Kendall Jenner Target Of Petition By Philadelphia 76ers Fans
Kendall Jenner appeared at Philadelphia’s Wells Fargo Center arena Friday night, presumably in support of her on again/off again boyfriend, Philadelphia 76ers point guard Ben Simmons, per the Inquisitr. In the Eastern Conference game, in which the 76ers lost to the Cleveland Cavaliers, there were multiple notes of intrigue for those who follow both basketball and the goings-on of the Kardashians.
Tristan Thompson, the father of Khloe Kardashian’s child, plays for Cleveland, and he and Simmons even had words near the end of the game, with Thompson taunting the young Sixer and Simmons, in turn, flipping him the middle finger.
During and after the Friday night game, which Philadelphia had been expected to win, Sixers fans expressed some discomfort at the idea of Kendall Jenner having shown up, and one fan has even launched a petition aimed at preventing future appearances.
A petition called “Ban Kendall Jenner From the Wells Fargo Center” was posted to Change.org over the weekend by a fan named Aidan Powers.
“It has come to the attention of Sixers fans that Ben Simmons has rekindled his relations with Kendall Jenner, a member of the notorious, career killing Kardashian/Jenner family,” the petition reads. “Jenner was front and center in attendance for the Sixers loss to the worst team in the league, the Cleveland Cavaliers. Better known as the Island of Misfits toys Lebron left behind. We as Sixers fans cannot sit idly by and let Kendall Jenner ruin what could be a truly special Sixers season by her attendance at Sixers games. We must take action. We must see that the Sixers and the Wells Fargo Center ban Jenner.”
Sixers fans, it is of the UTMOST IMPORTANCE that you sign this petition banning Kendall Jenner from future Sixers games at the Wells Fargo Center. We cannot sit idly by and let Jenner ruin what could be a truly special season. We must take action https://t.co/3RkLIDAGv6
— A (@aidan_34_powers) November 24, 2018
The petition, which as of Monday morning had gathered 6,429 signatures, is in line with a couple of rather sexist assumptions that are way too common among sports fans: That relationships with women, especially famous women, “ruin” male athletes, and that extracurricular relationships are a “distraction” from the job of a professional athlete.
Furthermore, the idea that athletes who get romantically involved with members of the Kardashian family have had their careers or teams “killed” as a result has been wildly overstated. Lamar Odom had plenty of problems in his life before he got together with Khloe, Kris Humphries was never all that special a player before or after his marriage to Kim, and James Harden’s relationship with Khloe coincided with his ascension as one of the NBA’s top guards.
If there is a “Kardashian curse,” it stopped affecting Philadelphia two days later when the Sixers beat the Brooklyn Nets on Sunday night – with Kendall is attendance.
