Caitlin Clark is part of the culture wars. It's not her fault. It's everyone else's.
If you want proof of bad faith, right-wing goofs launching a concerted effort to use Caitlin Clark in their culture war against the WNBA, look no further than noted basketball expert Nikki Haley.
After Clark was left off the Olympic team, Haley tweeted this about the WNBA star: "Let me get this straight: No player on the Olympic team has scored more 3-pointers this year in the WNBA than Caitlin Clark. And only one woman on the Olympic team has more assists than Clark this WNBA Season. And the US is not going to include her on the Olympic team? I think the Olympic selection committee should be asked do we want the best team to represent our country or not?"
As far as I can tell, Haley has mentioned Clark just once before. Last year when Haley was campaigning in Iowa, she spoke about Clark but called her "Caitlin Collins."
"We're excited to see the Lady Hawkeyes team," she said. "What a great coach they have. Caitlin Collins is phenomenal." Haley was apparently confusing Clark's name with CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins, who was also left off the Olympic team.
This is what it's been like from conservative and right-wing influencers after Clark didn't make the Olympics. Lots of fake outrage about something many of them know nothing about. They don't know the WNBA. They don't know Caitlin Clark. Or Caitlin Collins. They don't know basketball. They think a guard is someone you overrun at the Capitol.
What they do know is culture war. And race. The right loves talking race while simultaneously saying that's all you do. Sometimes their talk about race or culture is clumsily cloaked. Sometimes it's blatant.
In this case, with Clark, she is being used by bad actors to fuel the culture wars they created.
If you think it's absurd to put Clark and culture war in the same sentence, you haven't been paying attention. Everything is a prop to be used and she's no different. We fight over so much and Clark is just another one of those brawls. It's a nonsensical fight but it's a fight. This is why Haley jumped in. She knows it's a culture war. Why else would she care about who makes an Olympic team?
Clark doesn't want to fight anyone. She's just a hooper. But extremists are trying to co-opt her greatness and disfigure it into something grotesque. There is a creepy "we will protect our Caitlin at all costs" vibe and yes, it's weird. So weird. So oddly, strangely, weird.
It's also problematic and at times dark. There were numerous right-wing social media posters, some with huge accounts, piecing together collages of photos of part of the selection committee, focusing on the photos of the Black women members. The consensus expressed by these accounts was that Clark was left off because she's white.
Bypassing Caitlin Clark for Olympics was right for Team USA. And for Clark, too.
Part of the right-wing reaction is the subtext that Dawn Staley hates Clark which fits into the phony culture war narrative. Meanwhile, Staley said this recently about the star: "When I think about Caitlin Clark, I do think she's one of the greatest. Like she's the greatest of her time. She's the greatest of her time. I want women's basketball to grow, and I'm not too shy about saying why it grows. She's made it grow over the past two years. I'm actually gonna go back to her freshman year when she was killing then when nobody wanted to talk about Caitlin Clark because (University of Connecticut player) Paige Bueckers was all of that, deservedly so.
"Caitlin Clark won my Dawn Staley Award her freshman year when everything was about Paige Bueckers. That's nothing to take away from Paige Bueckers, but it's everything to say we need to make sure we're telling the stories of our entire game. Sometimes you have to go against the masses to really cut down and say what's happening in real time. Caitlin Clark is the sole reason why viewership has shot through the roof for our game. Sole reason."
Does that sound like someone who hates Clark?
One of the other things you'll hear is about marketing and money left on the table by Team USA. But when is the last time any of these people worried about how much money could be made from merch? When is the last time any of them cared about which women players should make the Olympic team? The answer is never. Not once.
Race is complicated and thorny. It can be a unifying force but can often be utilized as a weapon and that's what is happening here. Not in every instance but in many of them.
They would not be reacting this way if Clark was a dominant Black player shooting three-pointers from the logo. There would be no capes. No outrage. Haley wouldn't be chiming in. She wouldn't care.
Welcome to the culture war, Caitlin Collins.
Sorry ... Clark.