NBA Dress Code Update

A few weeks ago - or was it longer? - I blogged about the new dress code in the NBA. Players could no longer wear the clown gear while on duty. You know: sagging pants, baseball cap on sideways or cocked way over to one side, big poofy jackets... essentially, hip-hop attire. Of course some of the younger black players didn't like this and insinuated it was a racist rule.

In this column from Star Parker, she posits that this dress code just made good business sense, and please remember that the NBA is a business. Although, 78% of NBA players are black, 85% of the viewers are white and pretty well educated. Since the players cost money, and the viewers provide the money, David Stern, the NBA commissioner, isn't stupid; he knows who butters his bread. The mostly white middle class audience doesn't want to see a bunch of preening ghetto wannabes sitting in the stands trying to look as menacing as possible; so consequently, it is not the corporate image that Stern wants to project.

One of life's rules is that perception is reality. If you dress like a street thug, you may not be one, but you might as well, because that is how people will perceive you. I tell my students this all the time. The problem is that they see these multi-millionaire basketball players dressing that way, so guess how my students want to dress; as if that will also make them multi-millionaire basketball players. Unfortunately for them, they won't be looked at as preening multi-millionaires, they will just be looked at as street thugs. Not a good way to get a regular job.

Good Day to You, Sir