Montage: ESPN, The Worldwide Leader in Progressive Politics

‘When I saw Gronk doing what he did and the press corps yukking it up, you know, and Sean Spicer was kind of the catalyst there, I think it’s a bad thing’

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ORIGINALLY POSTED IN APRIL, 2017: 

In the same way TV viewers speak fondly of the days when MTV used to play music, or when the History Channel featured programs on history, today it’s common to hear sports fans pine for the day when ESPN — “The worldwide leader in sports” — focused on … sports. 

Tuning into the network today, viewers are liable to hear debates on race relations in America, a diatribe against efforts to crack down on illegal immigration, discussions over LGBT policies, and sometimes, in increasingly rare moments, what’s happening in the world of sports. On Tuesday, ESPN.com published a celebration of the cop-killer fugitive/feminist poet, Asata Shakur. 

Tuesday night, the Disney-owned network announced massive layoffs, with more than 100 on-air and off-air personalities getting fired immediately. (Of note, almost all of those impacted were straight sports reporters; not the personalities who've become known for pushing political progressivism.)

The layoffs quickly led to speculation that as the network abused its near-monopoly status as cable's go-to network to advance a left-wing agenda, viewers reacted by tuning out. 

Whether politics played a role in the network's demise is up for debate, but as the montage above shows, ESPN's political preoccupations are not. 

Whether it's ESPNW columnist Kate Fagan opining that we need to “reprogram the way we raise men” (to counter domestic abuse), questioning whether Robert Griffin III is really black due to his lack of interest in being a racial spokesman, or Max Kellerman chastising the New England Patriots for visiting the White House and "normalizing" the Trump Administration, or Tony Kornheiser likening the Tea Party to ISIS ... tuning into the ESPN often feels like watching the TV network for the Daily Kos. 

What do you think of ESPN's announced layoffs? Did politics play a role? Let us know in the comments below.

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