To know that PC KNEEJERKS blow.
Too bad the ignorant, intolerant idiots who called for the firing of Jeremy Kappell, AND those who fired him, don't know who Mark Lane is. They probably don't listen to Bob Dylan much, when there's Taylor Swift and Ariana Grande. Or soft music with NO lyrics at all.
No. The world today is full of sassy misinformed bully blowhards like mis-named"LOVELY WARREN, the Mayor of Rochester, New York (any statues of white guys you'd like taken down, LOVELY lady?), and hypocrite weasels like dopey-faced station manager goon Richard Reingold, a man who looks like he got a face transplant from Rick Moranis.
I'm ranting about the firing of JEREMY KAPPELL for a very obvious and innocent "jumble" that the Rev. Spooner would instantly forgive.
I used to be a disc jockey. I know that in the course of hours every night, the odds are you'll mispronounce a name, or do an audio typo.
But do you REALLY have to be a former disc jockey to understand that? Hasn't everybody had an embarrassing moment where a word comes out wrong and everyone points at you?
Unfortunately for Jeremy Kappell, his tongue-twist happened while mentioning Martin Luther King Jr.
As he hurried along, whether ad-libbing or reading from a TelePrompter, the LOOOO in LUTHER stayed in his brain a nano-second too long, and clashed with KING JOOOOONIOR.
The result: "Martin Luther Koon/ KING Jr."
He caught and corrected it as he spoke, but made the mistake of NOT acknowledging it.
We're talking about live television. He may not have thought it was that audible. He may not have remembered, in that split second, that "Coon" is, for most people, an ancient slang term. Put it this way, if it was popular, rappers would've found a way of fucking with it, as they do "Nigga." Right? They don't.
The TV show's anchors didn't say, "By the way folks, if you thought he said a bad word, he didn't mean it." Nobody told Kappell during a commercial break, "this could be a problem, apologize." It wasn't a big deal until a few people decided to make it a big deal.
It was a big deal for professional PC pests and paranoids and politicians like LOVELY WARREN
Why not fight for ALL people defamed and misunderstood, lady?
Author Kurt Eichenwald has a different take on the brain-mouth mangle that happened to Kappell. It's still a spoonerism:
Before he knew what hit him, Kappell, a veteran newsman for several TV stations, was out of a job and branded a racist.
You'd think his boss, who looks like an impotent senile goggle-eyed frog, but maybe isn't, would at LEAST say, "Whether he meant it or not, we have to fire him, and set an example to make sure all reporters speak more slowly, measure their words, and are CAREFUL to NEVER mispronounce anything."
Nah. He was too busy scrambling atop his high horse and being a sanctimonious old suck-up to LOVELY WARREN.
TWITTER is now the instant arbiter of tastes and trends, and as you might expect, a lot of ignorant opinionated people, comfortable in calling everyone RACIST and feeling sorry for themselves, and underlining their agenda even when it's not called for, were quick to shout about KAPPELL and about horrible racist White America (which elected a black man President). Kappell being fired (by an old white man) was ignored.
It does seem that maybe 70% of the Tweeters, including a lot of black people, do believe Kappell simply fumbled his words, and pointed out that a man would have to be a card-carrying Nazi KKK Racist LUNATIC to say "Martin Luther Coon King Jr," on a broadcast and expect to get away with it.
Check out some of these. See if there are any that strike YOU as IGNORANT, INTOLERANT, or smug in deciding whether a stranger they don't know BE A RACIST consciously or, hey hey hey, subconsciously.
WABC's anchorman (years ago) Roger Grimsby was once asked if he made an embarrassing gaffe on the air.
He straight-faced, "Yes, one time I mispronounced "COUNT."
Do you suppose if he did that today, he'd be fired as a misogynist? Called a pervert? YOU BET.
In a jury trial, you look for motive and intent and a past record of bad behavior. Kappell was instantly shot down without regard to any of it.
There have been unfortunate cases where there was a word-slip, and NOTHING happened. The person was forgiven. There was also the notorious ESPN incident where a young reporter, referring to an Asian basketball player's flaws, ad-libbed there "was a chink in his armor." The kid had no idea that he'd been offensive and was mortified. What do you say, that everybody should make a point of checking out all offensive or potentially offensive terms, and hang out with dumbass racist morons who use them? It's possible that nobody's heard the word "chink" since Archie Bunker used it...and a lot of people under 30 don't know who Archie Bunker is.
Dazed and confused, his wife by his side, Kappell issued a video apology. Will it get him his job back? Of course NOT.
Anyone concerned that this guy might not have a lot of savings and might have to go crawl around for some obscure job somewhere, doing something he HATES because some haters and condescending clods pushed him under the bus?
Will there be a TV station in Canada, on cable, on the Internet, or in Europe that will allow him to do the job he loves?
How many YEARS will it take, if at all, for him to get this stain off his record?
Nobody points a finger at jerks like Michael A. Tewell, who take the time to be SO much HOLIER THAN THOU:
He wasn't the first to cast a stone, but you can bet, he would be the first to declare "I don't see color," and the first to cross the street if three black guys came strolling toward him. Or do I misjudge the poor fellow? Gosh, there DOES seem to be misjudging going on regarding utter strangers. Sorry, Mikey, I'm sure YOU are a saint.
Meanwhile, Google Kappell's name and you get reports such as this one from CBS:
I'm sure LOVELY WARREN is doing a LOVELY job in Rochester, and the town has no crime, no sanitation problems, on-time transportation, no unemployment, a boom in real estate prices, and is the very model of small town perfection. (It's Albany, Buffalo and every other town up there that sucks.) What she should look into next, though, is making sure the next weatherman is OF COLOR, and preferably, a weather PERSON (ie, female). Also, let's look into why the station manager is an old white guy. That doesn't seem too fair, does it? Did he instantly fire Kappell to save his own vile, WHITE hide? Must be so, y'all.
Mostly, what's happened here is that we've seen another example of ignorance and intolerance.
A sign of HOPE is the number of "LIKES" that intelligent and compassionate Twitter users have gotten for pointing out that Kappell merely made a mistake, and that he should not have been fired.
But HOPE doesn't feed this man's family or get him a new job. Does it? We have to wait and see.
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