What Were They Thinking?

The Spain Olympic men's basketball team, which includes the likes of NBA players Pau Gasol and Jose Calderon, is being criticized for a photo released to the public of the entire team pulling their eyelids back to make them appear more Chinese-like. When asked about it, the players say it was all in good taste and an "affectionate gesture" according to Calderon, and "absurd" that it would be taken as racist, by Gasol. Spain's women's team reportedly did the same thing in a photo. As for my input, what were they thinking? Seriously, that's the same as if they played the Olympics in Kenya and painted their faces black. Could someone tell me what Calderon is talking about? Affectionate? Does he even know what that means when he says it? And Gasol...You screwed up. And now he's trying to defend his actions by pissing more people off by calling it "absurd" if people took it in a racist way. Pau, you're getting paid to play basketball, not to tell people what to think...so please just shut up and go practice your jumper. It's clearly a racist act and they should, and have, appologized for their actions. I believe them when they say they didn't mean to offend anyone, but honestly let's use some common sense here. Didn't anyone step up during this photo shoot and say, "Hey guys, maybe it's not a great idea to mock the largest population of humans on Earth...especially when we're going to be playing on their court."? It's too bad that foolishness like this has to happen during a time of world unity. Oh well...see that's what bothers me...it's Spain so it's an "oh well." If the U.S. players did that it would have hit front page headlines of every sports page in the world...because remember, we as Americans are the bad guys and we do everything wrong in the eyes of the rest of the world. But don't worry about it Spain, the world still loves you.