The Patriot Post® · Canadians Fire Broadcast Legend For Supporting Vets

“Cancel culture” claims another victim — this time NHL legend Don Cherry. “On Monday, Canadian broadcaster Sportsnet fired legendary NHL commentator Don Cherry for comments he made concerning immigrants and fallen Canadian veterans while he was on air Saturday night,” reports The Daily Wire. What was Cherry’s offense? Supporting veterans.

The 85-year-old Cherry, a longtime proponent of veterans during his decades-long career in NHL broadcasting, was advocating buying poppy pins in support of Canada’s fallen veterans. He said, “You people love — you, that come here, whatever it is — you love our way of life, you love our milk and honey. At least you could pay a couple of bucks for poppies or something like that. These guys paid for your way of life that you enjoy in Canada.”

USA Today’s coverage was titled, “Don Cherry fired after making racist comment on air.”

Wait, what?

Read Cherry’s comments again. We challenge anyone to make the case that what he said was “racist” in even the remotest sense of the word.

Nevertheless, Sportsnet President Bart Yablsey said in a statement, “Sports bring people together — it unites us, not divides us. Following further discussions with Don Cherry after Saturday night’s broadcast, it has been decided it is the right time for him to immediately step down. During the broadcast, he made divisive remarks that do not represent our values or what we stand for.”

So in declaring that sports don’t divide us, Yablsey and his ilk divided Canadians (and American hockey fans) over sports. At the cost of undermining support for veterans — on Veterans Day (known in Canada as Remembrance Day) — this hoser bowed to the social-justice warriors demanding Cherry’s scalp for some contrived offense toward immigrants, who, by the way, are of all kinds of races, including Caucasian.

This may be Canada, it may be hockey, and it may be one of the more, er, colorful commentators in sports, but it’s one of the more unbelievably ridiculous manifestations of Orwellian speech policing.

While Cherry’s broadcast partner, Ron MacLean, disgracefully apologized and threw him under the bus, Cherry was unapologetic. “I know what I said and I meant it,” he said. “Everybody in Canada should wear a poppy to honor our fallen soldiers.” He added, “I speak the truth and I walk the walk. I have visited the bases of the troops, been to Afghanistan with our brave soldiers at Christmas, been to cemeteries of our fallen around the world and honored our fallen troops on Coach’s Corner.”

And as a closing thought, Hot Air’s Allahpundit makes reference to the recently reelected Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau when he says of Cherry: “Poor guy. If only he’d done something more innocuous, like repeatedly wearing blackface as an adult, he’d have qualified to earn the support of millions of Canadian liberals who are happy to see him booted off the air today.”