Sportswriter Out at Denver Post After Controversial Tweet About Japanese Indy 500 Winner
Apologies won’t save you from the PC mob
Now former Denver Post sportswriter Terry Frei faced massive criticism after he tweeted he felt “very uncomfortable with a Japanese driver winning the Indianapolis 500 during Memorial Day weekend.” Takumo Sato became the first Japanese winner of the famous car race.
The social media pile on led him to apologize and delete his tweet.
Later Monday, The Denver Post released a statement that condemned Frei’s views and announced he no longer worked at the publication.
From ABC10:
Late Monday morning, the Post sent a statement to 9NEWS, which said Terry Frei was no longer with The Denver Post.
The newspaper’s statement read in its entirety:
“We apologize for the disrespectful and unacceptable tweet that was sent by one of our reporters. Terry Frei is no longer an employee of The Denver Post. It’s our policy not to comment further on personnel issues.
The tweet doesn’t represent what we believe nor what we stand for. We hope you will accept our profound apologies.”
The Post would not elaborate on whether Frei was fired or quit.
Here is one response to Frei’s tweet, which he has deleted:
Nothing specifically personal, but I am very uncomfortable with bigots tainting the moment of the first Asian driver to win the Indy 500. pic.twitter.com/OFKMeMPP1g
— Sung Min Kim (@sung_minkim) May 29, 2017
After he deleted the tweet, he tweeted out “I apologize,” but that received just as much criticism.
So Frei wrote out a lengthy post to explain why he felt uncomfortable. His father served in WWII, where he “conducted unarmed reconnaissance missions over Japan as a pilot during World War II.”
https://twitter.com/TFrei/status/869036468429127680
Sports Becoming Too Political?
Again, the Post didn’t clarify if it fired him or if Frei quit. In a world where all sports is also political, this incident isn’t all that shocking.
Just look at ESPN, the world’s largest sports network, and the backlash they’ve received for becoming more political.
I know ESPN has lost viewers and money more for its outdated business model, but there’s no denying they’ve also lost revenue due to its tolerance of liberal behavior from its anchors. Even longtime anchor and fan favorite Linda Cohn admitted as much earlier this month. From Newsbusters:
How many times have you or someone you know said the following, “Why doesn’t ESPN just stick to sports?” or “Since when did ESPN become a political channel?” Well, apparently Linda Cohn, who has been with the network for over 25 years, thinks politics IS partly to blame for the layoffs. In an interview this past Friday with WABC’s “Bernie and Sid Show,” Cohn spoke about the loss of viewership the network has been experiencing.
Cohn, when asked if she feels there was a “distaste” among viewers for politics invading the programming decisions, said she feels it that is “definitely a percentage of it….I don’t know how big a percentage,” she said, “but if anyone wants to ignore that fact, then they’re blind. And that’s what I meant about the core group of what made ESPN so successful.”
ESPN fired Curt Schilling over his controversial tweets and thoughts, but let others fly. In 2011, ESPN refused to fire Todd Grisham after he called the Oklahoma loss to Texas Tech a “trail of tears.” He later apologized. Then in August 2016, Grisham tweeted, “As impressive as Ichiro’s 3,000 hits are, his unwillingness to learn English after 15 years in America amazes me more.” He deleted the tweet and apologized a few hours later.
Also in 2011, longtime ESPN anchor Kenny Mayne tweeted out that he “almost rammed car with palin bumper sticker. with intent.” Mayne is still there.
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Comments
If the leftists do not crush all non-PC comments, we might have open, reasonable, logical, and educational discussions about issues, thoughts, language, and other cultural topics. That would be devastating to the totalitarians who view Orwell’s 1984 as a guide.
[class] diversitists are, unsurprisingly, Pro-Choice.
In all seriousness, just because you can name 999 other cases of excess political correctness in American life doesn’t mean that the other 1 case isn’t egregious and well worth firing people over.
This is that one case. The writer made pains to note that this had nothing to do with the individual, but with the Japanese people as a group. And not just the holding of this belief, but broadcasting this belief on Twitter while employed as a sportswriter for a major newspaper, and commenting on an event being covered by his newspaper. Nor is it any comfort that he is singling out the Japanese, not Asians in general. He used his pedestal to chew out someone for his race and ancestry, and specifically not because he was a bad guy personally.
How is this even remotely defensible? He has every right to say it, of course – but he has no special right to be on the Denver Post’s payroll while doing so.
We could ask one of the 426,000 WWII American casualties in the Pacific Theatre. I’m sure there are a few still around. But no, you’re taking the side of the progressives rather than the heroes who fought and died protecting America. How is THAT defensible?
Borque is right. It was a dumb thing to say and I agree with his firing. Would he be “uncomfortable” if a German or a Brit had won? I’m gonna guess no, he wouldn’t. It’s stupid to hold this one guy responsible for the actions of his country decades before he was born.
If the writer made the same comment about a Jew winning the race on a particular day, he’d get a raise.
Boycott the Denver Post.
And why are they firing the guy? THEY published the piece!
Twitter, not the Denver Post, “published the piece.”
Obviously Sato is killing the urban myth that Asians are bad drivers. It’s great to see an international flavor to the 500 as it is a famed international race. It also shows that coming from F1 to Indy cars is a lot easier than going from Indy car to F1. Montoya still holds the lap record in F1 with his Monza run. If you look at Indy winners recently…. it is VERY international. Love it.
It’s not a myth at all.
The “myth” I’ve heard is Asian women drivers.
So solly!
I have cracked ribs. stop making me laugh.
hehe
CHAR CHAR!!!!!!
THAT’S NOT PC!!!!!
(PC = politically corrupt!)
Worse, it’s progressive corruption. Also, progressive confusion, progressive collusion, progressive climate [change]…
Imagine all of the questions the left would be asking if Mikhail Aleshin, a Russian driver had won the race… we’d have to endure a month’s worth of stupid questions on who in IndyCar might have had Trump connections
Yah he should’ve been locked up in one of FDR’s internment camps instead of driving a race car.
It is an uncomfortable coincidence, but Americans are not [class] diversitists, and we cannot progress to judge people by their diversity class (i.e. “color of their skin”). This is a leftist moral and legal precept that has no place in civilized society.
Yes, it was a weird thing to tweet.
But I won’t go along with firing someone over such trivia, just because it’s relatively high-profile trivia.
A case like this isn’t part of some epic battle between right and wrong. Both parties can be wrong.
Louis Mountbatten specified that there be no Japanese dignitaries at his funeral. It caused all sorts of hooting and hollering, but his instructions were followed anyway. Of course in his case those dignitaries would have been the same individuals he’d spent the most important part of his career fighting, so there was obviously something personal involved.
A case like this isn’t part of some epic battle between right and wrong. Both parties can be wrong.
Care to explain this?
How exactly are “both parties wrong” in this case?
I was pulling for an American driver with a Chevrolet engine. Sue me.