No please clue me in

That statement explains a lot.

I commend Dan and Olivier for having the courage to take a very public stance on what is a very important issue.

There have been several moments in history where sports and "politics" have collided, with the final stages of big events being used to bring attention to morally just causes. History has sided with those sportsmen over the passage of time and I am confident the same will be said of Dan and Olivier with time.

Makes perfect sense to me. Colman wants to speak his mind freely and independently without corporate involvement. Good for him.

I think they should be able to wear whatever shirt they want. But it's the EPT's choice not mine.

I'm just happy to hear that Dan and Olivier have donated millions to help Palestine and live a nice middle class lifestyle. Even though I think their political stance is naive and simplistic, I'm glad to know they don't live in million dollar condos and instead are using the evil of poker to help the less fortune. Well done guys.

Just blur out the fkn shirts.
PS should be happy players are tolerating them and theire cameras in tournaments anyway.

I'll bite on this one.

The tournament is held in Barcelona. The organizer is PokerStars, also based in Europe.

So I'll admit being a little confused by the point you're trying to make... I'm not above asking for a clue.

For a future EPT/WSOP event, I was hoping to wear a shirt that read:


"Scumalicious, you touch these boys. They don't know. They don't know about the scum... They don't know."


After reading through this thread, now I don't know.

Should your car manufacturer have the right to sue you for damaging their brand because you put a controversial bumper sticker on your car? I think most of us realize that the bumper sticker may have something to do with the driver, but has nothing to do with the vehicle. Similarly, I think PokerStars would be overestimating the impact on its brand by failing to censor political statements.

I think knowing a player's political leanings is much more interesting than knowing which college they dropped out of or what their astrological sign is. If poker personalities will drive tournament broadcasts, then I think anything that suppresses political commentary is a mistake.

Maybe you could make a show that capitalizes on it. Bring back poker after dark, but make it "political poker after dark". For example, three pros who favor pot legalization go up against three pros who don't (if you could find them). The losers have to contribute a portion of their losses to their opponents' political cause. Meantime, the table chatter raises the pros and cons of the issue. Kind of a combination of high stakes poker with "The View" and a little FOX News or MSNBC.

Having people decide what their opinion is on an issue because they saw some poker player wearing a shirt saying something at a final table isn't the answer.

Do I have to give you a clue or have you figured it out yet?

This "Clue" game is fun but you aren't very good at it

Yeah, no one has ever heard of the Palestinians before. Thanks, Dan and Ollie, for bringing it to the world's attention.

Colman thinks its not appropriate to speak up for the game that provides him a livlihood but it is appropriate to make a political statement for gaza.

Try walking around all day with the words "KICK ME" on your shirt.

[x] Words are powerful.

Sponsorship patches are allowed, but they can only be up to a regulation size, and I think you're supposed to notify the organisers on day one. (If you have no sponsor at the start of the tourney, you can't suddenly start advertising one if you make it to the FT.)
They also have a funny rule that says something like "We won't allow more than 2 players sponsored by a rival site on the feature table, so if there are three of them, one of them has to cover up his patches".

FWIW, I think some of the rules are kind of silly, but are totally understandable from a corporate perspective. Stars has every right to take measures to protect their brand, and players should really read the small print before registering.

(There's also a rule that entrants should make themselves available for TV interviews. I guess Colman would call their bluff on enforcing that one.)

Last I checked Barcelona was in Spain and Spain was not in the US.

how on Earth does this thread get >100 posts? The organisers clearly screwed up by allowing these tshirts to be worn, they've admitted their mistake and it presumably won't happen again. End of story. Pretty puzzling that so many people are actually arguing that the tshirts ought to be allowed, as that's absolutely idiotic.

The major issue in my opinion is that they never opted for V-necks. I don't think anyone would have a problem with anything else if they had.

Yes V-necks are slightly more expensive but when you consider they are paying $50,000 each to play the tournament what difference is a few more bucks to look cool?

Why is it the organizers job to tell us what to wear? Those shirts would be perfectly acceptable in a cash game.

Nolan Dalla does not agree.

http://www.nolandalla.com/political-...p-place-poker/

I obv respect Dalla, who doesn't, but here is an excerpt from that link:

So he flat out equates people wearing shirts dealing with a real to life war and being political to people standing up against UIEGA.... To me people dying /= not being able to play poker online. If people would have worn more t-shirts UIEGA might not have happened.... Just think of how literally insane that comment is. Obv he wants to talk about the bigger picture but that line, to me, is beyond redic.

I agree with pokerstars here as that was majorly embarrassing for poker. Sponsors don't want to see it and neither does anyone watching at home and nobody wants to play with people like that and those are the guys with the $.

I think the majority don't want to see people win and not care because they sold about everything of themselves, see people turn it into a personal agenda like politics or not giving interviews or see people in the tank for 5+ minutes deciding whether to call or fold when they would've done the same thing in 10 seconds anyway. We've got a lot to clean up for TV wise even in 2014.

I don't think refusal of entry is necessary--just tell them to flip the shirts inside out or go get another one. Players have plenty of avenues other than a poker TV cast to throw out agenda these days. While TV ratings seem to go up when there's faces/heels, this seems to be a very poor way to go about it.

(I probably wouldn't hate if it was thrown out in an interview, but the last thing stars wants is to project something like that as their image of players at their tables)

What do "something like that" and "people like that" refer to? Anyone with an opinion? Or anyone with a different opinion than you? I'm not embarrassed for the players at all.

The "guys with the $" argument is curious for several reasons, but it mostly gives me a chance to point out that Colman and Busquet did get the money this time.

I have read a number of posts stating "Free Gaza" and "Save Palestine" are innocuous and they do not understand why anybody would have an issue with it. Actually, to most Jews, it is very offensive. If you understand this, then you can understand why Stars made the decision they did.

I get this from a business perspective. You can't as a company offend (which this did to some folks) part of your viewership so that you can appease the political position of another part. That's why it's best to keep it vanilla.

There's a ton of propaganda in the US in regards to the Israel Palestine conflict (there's "peace" when the only people dying are palestines), so it would be jarring for westerners to see a free gaza t shirt on tv.

I think both sides are wrong, both sides are ****ing crazy, but israel is portrayed in a favorable light. If they were wearing israel or obama or american flag t shirts there would not be public outcry.