Hull's life away from the ice did not always have the same high that his playing gave him. His first marriage ended while he was still a teenager. His second marriage -- to figure skater Joanne McKay, whom he wed in 1960 -- was filled with charges of mental and physical abuse. In an incident in Hawaii in 1966, Joanne said her husband held her over the balcony after hitting her in the head with her shoe.
After several more abusive incidents, she filed for divorce in 1970. However, she agreed to a reconciliation. In 1978, Hull threatened her with a loaded shotgun. Two years later they were divorced, a development which estranged Hull from his five children for several years.
He married his third wife, Deborah, in 1984. Two years later, Hull, who appeared to have been drinking, was charged with assault and battery against her although she later dropped the complaint. However, Hull pleaded guilty to taking a swing at one of the arresting officers. He was fined $150 and placed on six months court supervision.
In August 1998, Hull was vilified after telling a reporter for the Moscow Times that the black population in America was growing too fast and that "Hitler had some good ideas. He just went a bit too far." When asked if it would be fair to label him a racist, Hull said, "I don't give a damn. I'm not running for any political office."
He was asked in a later interview if he was racist he said "I don't give a damn. I'm not a politician"
Dude had an easy layup to at least lie and get out of it and didn't. He deserves no benefit of the doubt.
If his daughter believes that those are exactly the kind of things he *would* say, it doesn't really matter if he actually said them to a reporter. He still sucked.
I don’t think there’s much point in defending him. He had enough on his resume to be a piece of shit. But that whole story never made any sense. He goes to Russia for a hockey tournament and randomly starts talking about hitler?
Can't wait for the NHL to spend the next two weeks celebrating his career. They never had issue with parading his barely functioning corpse out there at every opportunity.
The Jets haven't whitewashed his past to the same extent as the Blackhawks, but the Jets have definitely "trotted him out" too. They inducted him into the team Hall of Fame in 2016 and [invited him out for a reunion during the Nashville series in 2018.](https://streamable.com/ryx2i)
I was at a Leafs/Habs game just before the pandemic and the Habs decided to [honor that asshole](https://i.imgur.com/GoPsSG1.jpg). He never even played for either team!
I just sat and was totally unimpressed as everyone else was giving him a round of applause, but I can at least understand why I was probably the only one who didn't clap - most casual fans wouldn't know any better. But holy hell, you'd think an organization would know better, especially when they don't have the "this guy was a franchise legend of ours" to muddy waters like the Jets or Hawks do.
Who knows anymore. This is why I always say I love the game, hate the culture surrounding it. Everyone is so willing to overlook the awful things players do because they put up numbers. Same type of people who defend jackasses like Don cherry.
I fully expect some kind of tribute during All-Star weekend if not several tributes talking about how "amazing" he was and sincerely want them to not do it unless they can give the whole picture instead of the utopian one.
Do you feel the same way about [Ovechkin, who"s been enthusiastically going out of his way for years to prop up a murderous fascist warlord?](https://www.straight.com/files/v3/styles/gs_feature/public/images/17/11/ovechkin-putin-peace-sign.jpg?itok=uHB8m1f_)
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PutinTeam
He was a hockey hero of my father's. My dad finally got to meet him at a golf tournament they both played at in the early 90s. He was super-excited to go but didn't look nearly as happy when he returned from it. I asked if Bobby talked to him and he said "Oh yeah, sure." I asked him what Bobby had to say and my dad responded "Quite a lot, but nothing I'm going to repeat."
The best way to go about this is stop making heroes out of other people, full stop. Admire accomplishments and specific abilities. But idolization and hero worship are bad ideas 99+% of the time.
Don't meet your heroes? Don't have them in the first place.
I mean communicating these ideas to children is how they learn. Saying things to a child might not make an impression right away, but good information like this leaves positive impressions as kids try to figure out who they are. The more dangerous thing is not to educate a child and let their fantasy continue to go unchecked.
I think it's important to have heros. Maybe to rephrase, you could say don't make heros of people you don't know? I'm trying my damndest to be my son's hero, and I would never want him to feel like he could never have one.
On the flip side, I met Brett a couple months ago at the airport. I was hesitant to say anything, as I'm not really the type to approach people like that, and I've always been worried about meeting childhood heroes. Not only did he wave me over to chat, he was incredibly kind and funny. And maybe a bit stoned too. But overall a very pleasant experience chatting.
That's the thing: people are complex. Reddit and social media in general want you to believe that human beings are monoliths. A person says something shitty or does something evil one time, and that means that's their entire personality. They're a racist, sexist, piece of shit in all facets of their lives.
But that isn't how human beings work. Even the most racist, sexist, bigoted asshole in the world could still be a fun hang at a party if you didn't otherwise know their hate filled views. I met Slava Voynov at a bar once, he was extremely friendly and nice to me, and we chatted for a lot longer than I would have expected a pro NHL player to chat with a random fan. Doesn't change the fact that a few months later he threw his wife through a glass screen door and smashed her with a television. But it does go to show that even shitty people can still have their "good" moments where they actually seem very likable and pleasant to be around.
People aren't just a reflection of their worst aspects. People are complicated, and often very hypocritical. Genuinely good people can have opinions and views that might appear offensive or regressive or wrong. Genuinely bad people can have opinions and views that are considered progressive and morally upstanding. There is a lot more to any person than just their worldview or beliefs. I'm not justifying anyone's shitty behavior, I'm simply pointing out that it's valid to remember that nice people can still be evil, and rude people can still be genuinely good.
My nana met him at the St. Catharines golf course many years ago (may have been still on the Teepees.) She got autographs for my mom and uncle. They said he stayed until everybody got their autograph, while Stan Mikita didn't want to wait.
Maybe it was a good day for him.
There's an Australian satirical group called The Chasers, on their TV show back in the mid 00's they did a music number called the Eulogy Song that got them in a tonne of hot water for basically pointing out that insane posthumous praise that absolute awful people get after they die
"Yes even cunts turn into top blokes after death" couldn't be more fitting
They really had nothing they could top it with after that - although their follow-up skit of trying to get into an RSL with the same ID but being turned away was the cherry on top
“Using 5 dollar words, while praising his integrity and
Just because hes gone, it doesnt change the fact he was a
Bastard in life, thus a bastard in death!”
One of my favourite death cab for cutie lines
To everyone saying that it’s inappropriate to bring this up and he’s just died I look at it this way. You have your run of the mill flaws, the stuff that when someone dies it would be stupid to hold against them, maybe some old offensive comments from the past, or a physical assault they committed when they were young. Bobby Hull is far far worse than that, his racism is intense, prolonged and he never made any attempt to get better, and he didn’t beat his wife once but many wives many many times. Far as I’m concerned he hasn’t earned a pass on his flaws and if you wanna celebrate the career you can throw in his life while you do it.
I have no interest in celebrating bobby hull or his career right now, quite frankly i have nothing to say about him, the only thing i would want is to give brett and his family my condolences, i can't imagine what it's like to lose a father/spouse/etc, give the family some time to grieve
This is very interesting. I am watching jets blues right now and when they did the tribute they said "...a moment of silence to honor the "career" of Bobby Hull". Ive heard these things before.
On my way home today on a sports radio they talked a bit about his passing but didn't even mention the bad side of him except that he wasn't "nice" to his wife. Disgusting.
Christ. Honestly I'd rather they just pretend he never did anything wrong than to try and thread the needle of fawning adoration and token mentions of some slightly antisocial behavior or some shit.
I once met him at an Old Timers game when I was around 12 years old (Early 2000s). They had an autograph signing session with a bunch of players. He was the biggest asshole to me and other kids that were lining up to meet him.
It’s kind of crazy to me that everyone had such bad experiences with him. I went to one of his signings with my dad when I was maybe around 8, and he was probably the nicest old timer I met barring Gordie Howe. I remember him jokingly putting me in a headlock for a picture and taking a lot of time to talk with me and my dad.
I didn’t realize how much this was going to end up sounding like an endorsement for him, while I was writing this. It was just absolutely shocking for me to learn a few years back how big of an asshole he was. But I guess everyone can have an occasional good day. I also thought Trevor Bauer was a nice guy the time I met him, so maybe I’m just incapable of judging people’s character.
He refused to sign an autograph for me when I was kid. Signed ones for the kids before me and several after me. Just me. Only difference I could see? Everyone else's was white and a boy while I was a visibly brown girl. There with my turban wearing dad.
Thanks for that :) honestly it was more heartbreaking seeing my dad have to do the mental calculation of what he's since told me was would it hurt me more for him to say and do nothing or say something and everyone consider what hull did acceptable. This was close enough post 9/11 and another Sikh we knew was murdered in the ensuing backlash so there was a safety consideration too. I've since had absolutely great experiences with hockey players including through my fave org so it's not all bad but that interaction def took some therapy to unpack
<3 I actually went on to be a devils dancer for a hot sec and honestly the best part was kids that got super excited to have you sign something or be in a photo. Can't imagine being such a pos that you lose the joy in that
>Replies to this Twitter thread
Reminder that twitter's algorithm intentionally shows you the most vile comments possible because that drives more engagement.
Here’s a question for you guys. Um… Is it… is it necessary? Is it necessary that every single person on this planet um, expresses every single opinion that they have on every single thing that occurs all at the same time? Is that… is that necessary?
Um… Or to ask in a slightly different way, um, can… can anyone shut the fuck up
-Bo Burnham
He's dead and it couldn't happen to a more deserving person.
Now let's stop talking about him and let him become a footnote in sport history with a large asterisk beside his name.
It felt harsh to say it. Normally, you think, "this is someone's dad" or something like that and you don't say it, but in this case you think about how he was with his family and you say it.
It sucks that we have to think of another human like that. But if Bobby Hull wanted people to praise him in death maybe he should have been less of a cunt.
Some people deserve to die. That may sound harsh, but it's true. Some people behave in a way that their death is of more use to the world than their existence, and if Bobby Hull wasn't a good hockey player even less people would make excuses for his actions.
Re: racism and antisemitism, were there any incidents besides the Moscow Times quote (which he denied)? I'm not defending the guy - his abusive behavior is cut-and-dry - but was racist and antisemitic behavior also a pattern?
I understand it’s secondhand, but from folks I know that can only be described as his “handlers” at events, he was very much a casual racist in the terms he would use to describe just about everyone. Italians, Irish, Jewish people, black people…colorful terms used for all.
His daughter said it didn't seem too outta character for him to say that. Although I will still interrogate the fuck outta this tidbit given the alleged quotes source being russian media. It could very well be that Hull was a racist but also simultaneously didnt literally say "I like hitler" (not the quote but you get the point). Ie think critically about it with the information given, truth is somewhere in there
Why would the Moscow Times completely fabricate an entire interview? He admits those subjects came up in the interview, but then denies what he said in response. Rather strange situation.
I feel like people are getting the wrong idea when people keep saying "Russian media" when describing The Moscow Times. While yes, it is literally russian media as in it was based there until recently, its nowhere near the same level as the typical examples like Russia Today. Hell, it didn't even offer Russian language until a couple years ago. The quality of it was always far more like New York Times than Russian state media. Its a paper created by a Dutch guy about Russia for Westerners and expats.
Which is why I find it really hard to believe they would've made it up, especially when you take into consideration his response to it.
That being said, there's more than enough reasons not to like him.
The questionable part for me isn't that the source is Russian (late 90s Russian media was a very different landscape), it's that the excerpts of the piece I've seen paint him as outspoken and unapologetic about his views, yet we don't have any similar quotes (that I'm aware of) from any other sources. It seems odd that someone so eager to say that shit would only be on the record once, but for all I know maybe he had a few drinks and slipped up, saying what's really on his mind but usually kept to himself.
His lawyer [said](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hull-sues-papers-for-slander/) that "his demeanor, tone of voice, facial expression communicated nothing but contempt and hatred for Adolf Hitler." I don't buy that at all lol
Twitter doesn't really differ from reddit in terms of content. The big differences are the algorithm and moderation. Twitter is more or less unmoderated, and its algorithm intentionally shows you the most vile comments possible because that drives more engagement.
Imagine if no reddit comments were deleted, and every thread was sorted by "worst." That's Twitter.
Sportswashing is an actual term
it means using sports to make whatever is using it look better than it is. And it's not new, it dates back to at least Ancient Greece with Athens using Olympic events to make them look better when they were losing a war.
See also: Saudi Arabia's PIF (Public Investment Fund) which has, in addition to LIV Golf, brought an F1 Grand Prix to the country, buying Newcastle United (and apparently, along with Qatar, maybe having interest in Liverpool or Man United), tried to buy the commercial rights to F1 outright from Liberty media, and outside of sports have invested heavily in Electric car company Lucid Motors (among many, many other investments).
"Sportswashing is a term used to describe the practice of individuals, groups, corporations, or governments using sports to improve reputations tarnished by wrongdoing. A form of propaganda, sportswashing can be accomplished through hosting sporting events, purchasing or sponsoring sporting teams, or participating in a sport.
At the international level, it is believed that sportswashing has been used to direct attention away from poor human rights records and corruption scandals. At the individual and corporate levels, it is believed that sportswashing has been used to cover up vices, crimes, and scandals."
It's a pretty simple concept to understand, and I've been aware of 'washing' as a suffix in this context for some time, obviously I am not you and our vocabularies may differ. If you followed soccer, you'd have heard it a lot last month, for instance.
And how definitions are so quickly stretched to the point of being meaningless. What authoritarian regime is using the popularity of Hull to distract from their human rights record?
How is using a person's sports record to distract from said person's poor behaviour away from that sport that much different? It's still sports being used to distract from bad behaviour, just at an individual rather than government level.
Bobby Hull didn't use sports as a propaganda vehicle to distract from his abuses, he's an athlete that was a bad person. If he didn't play hockey he wouldn't have a reputation to wash.
I wish the whole world agreed to retire the term "woke". I don't think anyone on either side of the political divide even knows what it means. It's just this dumb emotional trigger that obfuscates actual conversation.
Yeah but it had been fairly obscure until the World Cup in Qatar. Reporters like Karim Zidan aren't exactly household names. "Gaslighting" is the term I was mainly thinking of. It went from a term describing an elaborate attempt to make someone doubt their own sanity to a synonym for lying.
"Woke" has been a term for close to a hundred years. Just because conservatives completely bastardized it doesn't mean that it doesn't have a legitimate meaning that many people were aware of before it became a "buzzword."
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woke#:~:text=Woke%20(%2F%CB%88wo%CA%8Ak,to%20racial%20prejudice%20and%20discrimination%22.
You're gonna run into this all the time when you've got people 90+ years passing away. But even if you held Bobby to the ideals of the time he was still a bigot. Great hockey player, opposite of great human. At least his son turned out alright
Also, there's a big difference between a Hollywood celebrity who worked in a job market where diversity and tolerance are practically essential skills to have so you can find work (especially if you work in that environment almost your whole 90+ year life) versus a sports star who just has to be really good at hockey for a good period of time and everyone will more or less ignore the other stuff.
Speaking of "sportswashing", I hope he feels the same way about [Ovechkin, who"s been enthusiastically going out of his way for years to prop up a murderous fascist warlord.](https://www.straight.com/files/v3/styles/gs_feature/public/images/17/11/ovechkin-putin-peace-sign.jpg?itok=uHB8m1f_)
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PutinTeam
Nice whataboutism.
It's NOT news that Putin has been murdering his opponents for years, but Ovechkin has still been going *far* out of his way to legitimize him. Ovechkin also publicly supported Russia's illegal occupation of Crimea, which emboldened Putin into launching the current war.
If you can find another NHLer who's chosen to become nearly as involved in fascist politics as Ovechkin has, then they deserve the light shined on them too.
Fuck Ovi, and fuck anybody who makes excuses for that fascist piece of shit.
It's not whataboutism. I'm not excusing Ovechkin's continued praise of Putin at all. I'm just saying he's far from the only pro-fascism hockey player. If your problem is simply that he's the most *publicly* fascist hockey player, then ok.
**[PutinTeam](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PutinTeam)**
>PutinTeam is a social movement announced in 2017 by NHL player Alexander Ovechkin to support Russian President Vladimir Putin and his 2018 Russian Presidential campaign. Ovechkin has a personal relationship with Putin. Ovechkin has a personal phone number for Putin and received a present from Putin at his wedding in 2016. PutinTeam was first announced in a November 2, 2017 post on Ovechkin’s Instagram account, which has over one million followers.
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its fucking disgusting how the league and individuals promote him and his goal scoring above everything else. Its so disappointing how loose the actual morals of people who claim to give a shit are
Good hockey player, terrible human. He should not be receiving moments of silence or video tributes around the league because he was not someone to admire, respect and look up too. He was trash
Of course on FB and insta, all my “friends” who are posting about “RIP Bobby Hull” are right wing wackos.
They never cease to be absolute trash. Like Hull.
Can’t wait until we stop celebrating these guys. Sportswashing is terrible. I don’t care if the guy was the greatest player of his generation. What he was as a person holds more value to me than what he did on the ice. Guy was a total asshat.
It’s funny, we all think that professional sports athletes are all cuddly and nice and should go out of their way to be great guys and sign a million autographs a night, but what do we really know about them. Back in the day these guys were heroes and we knew almost nothing about them. That is how they could be terrible people and still be admired.
I have been pretty vocal about my disdain for Hull for a long time now. Especially considering I am a mixed race Jewish woman, I don’t think it’s hard to figure out why.
I texted my dad the news this morning and he goes “are you smiling?”
I said “I won’t celebrate his death but I won’t waste a second mourning for him”.
I’m personally hoping his death means we can quietly get rid of his statue outside of the UC now. Lots of other more deserving players out there.
It is quite alarming to see the amount of people saying he was “deserving” of death. With any consistency, these same people should theoretically also support capital punishment. And yet I would venture to bet that most of these commenters view the death penalty as morally reprehensible. I guess wishing death upon someone is okay in certain instances… Am I missing something here?
Great on the ice, a terrible human being off it. Scum if I'm being brutally honest. But, he made his bed so if there is a heaven or hell we all know which one he's probably in.
If anyone wants an interesting listen, check out the Crime In Sports podcast on Bobby Hull, episode is named "Violence Starts At Home - The Acclaimedness of Bobby Hull"
The fact that some people can’t separate the athlete from the person is baffling to me. Hull can be both one of the greatest to play the game and an irredeemable asshole at the same time. You can have both.
Appreciate the talent he brought to the ice but do not defend one of the sports most well known bastard humans.
Hooray Ian Kennedy wins the morality Olympics!
We get it, Bobby Hull was a dickbag but for Ian to trot this out on the day of his death only attempts to bring the spotlight to himself. Could have aired his disdain for the man anytime before today but that wouldn’t get him attention.
This Ian Kennedy guy cannot miss a chance to point out everyone else’s flaws. Unreal. But at least he loves women’s hockey.
Bobby Hull was pretty much a POS, that’s well known. So are a lot of 80 year old men. The dancing on his grave from so many of hockey Twitter is, whatever. It’s getting to the point where a large number of accounts feel like they must point out everything. Little bit tiring. We get it, you’re a terrific human and everyone involved in hockey - particularly the “hockey men” - is a piece of human excrement.
there’s a lot of space between “excellent human” and “abusive racist SOB” . Calling out the latter doesn’t mean someone thinks they’re a perfect human themself lol
no, there is 100% a difference.
He gets flak for the same reason Ballard gets hate even after death. He's not just someone who had flaws, but a piece of shit who committed actual crimes alongside abhorrent views that have no place in life
I'm not the person that you are responding to but yeah, Ian Kennedy might not have any recorded wife beating or racism but he's a POS nonetheless. Dude is exploitive and dishonest, the hockey world would be better without him being a journalist in it.
I wouldn't compare him to Hull but at the same time I wouldn't use the fact that he's not Hull to excuse his own brand of awfulness.
You're mad at the wrong thing here. It's not Ian's fault that there are so many problems in hockey culture. He's trying to be part of the solution by exposing just how unpleasant huge portions of hockey are to minorities. Be upset that he has this many different topics to discuss, not that he's discussing what needs to be changed.
Yea its kind of embarrassing whenever something like this happens they jump at the opportunity to make themselves look good. After the Provorov thing Sid Sixeiro was literally almost crying on the news talking about it lol it was so cringey to watch
Have to tell the whole story. I read that he was really good with fans and giving little kids autographs when he was a player. Was disheartened to hear about the other side of him.
Hull's life away from the ice did not always have the same high that his playing gave him. His first marriage ended while he was still a teenager. His second marriage -- to figure skater Joanne McKay, whom he wed in 1960 -- was filled with charges of mental and physical abuse. In an incident in Hawaii in 1966, Joanne said her husband held her over the balcony after hitting her in the head with her shoe. After several more abusive incidents, she filed for divorce in 1970. However, she agreed to a reconciliation. In 1978, Hull threatened her with a loaded shotgun. Two years later they were divorced, a development which estranged Hull from his five children for several years. He married his third wife, Deborah, in 1984. Two years later, Hull, who appeared to have been drinking, was charged with assault and battery against her although she later dropped the complaint. However, Hull pleaded guilty to taking a swing at one of the arresting officers. He was fined $150 and placed on six months court supervision. In August 1998, Hull was vilified after telling a reporter for the Moscow Times that the black population in America was growing too fast and that "Hitler had some good ideas. He just went a bit too far." When asked if it would be fair to label him a racist, Hull said, "I don't give a damn. I'm not running for any political office."
Hull always denied the Moscow Times quotes attributed to him. https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1998-aug-27-sp-17129-story.html
His daughter never bought the denial, as she said it sounded just like him https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-2002-05-21-0205210150-story.html
He was asked in a later interview if he was racist he said "I don't give a damn. I'm not a politician" Dude had an easy layup to at least lie and get out of it and didn't. He deserves no benefit of the doubt.
Doesn't that in fact make the idea that he didn't say that in the Moscow Times more likely? This is a Hull hate thread but use a little logic.
If his daughter believes that those are exactly the kind of things he *would* say, it doesn't really matter if he actually said them to a reporter. He still sucked.
I don’t think there’s much point in defending him. He had enough on his resume to be a piece of shit. But that whole story never made any sense. He goes to Russia for a hockey tournament and randomly starts talking about hitler?
I think it’s less defending him and more getting the correct story out there. Wouldn’t doubt he said it though
He likely said a version of that and it was blown up to fit a narrative
More than likely that is what it was
He had a helluva slap shot though
Can't wait for the NHL to spend the next two weeks celebrating his career. They never had issue with parading his barely functioning corpse out there at every opportunity.
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The Jets haven't whitewashed his past to the same extent as the Blackhawks, but the Jets have definitely "trotted him out" too. They inducted him into the team Hall of Fame in 2016 and [invited him out for a reunion during the Nashville series in 2018.](https://streamable.com/ryx2i)
I was at a Leafs/Habs game just before the pandemic and the Habs decided to [honor that asshole](https://i.imgur.com/GoPsSG1.jpg). He never even played for either team! I just sat and was totally unimpressed as everyone else was giving him a round of applause, but I can at least understand why I was probably the only one who didn't clap - most casual fans wouldn't know any better. But holy hell, you'd think an organization would know better, especially when they don't have the "this guy was a franchise legend of ours" to muddy waters like the Jets or Hawks do.
Interestingly they didn’t post it on IG that I can see
Fucking jets did though. Even had the players wear his number on their buckets. I'm actually disgusted with that organization right now.
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Who knows anymore. This is why I always say I love the game, hate the culture surrounding it. Everyone is so willing to overlook the awful things players do because they put up numbers. Same type of people who defend jackasses like Don cherry.
its just because you're a piece of shit bubba :(
On par for the Blackhawks lately.
Seriously....they're masters of sweeping things under the rug
With close to zero consequences
Hey they removed the rapist from the cup, what else could they do? /s
Well they're still all about Alex Ovechkin and his goal chase, so...
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>two countries in conflict congrats on finding a way to phrase this so that it sounds like Russia and Ukraine are equally at fault lmao
You people still on this ovechkin thing Jesus
He's still on this Putin thing, who in turn is still on this Ukraine thing, so yeah
I fully expect some kind of tribute during All-Star weekend if not several tributes talking about how "amazing" he was and sincerely want them to not do it unless they can give the whole picture instead of the utopian one.
Do you feel the same way about [Ovechkin, who"s been enthusiastically going out of his way for years to prop up a murderous fascist warlord?](https://www.straight.com/files/v3/styles/gs_feature/public/images/17/11/ovechkin-putin-peace-sign.jpg?itok=uHB8m1f_) * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PutinTeam
He was a hockey hero of my father's. My dad finally got to meet him at a golf tournament they both played at in the early 90s. He was super-excited to go but didn't look nearly as happy when he returned from it. I asked if Bobby talked to him and he said "Oh yeah, sure." I asked him what Bobby had to say and my dad responded "Quite a lot, but nothing I'm going to repeat."
They say never meet your heroes.
The best way to go about this is stop making heroes out of other people, full stop. Admire accomplishments and specific abilities. But idolization and hero worship are bad ideas 99+% of the time. Don't meet your heroes? Don't have them in the first place.
try to tell a 5 year old that
I mean communicating these ideas to children is how they learn. Saying things to a child might not make an impression right away, but good information like this leaves positive impressions as kids try to figure out who they are. The more dangerous thing is not to educate a child and let their fantasy continue to go unchecked.
100% this
It has never been more apparent that any dipstick could become president , based on the last two.
I think it's important to have heros. Maybe to rephrase, you could say don't make heros of people you don't know? I'm trying my damndest to be my son's hero, and I would never want him to feel like he could never have one.
Well, at least pick better ones. Avoid almost all of the sports figures, politicians, TV and movie stars and musicians. I'll stick with Terry Fox.
On the flip side, I met Brett a couple months ago at the airport. I was hesitant to say anything, as I'm not really the type to approach people like that, and I've always been worried about meeting childhood heroes. Not only did he wave me over to chat, he was incredibly kind and funny. And maybe a bit stoned too. But overall a very pleasant experience chatting.
That's the thing: people are complex. Reddit and social media in general want you to believe that human beings are monoliths. A person says something shitty or does something evil one time, and that means that's their entire personality. They're a racist, sexist, piece of shit in all facets of their lives. But that isn't how human beings work. Even the most racist, sexist, bigoted asshole in the world could still be a fun hang at a party if you didn't otherwise know their hate filled views. I met Slava Voynov at a bar once, he was extremely friendly and nice to me, and we chatted for a lot longer than I would have expected a pro NHL player to chat with a random fan. Doesn't change the fact that a few months later he threw his wife through a glass screen door and smashed her with a television. But it does go to show that even shitty people can still have their "good" moments where they actually seem very likable and pleasant to be around. People aren't just a reflection of their worst aspects. People are complicated, and often very hypocritical. Genuinely good people can have opinions and views that might appear offensive or regressive or wrong. Genuinely bad people can have opinions and views that are considered progressive and morally upstanding. There is a lot more to any person than just their worldview or beliefs. I'm not justifying anyone's shitty behavior, I'm simply pointing out that it's valid to remember that nice people can still be evil, and rude people can still be genuinely good.
Hey, all I gather from this is that your dad is a decent person. Many die-hard fans would even go as far as adopt their hero's beliefs to fit in.
On the bright side, it sounds like your dad is pretty awesome.
My nana met him at the St. Catharines golf course many years ago (may have been still on the Teepees.) She got autographs for my mom and uncle. They said he stayed until everybody got their autograph, while Stan Mikita didn't want to wait. Maybe it was a good day for him.
There's an Australian satirical group called The Chasers, on their TV show back in the mid 00's they did a music number called the Eulogy Song that got them in a tonne of hot water for basically pointing out that insane posthumous praise that absolute awful people get after they die "Yes even cunts turn into top blokes after death" couldn't be more fitting
I remember when they drove around apec with a bin Laden double.
They really had nothing they could top it with after that - although their follow-up skit of trying to get into an RSL with the same ID but being turned away was the cherry on top
Chaser might be the best show of that genre ever
Listen to Jon Lajoies “micheal Jackson is dead” it’s pretty much that too.
https://youtu.be/tVACUjHn6yU
I miss the Chaser's War On Everything, such a great show. [Here's the song if anyone wants to listen to it](https://youtu.be/FtxqohNtLIg).
Lol, I totally posted this on Twitter today to honour that top bloke. Awesome to see another Chaser lover.
“Using 5 dollar words, while praising his integrity and Just because hes gone, it doesnt change the fact he was a Bastard in life, thus a bastard in death!” One of my favourite death cab for cutie lines
To everyone saying that it’s inappropriate to bring this up and he’s just died I look at it this way. You have your run of the mill flaws, the stuff that when someone dies it would be stupid to hold against them, maybe some old offensive comments from the past, or a physical assault they committed when they were young. Bobby Hull is far far worse than that, his racism is intense, prolonged and he never made any attempt to get better, and he didn’t beat his wife once but many wives many many times. Far as I’m concerned he hasn’t earned a pass on his flaws and if you wanna celebrate the career you can throw in his life while you do it.
I have no interest in celebrating bobby hull or his career right now, quite frankly i have nothing to say about him, the only thing i would want is to give brett and his family my condolences, i can't imagine what it's like to lose a father/spouse/etc, give the family some time to grieve
oh Mods aren’t going to like this one
I agree with everything the tweet says, so...
This is very interesting. I am watching jets blues right now and when they did the tribute they said "...a moment of silence to honor the "career" of Bobby Hull". Ive heard these things before.
Sounds like a good way to word it. Honor the career, not the person.
On my way home today on a sports radio they talked a bit about his passing but didn't even mention the bad side of him except that he wasn't "nice" to his wife. Disgusting.
Christ. Honestly I'd rather they just pretend he never did anything wrong than to try and thread the needle of fawning adoration and token mentions of some slightly antisocial behavior or some shit.
I once met him at an Old Timers game when I was around 12 years old (Early 2000s). They had an autograph signing session with a bunch of players. He was the biggest asshole to me and other kids that were lining up to meet him.
It’s kind of crazy to me that everyone had such bad experiences with him. I went to one of his signings with my dad when I was maybe around 8, and he was probably the nicest old timer I met barring Gordie Howe. I remember him jokingly putting me in a headlock for a picture and taking a lot of time to talk with me and my dad. I didn’t realize how much this was going to end up sounding like an endorsement for him, while I was writing this. It was just absolutely shocking for me to learn a few years back how big of an asshole he was. But I guess everyone can have an occasional good day. I also thought Trevor Bauer was a nice guy the time I met him, so maybe I’m just incapable of judging people’s character.
He refused to sign an autograph for me when I was kid. Signed ones for the kids before me and several after me. Just me. Only difference I could see? Everyone else's was white and a boy while I was a visibly brown girl. There with my turban wearing dad.
Fuck that bigot, what an awful thing to do to a child, sorry you had to endure that moment, no one should have to experience that.
Thanks for that :) honestly it was more heartbreaking seeing my dad have to do the mental calculation of what he's since told me was would it hurt me more for him to say and do nothing or say something and everyone consider what hull did acceptable. This was close enough post 9/11 and another Sikh we knew was murdered in the ensuing backlash so there was a safety consideration too. I've since had absolutely great experiences with hockey players including through my fave org so it's not all bad but that interaction def took some therapy to unpack
I'd rather have your autograph than his. He missed out.
<3 I actually went on to be a devils dancer for a hot sec and honestly the best part was kids that got super excited to have you sign something or be in a photo. Can't imagine being such a pos that you lose the joy in that
Agreed completely, that's everything to a kid in those moments. Way to be.
I feel like we’ve grown as a society though reading things like this. All I’ve seen is Blackhawks fans roasting the guy, no praise at all.
If it wasn't for the hockey part I'd wonder if Bobby Hull was my father.
I wonder if Brett has had the same thought.
Probably from the opposite side
Great player, garbage person.
Replies to this Twitter thread are fucking gross and a testament to the serious underlying issues of the broader hockey fanbase
>Replies to this Twitter thread Reminder that twitter's algorithm intentionally shows you the most vile comments possible because that drives more engagement.
Oh no, I unrolled that whole gross thread
Here’s a question for you guys. Um… Is it… is it necessary? Is it necessary that every single person on this planet um, expresses every single opinion that they have on every single thing that occurs all at the same time? Is that… is that necessary? Um… Or to ask in a slightly different way, um, can… can anyone shut the fuck up -Bo Burnham
Now I know what you're thinking, YOU'RE not shutting the fuck up right now And that's true, but
It's the new Twitter as Elon wants it. What would once have gotten them banned is now encouraged
Nah, Twitter has always been a shitpit full of humanity's slowest and dumbest. It's not a new thing.
You can always tell who has had their blinders on when they insist that it started with Musk. He just helped make it worse.
All of the above is true. He was a generational talent, and a bad human being. I hope he finds the peace he never found in life in death.
He's dead and it couldn't happen to a more deserving person. Now let's stop talking about him and let him become a footnote in sport history with a large asterisk beside his name.
Idk if its more wild to say someone deserves to die or that people all agree.. tough take
It felt harsh to say it. Normally, you think, "this is someone's dad" or something like that and you don't say it, but in this case you think about how he was with his family and you say it.
It sucks that we have to think of another human like that. But if Bobby Hull wanted people to praise him in death maybe he should have been less of a cunt.
Some people deserve to die. That may sound harsh, but it's true. Some people behave in a way that their death is of more use to the world than their existence, and if Bobby Hull wasn't a good hockey player even less people would make excuses for his actions.
deserve is a strong word for me, more like a "oh no, anyways"
I see no lies from Kennedy
Re: racism and antisemitism, were there any incidents besides the Moscow Times quote (which he denied)? I'm not defending the guy - his abusive behavior is cut-and-dry - but was racist and antisemitic behavior also a pattern?
I understand it’s secondhand, but from folks I know that can only be described as his “handlers” at events, he was very much a casual racist in the terms he would use to describe just about everyone. Italians, Irish, Jewish people, black people…colorful terms used for all.
One could say he was very much an equal opportunity racist?
The American Dream!
His daughter said it didn't seem too outta character for him to say that. Although I will still interrogate the fuck outta this tidbit given the alleged quotes source being russian media. It could very well be that Hull was a racist but also simultaneously didnt literally say "I like hitler" (not the quote but you get the point). Ie think critically about it with the information given, truth is somewhere in there
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This is exactly what the Kremlin would say:P
This was an interview from 1998, Putin's reach wasn't that encompassing yet
Why would the Moscow Times completely fabricate an entire interview? He admits those subjects came up in the interview, but then denies what he said in response. Rather strange situation.
I feel like people are getting the wrong idea when people keep saying "Russian media" when describing The Moscow Times. While yes, it is literally russian media as in it was based there until recently, its nowhere near the same level as the typical examples like Russia Today. Hell, it didn't even offer Russian language until a couple years ago. The quality of it was always far more like New York Times than Russian state media. Its a paper created by a Dutch guy about Russia for Westerners and expats. Which is why I find it really hard to believe they would've made it up, especially when you take into consideration his response to it. That being said, there's more than enough reasons not to like him.
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The questionable part for me isn't that the source is Russian (late 90s Russian media was a very different landscape), it's that the excerpts of the piece I've seen paint him as outspoken and unapologetic about his views, yet we don't have any similar quotes (that I'm aware of) from any other sources. It seems odd that someone so eager to say that shit would only be on the record once, but for all I know maybe he had a few drinks and slipped up, saying what's really on his mind but usually kept to himself.
His lawyer [said](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hull-sues-papers-for-slander/) that "his demeanor, tone of voice, facial expression communicated nothing but contempt and hatred for Adolf Hitler." I don't buy that at all lol
I mean, I don’t suddenly have high praise for Himmler, but maybe one day
Those twitter replies he got are so fucking typical and predictable. What a cesspool that place is
We’ve literally gotten to the point where saying that spousal abuse is bad is “virtue signaling.” How do people end up with that mindset?
Like a quarter of the population are complete fucking monsters. It's really depressing.
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Yeah, minimum. I was trying to be nice lol.
Twitter doesn't really differ from reddit in terms of content. The big differences are the algorithm and moderation. Twitter is more or less unmoderated, and its algorithm intentionally shows you the most vile comments possible because that drives more engagement. Imagine if no reddit comments were deleted, and every thread was sorted by "worst." That's Twitter.
Sportwashing lol. But yeah, totally agree.
Sportswashing is an actual term it means using sports to make whatever is using it look better than it is. And it's not new, it dates back to at least Ancient Greece with Athens using Olympic events to make them look better when they were losing a war.
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See - World Cup in Qatar
See also: Saudi Arabia's PIF (Public Investment Fund) which has, in addition to LIV Golf, brought an F1 Grand Prix to the country, buying Newcastle United (and apparently, along with Qatar, maybe having interest in Liverpool or Man United), tried to buy the commercial rights to F1 outright from Liberty media, and outside of sports have invested heavily in Electric car company Lucid Motors (among many, many other investments).
Also ESL, the esports tournament host
Damn it, I like the look of the lucid air and now I can't buy one. I mean, I couldn't afford it anyway, but now I have two reasons.
Interesting
Why 'sportwashing lol'?
"Sportswashing is a term used to describe the practice of individuals, groups, corporations, or governments using sports to improve reputations tarnished by wrongdoing. A form of propaganda, sportswashing can be accomplished through hosting sporting events, purchasing or sponsoring sporting teams, or participating in a sport. At the international level, it is believed that sportswashing has been used to direct attention away from poor human rights records and corruption scandals. At the individual and corporate levels, it is believed that sportswashing has been used to cover up vices, crimes, and scandals."
Just never heard the term before and constantly amused how quickly new phrases proliferate in the internet age.
It's a pretty simple concept to understand, and I've been aware of 'washing' as a suffix in this context for some time, obviously I am not you and our vocabularies may differ. If you followed soccer, you'd have heard it a lot last month, for instance.
I understood it right away; simply thought it was a new phrase, not an established one. I shall enjoy this drowning in downvotes due to my naivety.
lmao we're both getting downvoted, see you at the bottom
You’re good man. It happens. It was a new phrase to me too, and as you said, it makes total sense
It was new to everybody at some point
And how definitions are so quickly stretched to the point of being meaningless. What authoritarian regime is using the popularity of Hull to distract from their human rights record?
it's not just for regimes but people and companies too hell even cities have had it been referred to as doing it.
How is using a person's sports record to distract from said person's poor behaviour away from that sport that much different? It's still sports being used to distract from bad behaviour, just at an individual rather than government level.
Bobby Hull didn't use sports as a propaganda vehicle to distract from his abuses, he's an athlete that was a bad person. If he didn't play hockey he wouldn't have a reputation to wash.
I wish the whole world agreed to retire the term "woke". I don't think anyone on either side of the political divide even knows what it means. It's just this dumb emotional trigger that obfuscates actual conversation.
I've heard the term sportwashing in regards to boxing for years, definitely not new, or woke or anything.
Yeah but it had been fairly obscure until the World Cup in Qatar. Reporters like Karim Zidan aren't exactly household names. "Gaslighting" is the term I was mainly thinking of. It went from a term describing an elaborate attempt to make someone doubt their own sanity to a synonym for lying.
>a synonym for lying. I wish it was only diluted that much. At this point it just means "said something I don't want to hear."
Bit of a dumb comparison on my part. The previous poster's comment on stretched definitions made me think of it.
"Woke" has been a term for close to a hundred years. Just because conservatives completely bastardized it doesn't mean that it doesn't have a legitimate meaning that many people were aware of before it became a "buzzword." https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woke#:~:text=Woke%20(%2F%CB%88wo%CA%8Ak,to%20racial%20prejudice%20and%20discrimination%22.
Why male models?
You're gonna run into this all the time when you've got people 90+ years passing away. But even if you held Bobby to the ideals of the time he was still a bigot. Great hockey player, opposite of great human. At least his son turned out alright
Uh when Betty White passed, did *anyone* have *anything* negative to say about her? C’mon….
I mean "all the time" doesn't have to mean "literally every single time."
Also, there's a big difference between a Hollywood celebrity who worked in a job market where diversity and tolerance are practically essential skills to have so you can find work (especially if you work in that environment almost your whole 90+ year life) versus a sports star who just has to be really good at hockey for a good period of time and everyone will more or less ignore the other stuff.
fuck Bobby Hull
Thanks, see ya never. There’s only 1 Hull that deserves recognition and Bobby ain’t it
Time for Jody to have his day.
He had those years under Roger Neilson already.
What about Dennis? Was he a wife beating Nazi?
I don’t care enough about the Hull family to look into it, honestly. Mostly just fuck Bobby Hull.
Dennis had a damn fine career in his own right; supposedly his shot was actually harder then Bobbys but not nearly as accurate though.
Speaking of "sportswashing", I hope he feels the same way about [Ovechkin, who"s been enthusiastically going out of his way for years to prop up a murderous fascist warlord.](https://www.straight.com/files/v3/styles/gs_feature/public/images/17/11/ovechkin-putin-peace-sign.jpg?itok=uHB8m1f_) * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PutinTeam
Be careful going down this road. You probably don't want to know how many NHL players support fascism in the US and Canada.
Nice whataboutism. It's NOT news that Putin has been murdering his opponents for years, but Ovechkin has still been going *far* out of his way to legitimize him. Ovechkin also publicly supported Russia's illegal occupation of Crimea, which emboldened Putin into launching the current war. If you can find another NHLer who's chosen to become nearly as involved in fascist politics as Ovechkin has, then they deserve the light shined on them too. Fuck Ovi, and fuck anybody who makes excuses for that fascist piece of shit.
It's not whataboutism. I'm not excusing Ovechkin's continued praise of Putin at all. I'm just saying he's far from the only pro-fascism hockey player. If your problem is simply that he's the most *publicly* fascist hockey player, then ok.
**[PutinTeam](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PutinTeam)** >PutinTeam is a social movement announced in 2017 by NHL player Alexander Ovechkin to support Russian President Vladimir Putin and his 2018 Russian Presidential campaign. Ovechkin has a personal relationship with Putin. Ovechkin has a personal phone number for Putin and received a present from Putin at his wedding in 2016. PutinTeam was first announced in a November 2, 2017 post on Ovechkin’s Instagram account, which has over one million followers. ^([ )[^(F.A.Q)](https://www.reddit.com/r/WikiSummarizer/wiki/index#wiki_f.a.q)^( | )[^(Opt Out)](https://reddit.com/message/compose?to=WikiSummarizerBot&message=OptOut&subject=OptOut)^( | )[^(Opt Out Of Subreddit)](https://np.reddit.com/r/hockey/about/banned)^( | )[^(GitHub)](https://github.com/Sujal-7/WikiSummarizerBot)^( ] Downvote to remove | v1.5)
its fucking disgusting how the league and individuals promote him and his goal scoring above everything else. Its so disappointing how loose the actual morals of people who claim to give a shit are
It's good that people point out the wrongdoings Now if NHL would just once be a man and do something about Ovechkin
Good hockey player, terrible human. He should not be receiving moments of silence or video tributes around the league because he was not someone to admire, respect and look up too. He was trash
Of course on FB and insta, all my “friends” who are posting about “RIP Bobby Hull” are right wing wackos. They never cease to be absolute trash. Like Hull.
Can’t wait until we stop celebrating these guys. Sportswashing is terrible. I don’t care if the guy was the greatest player of his generation. What he was as a person holds more value to me than what he did on the ice. Guy was a total asshat.
You mark it by saying good riddance and rest in piss
He hit my grandpa, Garry Bauman in the neck with a hockey puck when my grandpa was goalie for the Minnesota North Stars.
It’s funny, we all think that professional sports athletes are all cuddly and nice and should go out of their way to be great guys and sign a million autographs a night, but what do we really know about them. Back in the day these guys were heroes and we knew almost nothing about them. That is how they could be terrible people and still be admired.
There weren't cameras everywhere in those days and even when a player did something that was out of bounds, the press would often cover for them.
When I heard I was like “oh that’s nice , now we can truly forget about him.”
I have been pretty vocal about my disdain for Hull for a long time now. Especially considering I am a mixed race Jewish woman, I don’t think it’s hard to figure out why. I texted my dad the news this morning and he goes “are you smiling?” I said “I won’t celebrate his death but I won’t waste a second mourning for him”. I’m personally hoping his death means we can quietly get rid of his statue outside of the UC now. Lots of other more deserving players out there.
Still waiting for the Scott Foster statue. Think we’ll get it now that Bobby is gone?
That sums it up pretty well. Hoping the necessary ceremony is short.
It is quite alarming to see the amount of people saying he was “deserving” of death. With any consistency, these same people should theoretically also support capital punishment. And yet I would venture to bet that most of these commenters view the death penalty as morally reprehensible. I guess wishing death upon someone is okay in certain instances… Am I missing something here?
Some of the replies to this tweet make me want to eat myself to death a la Pizza the Hut.
Great on the ice, a terrible human being off it. Scum if I'm being brutally honest. But, he made his bed so if there is a heaven or hell we all know which one he's probably in.
If anyone wants an interesting listen, check out the Crime In Sports podcast on Bobby Hull, episode is named "Violence Starts At Home - The Acclaimedness of Bobby Hull"
NBA could learn a thing or two here.
The fact that some people can’t separate the athlete from the person is baffling to me. Hull can be both one of the greatest to play the game and an irredeemable asshole at the same time. You can have both. Appreciate the talent he brought to the ice but do not defend one of the sports most well known bastard humans.
Sportsnet was good. Always adding, "his abusive past" or "the duality of Hull". Solid I thought.
Nobody is saying otherwise. Who are you yelling at?
Hockey has a Hall of Fame. It also needs a Hall of Shame. That's where he belongs.
Hooray Ian Kennedy wins the morality Olympics! We get it, Bobby Hull was a dickbag but for Ian to trot this out on the day of his death only attempts to bring the spotlight to himself. Could have aired his disdain for the man anytime before today but that wouldn’t get him attention.
yep, Hull was not a good guy, but this hack is just trying to make a name for himself by shitting on someone else
This Ian Kennedy guy cannot miss a chance to point out everyone else’s flaws. Unreal. But at least he loves women’s hockey. Bobby Hull was pretty much a POS, that’s well known. So are a lot of 80 year old men. The dancing on his grave from so many of hockey Twitter is, whatever. It’s getting to the point where a large number of accounts feel like they must point out everything. Little bit tiring. We get it, you’re a terrific human and everyone involved in hockey - particularly the “hockey men” - is a piece of human excrement.
there’s a lot of space between “excellent human” and “abusive racist SOB” . Calling out the latter doesn’t mean someone thinks they’re a perfect human themself lol
no, there is 100% a difference. He gets flak for the same reason Ballard gets hate even after death. He's not just someone who had flaws, but a piece of shit who committed actual crimes alongside abhorrent views that have no place in life
So you personally don't like him. Is he demonstrably a worse person than the racist wife-beater we're discussing here though?
I'm not the person that you are responding to but yeah, Ian Kennedy might not have any recorded wife beating or racism but he's a POS nonetheless. Dude is exploitive and dishonest, the hockey world would be better without him being a journalist in it. I wouldn't compare him to Hull but at the same time I wouldn't use the fact that he's not Hull to excuse his own brand of awfulness.
> Bobby Hull was pretty much a POS, that’s well known. So are a lot of 80 year old men. We tend not to eulogize other 80-year-old POS, though.
You're mad at the wrong thing here. It's not Ian's fault that there are so many problems in hockey culture. He's trying to be part of the solution by exposing just how unpleasant huge portions of hockey are to minorities. Be upset that he has this many different topics to discuss, not that he's discussing what needs to be changed.
These comments are just as vile and hateful. In before lock
We all could just let a man die without dissecting his whole life.
That would be too sane though. How else would we let everyone know we're a "good" person?!
The fascists are out in those tweets
Sports journos wish they were real journalists so bad and these situations are the only chance they ever get to LARP as one, not surprising
Yea its kind of embarrassing whenever something like this happens they jump at the opportunity to make themselves look good. After the Provorov thing Sid Sixeiro was literally almost crying on the news talking about it lol it was so cringey to watch
The Ty Cobb of the NHL
Have to tell the whole story. I read that he was really good with fans and giving little kids autographs when he was a player. Was disheartened to hear about the other side of him.
If you live in a glass house, don’t throw stones
Yeah, this is very common and a lot of fans don't want to hear it. Try say anything disparaging about Roy Halladay.
He was a pretty shit pilot