NBA referees are mad as hell and they’re not going to take it anymore, and it has nothing to do with them being the worst at their jobs of any professional sports officials, but rather their frustrations with the leagues refusal to negotiate. The NBA Referees Association, according to Yahoo!, has filed charges with the National Labor Relations Board, on the grounds that league leaders refuse to negotiate on issues like race, sex, and weight, among others.

And you just know that David Stern is handling this like a mature adult.

The memo and filing to the National Labor Relations Board also includes details of an alleged “obscene expression” by commissioner David Stern directed at union negotiators in a Jan. 24 meeting, referee sources said.

According to the memo, Stern – referred to as “one of the league’s negotiators” – got angry when the union attorneys sought to include what the union called “standard language found in many collective bargaining agreements” on discrimination.

“One of the league’s negotiators reacted to it with hostility and resorted to the use of an obscene expression in describing its effect,” the memo said. “When the NRBA representatives declined his demand to delete the obscene expression from their notes, this negotiator abruptly left the room.”

I want to know what the obscene gesture was. It could have been a throat slash, maybe a dismissive wank. Did he go with old faithful and give the room the double bird? Did he bend one of his underlings over a chair and pantomime sodomy? Or did he just go for the grand slam with the air machine gun hip thrust with one leg on a chair? I only hope that our government doesn’t close down tomorrow so that Congress can get involved.