Chances are, you’ve now heard of Donald Sterling even if you aren’t an NBA fan, thanks to his racially charged remarks. Sterling, owner of the NBA’s Los Angeles Clippers for more than 30 years, paid dearly for his words. The NBA itself acted swiftly, banning Mr. Sterling for life from the NBA and forcing him to sell his team.

Amid these sanctions and protests from players and fans, a conversation is emerging around the boundaries of discrimination and free speech. Mark Cuban, the outspoken owner of the Dallas Mavericks, has gone on record questioning whether the punishment fit the crime. After all, while Sterling’s words were shameful, there’s no evidence of actual discrimination.

Ian Crouch of the New Yorker says that the words themselves were sufficient to warrant the harsh reprimand Sterling received: “Words still matter, and when they’re spoken by athletes who occupy an elevated position in America’s sports culture they can be transformative.” For our society to continue its progress in ending discrimination, we must be critical of the language we use, he says.

Price Associate’s own expert in conflict, Andy Johnson, concurs with Crouch. He wrote on the topic of why words matter in “Devaluing Others in Conflict” from March of 2014:

Conflict always moves through devaluation…we first devalue others that stand in the way of our demand intrinsically… Once we have begun to devalue them intrinsically, we then move toward comparison. We compare them to others, ourselves or to a standard that is often unrealistic. We find them lacking in any or all of these comparisons. Once we find them deficient, we move toward systemic devaluation and at some level, determine that they fail to meet the barest minimal definition of humanness. We dehumanize them. Read more

As a society, we react to statements like Sterling’s because we understand that they are a fundamental part of the kind of thinking we are trying to overcome, even when separated from any identifiable actions. Whether it’s in sports, politics, or around the water cooler, accepting the devaluation of others is a prelude to conflict.

How do we combat this? By replacing it with its opposite: “with healthy levels of emotional intelligence and ethics, the two halves of character,” says Johnson. “Character precludes the path of devaluation and stops conflict in its tracks.