing to do with that ideology. But if he -- as I suspect -- started doing the hand signal to fit in with his conservative friends who want to "own the libs," might I suggest that helping white nationalists and the people who emulate them in their efforts to "distract and infuriate" people who are against racism is a really bad idea, even as a frat house joke.
Swales writes: That the gesture has migrated beyond ironic trolling culture to become a “sincere expression of white supremacy,” according to the Anti-Defamation League, could be seen in March 2019 when Brenton Tarrant, the white supremacist accused of killing 50 people in back-to-back mass shootings at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, smiled and flashed the sign to reporters at a court hearing on his case.
I've reached out to J.J. for comment and will update if I hear back. If nothing else his Instagram post indicates he's been scared straight. Ideally, though, he will have learned an actual lesson about how actions have meanings and consequences -- and that like it or not, when you're in the public eye, you will be held accountable for them.
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Footnote: In December, The New York Times
reported that officials at West Point and Annapolis -- our top military academies -- were reduced to investigating whether cadets and midshipmen who made the sign with their hands during television coverage of the Army-Navy football game were doing so to express racist sentiments. After a brief investigation, officials determined that the cadets were playing "
the circle game," which Dictionary.com describes as "an activity where one person makes a 'circle' with their fingers and holds it below their waist, convincing a second person to look at it. If the second person looks, they receive a punch to the shoulder."
I'm anything but a conspiracy theorist. But you'll have to forgive me if I am more than a bit skeptical of the investigators' findings. One thing is for sure, however: You can't play the circle game by yourself.
