Discussing Discourse #3
(WARNING: This article is NSFW. Content warning: sexual assault, racism.)
So, Heated Rivalry came out and was a big hit among liberal hockey fans and even some liberal non-hockey fans. It’s a huge cultural moment for the liberal hockey fan. These fans are trying to make it into a cultural moment for all of hockey, and they’re doing it in some rather harmful ways.
Now, I want to make clear: I am not here to shame anyone for liking the show or for expressing their love for the show. It may not be a show I’m interested in (I have not watched and will not watch it), but I don’t care if others are or not. The whole point of this section of this article is to call out poor fan behavior. A rather common problem, especially among white North Americans, is that they forget their actions impact others. That includes fan behavior. It’s long past time we start considering how our actions may impact others, and I’m here to help, because some fan actions are harming others.
There have been many discussions and articles since the release of Heated Rivalry, and many of them center around one question: “Will this show lead the way for the first openly gay NHL player?” Well, many fans of the show seem determined to make it so. Much of this seems to be centered around “WillMack”, which is short for William Smith and Macklin Celebrini. It started off as a cute way to point out their friendship. At this point, it seems as if “WillMack” fans are more determined to try to make them come out as gay. Especially after the show came out. Here’s the thing: let’s say they are gay, what good do you think it does to make signs and bring them to the arena, speculating on their sexuality? No, seriously. What good do you think it does? And this goes for posting online as well, and also for any player you want to speculate about the sexuality of. Keep it to your DM’s and private accounts. The male hockey world is violently homophobic, and emphasis on “violently”. I’ve written about this before. People lose roster spots, playing time, and get raped over this stuff. Even at professional levels, there are repercussions for being gay if it’s suspected. If these two are gay, love each other, and want to come out, they couldn’t because it wouldn’t be safe. Yet, you want them to come out or think it’s funny to make signs or posts speculating they’re gay, despite it putting them under the microscope in the hockey world by people who would do them harm? Yes, it is that serious. Do not try to downplay what you’re doing as just having “fun”. These are real lives affected when you do this kind of stuff. I know for a fact that, oftentimes, gay players, when fans start speculating on their sexuality online, have to go get girlfriends just to keep the microscope away from them. It’s that dangerous. Even at professional levels. I’m begging you all to stop. Players are not going to come out because of Heated Rivalry, and even if there had been a chance of it, it’s now dead because fans feel even more emboldened than before to speculate on players’ sexualities.
What I’m saying is, enjoy the show. I’m glad this show has an audience, and it’s impacted so many so strongly. That being said, how you express your love for the show matters. Especially when you bring others who aren’t a part of the show into it. “WillMack” sexuality questioning signs and posts aren’t cute or funny, you’re not a rebel changing hockey culture. Once again, this goes for any hockey player you would do this for; I just use “WillMack” because it’s the most common form of this. I’m begging fans that if you actually want gay hockey players to come out, you should stop actively making it harder for them to do so. Keep your jokes and speculation private. Please. You are not helping when you make this stuff public.
A frequent point of discussion is Carter Hart, or really, the entire trial around the five Canadian players accused of sexual assault. It’s the discussion that doesn’t stop and likely won’t stop. Something conservatives have been quite annoyed by is seeing signs at games calling out Carter Hart specifically (since he’s back in the NHL and the others aren’t) and progressives supporting Matt Petgrave, but not Hart. So, let’s discuss this. Why should someone support Petgrave, but not Hart? As much as it’s easy to dismiss conservatives for acting in bad faith or just not being informed, I do think it’s worth discussing why. Afterall, it does genuinely seem hypocritical. So, let’s dig in.
So, Matt Petgrave won’t be charged with manslaughter; therefore, the legal system in England seems to think he did nothing wrong. Meanwhile, Carter Hart was found “not guilty” in a trial (with no jury). Therefore, legally, these two players did nothing wrong, and both were (and still are) the center of controversy. I think before we go further, we all need to be honest with ourselves: no one, and I mean no one, agrees with legal decisions all the time. How many people actually believe OJ Simpson never killed anyone? I think you all understand my point now. Frankly, who is seen as “guilty” or “innocent” is usually a political view. The only difference is that one side usually does it because their view is rooted in evidence, and the other because it’s what they were going to believe anyway. You can also look at how the rich, powerful, and famous often either get off lightly or completely when they commit crimes. That, along with how few sexual assaulters get convicted. Frankly, if you look at the evidence presented, it’s pretty clear that Hart and his buddies committed a crime. The people who say otherwise deny that for purely political reasons, because they need him to be innocent, not because he is. But now, they have a court ruling to hit left-wingers over the head with. Right-wingers need the legal ruling to be “not guilty” because their politics demand a lack of bodily autonomy for women. They need to believe that women are whores who then feel regret later for having slept around and lie by claiming they were raped. They need to believe that men are above women. So, evidence be damned, the ruling fits their political worldview, and now, look at the loony left denying the courts like they do gender. The thing is, there is no convincing conservatives that the court ruling is wrong. You will not be able to do it without completely changing their worldview. It’s not a fight worth having. The fight was in the courtroom, and legally, the left lost. The discourse afterwards is something no one will change their mind on. Know what you believe and move on. Don’t fight with conservatives about it. There is nothing you can say to them that will even get them to begin to consider that the court ruling is wrong, unless they’re already doubting conservatism and a worldview.
Anyway, so legal decisions are political. No matter how the courts ruled, one of the sides would’ve been mad. If the courts had given a “guilty” verdict, the left would’ve rejoiced while conservatives would’ve screeched that the female judge was a “woke feminist activist” trying to “ruin the lives of young white men”. If it were a “guilty” ruling, it would be conservatives “denying the courts”. Conservatives won’t have the intellectual honesty to admit this is the case, but we all know how they react to things. So, legal decisions are political.
This brings us to Petgrave. I’ve seen many conservatives since it was announced that he wouldn’t be charged claim that the legal system got it wrong. Matt, according to conservatives, is “another violent black man let off by a woke police department”. If you followed the story at all, you probably saw something on those lines yourself. Conservatives strongly believe, to this day, that he committed manslaughter and that he did it on purpose. They need to believe that black men are inherently violent, that they are nothing more than wild animals. They need to believe that the color of their light skin makes them inherently superior to black people. Therefore, they do not believe this legal decision. It’s wokeness for them. Black men who do something violent, no matter the situation or reason, should be locked up, according to conservatives.
You, the liberal, progressive, leftist, or Marxist reading this article, know all this. Even if you couldn’t put it all into words, know all this. So, the question becomes, if we won’t be able to change conservative minds (without them already having doubts or in the process of moving left), what’s the point of this section of the article? It’s for us on the (North American) political left. (I emphasize “North American” because our left is considerably more to the right than the European left, and every type of our liberals would be considered right-wingers overseas.) I’m trying to put into words what many of us know, but some of you may not be able to express. Admittedly, I was struggling to express my thoughts myself and needed this as a challenge. So, really, it’s for me to understand my own thought process, but I thought it would be useful for others.
I know it seems underwhelming that there is no great grand argument we can make. No matter what, we appear to be hypocrites to conservatives. Everything I laid out would look like progressive brainrot to a conservative. I have a terminal case of “woke”. The thing is, we know that we aren’t. We can look at the facts objectively and come to our own conclusions. We know how the legal system works (and how unfair it is), we know what sexual assault looks like, and we saw the text messages. We also know hockey well enough to know when a violent act is intentional or not. Conservatives don’t and cannot. They have their feelings of superiority and the need to fit anything and everything into a framework that upholds those feelings. We want the rich and powerful to be held to account; we don’t want killers out on the streets (despite what conservatives claim about us), which is why we don’t merely look at skin color to determine whether they’re guilty or not (unlike conservatives). This lack of thought process is why conservatives so readily and happily use AI and watch Asmongold. This thought process is why the left does not. We don’t need someone or something else to do our thinking for us. So, hopefully, if you couldn’t before, you understand better why there is no hypocrisy in our stances on Hart and Petgrave. Also, hopefully, you don’t go and start debates with conservatives over it. It’s genuinely not worth it, unless they’re coming to you in good faith (and that is FAR more likely to happen in real life, not online).
P.S. After further reflection, what I’m trying to say is that it appears to be hypocrisy to conservatives because they themselves are hypocritical. Every accusation is a confession for those on the right.
Now, let’s discuss one last thing. Yes, this is a long article, but I had to add this at the last minute. Let’s discuss privacy, Instagram, cheating, and rich/famous relationships. So, it all started with a Twitter account I didn’t even know existed called “NHL Follow Tracker”. This account “reports” on who NHL players start following and unfollowing on Instagram. This account, and all that are similar to it, are scourges upon the internet. The fact that accounts like this exist and are followed by anyone at all shows one thing: fans fundamentally do not believe that public figures are human beings. Public figures are just things, objects, that exist to entertain us, normal people. It’s genuinely vile and repulsive. And this goes for TMZ, or really, anything that closely follows public figures’ personal lives. Public figures are human too, and deserve as much privacy as anyone else. You probably complain about government surveillance, so why are you privatizing it by doing it yourself, or supporting people who surveil the private lives of public figures? Stop it. No, seriously, stop it. Do not come to me with the “Well, this is what they signed up for” argument. All you’re doing is adding to the problem and showing me that you very easily devalue lives. This is a problem, and you are a part of it. Do not come to me with “Don’t blame the consumer” because yes, the consumer is fundamentally the problem. Accounts tracking celebrity Instagram follows, TMZ, and all these losers taking pics and videos of celebrities in public wouldn’t be doing it if there wasn’t a demand for it. Give public figures the privacy you, a non-public figure, want for yourself. People deserve privacy, no matter how popular they are.
Now, let’s talk about a direct consequence of this culture. This account “reported” that Johnny Beecher is now following a model on Instagram. A normal person would think nothing of it. Weird monogamous heterosexuals who have jealousy problems are now accusing him of cheating. I need you all to understand three things:
Following a model on Instagram doesn’t mean you’re cheating on your partner. You just have trust and jealousy issues, and you should probably work on them.
Not everyone is monogamous. I’m not saying that Beecher is polyamorous; what I am saying is that we need to stop assuming everyone is monogamous. There’s nothing wrong with polyamory, and we need to stop pretending there is. And yes, polyamory is more common in hockey than you think it is. “No one is free until we are all free” includes polyamorous people. Once again, I am not implying that Beecher may be polyamorous. That being said, if he is polyamorous, it just makes this negative view of him following the model look even worse.
Dynamics of rich/famous relationships are nothing like normal people’s relationships.
To round all this up, this is not evidence that he’s cheating on his partner, and it’s an intrusion on his privacy.
If you found value in this article, please consider paying for a subscription here at Prism Hockey, as subscription money goes to other subscriptions such as DeepL (for translating articles in other languages to cover hockey news around the world) or Google One (necessary for storage for my articles and graphics on social media) to ensure I can continue to cover hockey. If you aren’t able to buy a paid subscription, please consider at least getting a free subscription as all articles are free, and sharing this article. I’d also love to hear your thoughts on this article in the comments below (only paid subscribers can comment) or on social media. I can be found on Bluesky, Instagram, Mastodon, Threads, and Tumblr.