Enes Kanter Freedom: Why I Sacrificed My Future in the NBA to Stand Up to the Chinese Regime
American Thought Leaders
The Epoch Times
4.9 • 1.2K Ratings
🗓️ 29 December 2022
⏱️ 54 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
How can the biggest dictatorship in the world control a 100 percent American-made organization and put pressure on them to fire an American citizen?”
I sit down with NBA player Enes Kanter Freedom. After playing 11 seasons, his career abruptly ended when he made headlines, speaking out about human rights abuses in China.
“NBA is not the only one,” says Freedom. “You see Hollywood, you see Big Tech, you see academia, you see Wall Street, you see Congress … They’re pretty much trying to invade America from the inside because they know they’re not strong enough to invade America from the outside.”
Freedom tells me about what made him the man he is today, and what gave him the courage to stand up to major multinational corporations and the Chinese Communist Party.
He grew up in Turkey under a repressive regime, and was ultimately forced to choose between family and principle.
“They sent police to my house in Turkey and they raided the whole house. And they took every electronic away: phones, computers, laptops, iPads, because they wanted to see if I am still in contact with my family or not … They put my name on the Interpol list. So, until this day, I am pretty much an international criminal,” says Freedom.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | How can the biggest dictatorship in the world control a 100% American-made organization |
| 0:06.8 | and put pressure on them to fire an American citizen? |
| 0:10.2 | Today I sit down with NBA player Ennis Cantor Freedom. |
| 0:13.8 | After playing 11 seasons, his career abruptly ended when he made headlines |
| 0:18.4 | speaking out about human rights abuses in China. |
| 0:21.4 | They are pretty much trying to invade America from the inside |
| 0:25.3 | because they know they're not strong enough to invade America from the outside. |
| 0:29.4 | Freedom tells me all about what made him the man he is today. |
| 0:32.8 | He grew up in Turkey under a repressive regime and was ultimately forced to choose |
| 0:37.8 | between family and principal. |
| 0:40.0 | They sent a police to my house in Turkey and they rated the whole house |
| 0:43.1 | and they took every electronic away. |
| 0:45.1 | They wanted to see if I am still in contact with my family or not. |
| 0:48.2 | They put my name on Interpolis. |
| 0:49.9 | I'm pretty much an international criminal. |
| 0:52.4 | This is American Thought Leaders and I'm Janja Kellek. |
| 0:55.4 | Ennis Cantor Freedom is such a pleasure to have you on American Thought Leaders. |
| 1:01.0 | Of course, thank you for having me. |
| 1:02.7 | These days you are building a foundation that's going to focus on basketball as a unifying |
| 1:11.2 | force in the world and I want to talk to you about that. |
| 1:14.2 | But before we go there, I really want to talk to you about how we got here. |
| 1:18.4 | It's not too long ago. |
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