It took almost a week until the Women’s NBA finally get it right. League president Lisa Borders said in a statement it was rescinding the fines it levied when players wore black warm up shirts to show support of citizens and police officers involved in recent tragic shootings across America.

This shouldn’t have happened at all.

The WNBA needs more of a social conscience. More than 70 percent of its players are black and and they rightfully felt the problem of escalating gun violence is an important social issue that needed to be addressed.

When Carmelo Anthony, Chris Paul, LeBron James and Dwyane Wade stood up on the stage at the ESPYs to publicly urge politicians to push for tougher gun laws, they were canonized by the crowd. When the players in their sister league protested, they were penalized financially.

Give me a break.

These are extraordinary times in America and WNBA players had every right to vent their frustration when the league fined the New York Liberty, the Indiana Fever and the Phoenix Suns $5,000 and the players on each team were given a $500 penalty because the WNBA rules state uniforms may not be altered in any way. Normal fines for uniform violations are $200. Throughout this week-long crisis and subsequent backlash, people like Anthony of the Knicks, who openly supported the WNBA players; and Tamika Catching of the Indiana Fever, the president of the players’ union; became heroes– social activists who advocated athletes using their fame to speak out for the community.

Anthony, a member of the U.S. Olympic men’s basketball team, who has written powerfully on race in America, said, “I don’t see why there would be a reason for those ladies to get fined. Everybody has freedom of speech. This is a platform right now where everyone is affected and everyone shows their frustrations in different ways. And I don’t even think it was frustration on their behalf.”

The league, interestingly, was quick to give every team shirts in support of the Orlando tragedy in June, which the players wore.

“It’s a huge win overall,” Catchings said. “With this, I’m really proud of the players standing strong and for utilizing their voices. Change starts with us. We have a social responsibility as well.”

The Rev. Al Sharpton also got involved, saying his organization, the National Action Network, would pay the players’ fines. He called the penalty “unacceptable.”

The New York Liberty wore plain black shirts four times, including Wednesday against Washington. Indiana and Phoenix wore the shirts Tuesday night before their nationally televised game in protest after Alton Sterling and Philando Castille, two African-American men who were fatally shot multiple times by police officers in Baton Rouge and Minnesota respectively. The T-shirts, which read “Change starts with us: justice and accountability” on the front, also named of Alton and Philando, as well as the logo for the Dallas police department, in commemoration of the five police officers who were shot during a peaceful Black Lives Matter protest in Dallas.

The players used their post-game interview sessions to continue to speak on the importance of the Black Lives Matter Movement and their displeasure with police brutality. They refused to answer questions from the media about the game and restricted their comments to the issue at hand.

The fines were initially levied Wednesday, and neither the Fever nor the Liberty wore the shirts at their matinee game Thursday. Tina Charles of the Liberty did wear her warm-up shirt inside-out in honor of a shooting in Florida that morning. Charles told the AP she was happy that the league rescinded the fines. She has donated her entire salary this year to her charity — Hopey’s Heart Foundation,
The withdrawn fine means more money can be poured into a fund that will help buy automated external defibrillators.

Still, Charles said it was “embarrassing” that the players were fined in the first place.

“The only good thing that came out of it is that the 70 percent of the WNBA that are African-Americans are protected when the jerseys are on. We are united with police officers,” she said. “When we take off our jerseys and we are out there, we could be next. We were able to show our voice. People responding to me said you gained a fan, not because of what I do on the court, but the act I did. We have followers now because of who we are, not what we do.”

WNBA teams complied with the uniform rule Friday — the final day of games before the month-long Olympic break. Washington Mystics players had shirts saying “Black Lives Matters” in the locker room after their game Friday night. Seattle Storm and Minnesota Lynx players tweeted pictures of their teams wearing black shirts featuring a Martin Luther King Jr. quote before their game. To avoid getting fined, they didn’t wear those shirts on the court.

The WNBA’s retraction of the fines and penalties, and Border’s statement came only after the players refused to stop protesting.
Once again, women came to the fore to facilitate social change. Let’s hope this time it resonates with the league office..