White Girl Paid a Lot: Caitlin Clark’s Woes in Racialized America

By Selwyn Duke

Caitlin Clark would assuredly just like to play basketball. Unfortunately for the WNBA standout, however, focus on the game has been subordinated to racial games in an America in which everything is now about identity politics.

Quite notably, on June 1, Chicago Sky player Chennedy Carter shoulder-checked Clark to the floor in what would later be ruled a “flagrant-1 violation.” Carter’s team would lose to Clark’s Indiana Fever 71-70 that day, but she has received no penalty.

Then, this “past week, it was reported that Caitlin Clark was left off the U.S. Olympic Women’s Basketball Team, with reports that ‘there were concerns about her millions of fans’ being upset that she wouldn’t have gotten any playing time,” wrote American Thinker Thursday. “This rationale is interesting on two fronts. One: Those millions of fans would have watched the Olympic games, and two: Playing time would have been what it was. If Clark were put in to help the team, then her playing time would be justified by her production.”

Whatever the case, some are upset about another matter: that people dare speak of what many call anti-white bias against Clark, and that Clark didn’t act offended by discussion of that bias. So after Clark said recently that she didn’t really notice the negativity and just wanted to play ball — which once would’ve been considered an ideal diplomatic answer but is now deemed insufficient in this “silence is violence” time — the wokesters woke up.

For example, Connecticut Sun guard Dijonai Carrington tweeted the following:

Dawg. How one can not be bothered by their name being used to justify racism, bigotry, misogyny, xenophobia, homophobia & the intersectionalities of them all is nuts. We all see the sh*t. We all have a platform. We all have a voice & they all hold weight. Silence is a luxury.

— dιjonaι carrιngтon♛ (@DijonaiVictoria) June 13, 2024

(How “xenophobia” enters the equation here was not explained; of course, though, expecting commentary correctness from someone who begins her post with “Dawg” is perhaps silly.)

Then there was The Washington Post’s Kevin Blackistone, who, in what appears gaslighting, complained of “tired old tropes about [b]lack women.”

As a consequence, Clark was compelled to kiss the woke ring and make a statement about how the bigotry is “disappointing” and that people “should not be using my name to push those [racial] agendas” (tweet below).

I asked #IndianaFever’s Caitlin Clark directly about her name being weaponized for racism/misogyny (as Dijonai Carrington alluded to):

“It’s disappointing. … Everybody in our world deserves the same amount of respect. The women in our league deserve the same amount of respect.” pic.twitter.com/gyAWBqGG8c

— James Boyd (@RomeovilleKid) June 13, 2024

Yet there’s a double standard here, one noted by many social media users. For example, “So when do y’all speak up about the attack on her for being white?” asked “CJ,” responding to Carrington. “The attack on black men for calling out the bs?”

“’Black men are the lowest common denominator’ – liked by Chennedy Carter,” the poster added, making his case. “…[A]in’t heard a black woman or none of y’all say a peep about it. Silence is loud.”

As for the anti-white bias, one poster cheered Carrington on and wrote, “That’s exactly why we call her fanbase the Cait Clux Clan or CCC.” Another tweeter provided the example below (scroll down to see the comment).

Is this not racist? pic.twitter.com/6Q2sTsB8AR

— Ricky B (@RickyB_official) June 13, 2024

That Clark’s race has made her more marketable was also asserted by The View’s Sunny Hostin (below).

On ‘The View’ this morning, Sunny Hostin weighed in on debate over Caitlin Clark’s race:

“If Caitlin Clark is the vehicle … I have no problem with that.”

“But I do think she’s more relatable because she’s white, because she’s attractive.” pic.twitter.com/sRe9P9wBGd

— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) May 22, 2024

It’s ironic that Hostin mentions attractiveness as playing a role, too, and not only because (just being honest, not cruel) Clark doesn’t exactly set off the pulchritude meter. It’s that Hostin does, and this is why she has a commentary job despite being wrong in most everything she says. Her comments above are no exception, either, save one point:

Clark’s being white does enhance her marketability and helps explain why she’s now the world’s highest-earning female basketball player.

But so what?

The issue isn’t “white privilege,” which doesn’t exist — but being a novelty.

The are other examples of this, too. Consider Tiger Woods, mentioned earlier. His race also enhanced his marketability, greatly, because he was history’s first dominant “black” (he calls himself “Cablinasian”) golfer. Then there’s ex-race-car driver Danica Patrick, who, though never winning a race and perhaps best known for crashing, was marketed relentlessly and enjoyed lucrative endorsements because she was a woman in a man’s realm.

In the early ’80s, there was boxer Gerry Cooney, who received great press and purses not just because he was destroying fellow heavyweights for a time, but also because he enjoyed the novelty status of being a “great white hope” chasing a title that had for decades been held almost exclusively by black fighters. Novelty sells — big.

So it’s no surprise that Clark, a white woman in predominantly black league, would raise eyebrows and revenue. This isn’t “racism,” but market reality.

And what of the controversy? Will it turn off new prospective fans? NBA Commissioner Adam Silver doesn’t seem to think so. “I think ultimately, this is very healthy for women’s basketball and the WNBA,” he recently said. “It’s generating tremendous additional interest” (tweet below).

Adam Silver on Caitlin Clark and the WNBA. pic.twitter.com/aW6tq5xEuq

— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) June 7, 2024

He could be right, too. Just as with crashes in auto races, racial controversy does, unfortunately, sell in certain quarters. After all, if it didn’t, we wouldn’t have identity politics in the first place.