LeBron James got a ton of hate for trying asking Daryl Morey to ‘educate himself’ on the Hong Kong issue. A recent article explains why he was wrong.
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LeBron James had said this in response to Morey’s comments about Free Hong Kong:
“I don’t want to get in a word or sentence feud with Daryl Morey, but I believe he wasn’t educated on the situation at hand, and he spoke. And so many people could have been harmed, not only financially, but physically, emotionally, spiritually.”
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Daryl Morey reveals he has friends in Hong Kong in wake of LeBron James’ comments
Morey told the following to Jackie MacMullan of ESPN while discussing his new role with the 76ers:
“In the last 12 months, I had moments where I thought I might never work in the NBA again, for reasons I was willing to go down for. But I love working, I love what I do, and I didn’t want that to happen.”
Morey had befriended a number of Hong Kong residents while attending business school. He had first-hand knowledge of the challenges they faced as a semi-autonomous country. His decision to tweet his support was to express his solidarity for people he knew well.
The backlash Morey faced for his tweet was something that he wasn’t expecting at all. At one point, he had reason to believe the lives of his wife and kids could be in danger. Commissioner Adam Silver made a public statement that the NBA would not censor its players, employees or team owners:
“I do know there are consequences from freedom of speech; we will have to live with those consequences,” Silver said on Oct. 8, 2019. “For those who question our motivation, this is about far more than growing our business.”
