https://baptistnews.com/article/we-dont-talk-about-brittney/

Thanks for posting this interesting article. I have been very proud of the response that CNC has taken to this situation. She has certainly been the face of BU's support for BG. It saddens me daily to read or think about what BG is going through.

I think a great majority of Baylor fans support Britney and want her to have her number retired. CNC is right on in her support. I have not heard of a single negative comment from anyone that I know.

Great article, thank you for posting.

Alright, I found this article frustrating, and it makes me want to get on a soapbox, so here it goes. And just to put my cards out on the table, my opinion is that Britney's imprisonment is 100% politically motivated by a tyrannical foreign government, and that she does not deserve this.

I have two fundamental issues with this article.

#1 The premise that Baylor won't talk about Britney is false.

I mentioned this same thing in the thread about Mulkey's recent response: if someone is determined to say that a given public person/institution has not said enough or done enough about the situation, they will absolutely find a way to say that. The actual efforts of the target person are irrelevant, because it is always possible to add "oh, ok they did this, but did they also do _______."

So in this particular article, Garrett refers to "the silence from Baylor," and as support, he cites another article from Mark Wingfield. What does the Wingfield article say? "Apart from Collen's statement last week and on Sept. 26, in response to a question at a news conference, Baylor does not appear to have said anything about Griner since July 8. Baylor Women's Basketball recently tweeted a video clip showing Collen affixing a "BG" monogram to a women's basketball jersey." If you read this critically, you will find that that it is carefully worded to try and convince you of a conclusion that is opposite of the facts. By implication, Baylor DID say something on or before July 8 (and if my own memory serves correctly, it was multiple times). What the significance of that particular cutoff date is, Wingfield does not elaborate. He also does not explain why Collen's comments (which were expressed in more than just the one interview, by the way) somehow do not count as coming from Baylor. After all, what Baylor employee could be the more logically relevant voice to speak on the subject of a star women's basketball player? Nor does he offer any explanation about how the tweet he references (he omits that this was November 3!) somehow does not count as coming from Baylor (tweets from Baylor Athletics official Twitter page are not attributable to Baylor, didn't you know?).

Against all logic, Garrett and Wingfield stare in the face of comments from Baylor and declare "Baylor is silent!" Now, they may have a different idea of what is enough than I do, and reasonable people can disagree on that topic. That's fine. But they went out of their way to mischaracterize the facts, which is my problem with it. This looks to me like an example of what I mentioned above - they had a predetermined notion that Baylor would not do enough, and they will move the goalposts wherever is necessary to support that conclusion.

#2 Baylor's power in this situation is negligible at best.

When I see editorials like this, I always find myself asking, "what specifically are you saying ought to be done?" Garrett offers no specifics, only euphemism. "We should be moving heaven and earth now to rescue her from bondage." And I'm really not convinced that he's taken the time to examine my question for himself.

What I think he's advocating, since this is baked into the title and the concluding sentence of the article, is that we talk. To that, I say, go ahead, knock yourself out. Talk until your throat is sore from it. But just know that your advocating for an impotent solution. Garrett has presumably lived his entire life in the US, so he comes with this biased thinking that when the government acts wrongly, you raise awareness, you petition, you protest, you withdraw donations, and you vote against folks, because we live in a democratic republic, and this government is answerable to us, the citizens. If Britney were in a Harris County jail right now, Garrett's logic would make complete sense to me. But all of that logic goes out the window when it comes to Vladimir Putin. He puts his own people in prison if they speak against him. What possible good does the complaint of an American university do against a power-mad Russian tyrant? If you're looking for real world results that help Britney, I think Baylor standing on a podium and saying "release her!" every day has the equivalent utility of me declaring that I won't eat goldfish crackers in my lunch tomorrow.

Now, on the other end of it, if he is not just advocating for idle talk, and he means us to take the "move heaven and earth" comment seriously, then, yes, I do actually think we could do something. While I don't personally boast a military strategy background, I have very little doubt that if we chose to do so, we could send in a special forces team, raid the penal colony, and bring Britney home. I don't think it would be a terribly difficult operation for the US to pull off (and just for the sake of argument, let's assume Baylor is in a position to make such a thing happen). Fine. Then what? What I just described is an act of war against a country that has nuclear weapons. How many lives do you suppose will be lost in World War 3? Will rescuing Britney then have been worth it?

And yeah, I know there are middle solutions between those extremes, such as a prisoner swap, which we all know has been discussed. Truthfully, I haven't totally made up my mind on whether I support that as a solution, but as it relates to this article, it is totally irrelevant. Baylor University does not have an ounce of authority to offer those kinds of solutions on Britney's behalf. And I hate this this is the situation Britney faces! It's wrong, and I feel terrible for her. That just doesn't make Garrett's article any less absurd to me.

In the end, I cannot help but conclude that Garrett is either advocating for a pointless non-solution, or for one that leads to millions of deaths across the globe. I wish some very smart and well-educated person who has actually thought through this situation would write out a proposal that can be applied in the real world. I would take that very seriously. That isn't what Garrett's offering, though.