The cry of "sexism" is being shouted loudly by his employers, who happen to publish the Sun and The News of the World, highly sought after reading for those with intellect, especially the Page Three girls who tittilate us all and are certainly not exploited for showing us what they have upfront! Andy is suing The News of the World at present, but that has nothing to do with his sacking, of course.
Any employer will tell you that a sexist comment deserves a warning rather than a sacking. But, there you go. Rupert Murdoch and his cronies can do what they like. Richard Keys will keep his job. Why? He's not suing the News of the World.
Banter in the workplace happens. The female in the workplace is as guilty as the male. Men are untidy, can't multi-task, leave their dirty socks, can't work the washing machine etc etc. We all laugh along. It's banter for goodness sake, and no harm is done or offence taken.
I grew up with Andy Gray. I played football with him in our BB team. He visited my family home, even after he was a professional at Dundee Utd. He was a nice guy, and totally harmless! His sense of humour and his knowledge of the beautiful game will be missed.
It's a sad day for common sense.
MadPriest pitches in with this....
10 comments:
As a female, I totally agree! Especially as he didn't even make the comments on air but in what he presumed was a private conversation!!
Sorry, disagree. Gray and Keys' comments were bigoted, offensive and pathetic. The tipping point between a warning and a sacking was the video of Gray dangling his mic and telling fellow presenter Charlotte Jackson to "tuck this in for me, love" as he gestured towards his trousers. Sexism is not a trivial matter, and sadly it's endemic in football. Murdoch's minions may be hypocrites, but they are not wrong to act on this, they're wrong not to act on other things they do.
Kinda agree with Simon - yer man ought to be aware he lives in a fairly PC media culture and this sort of behaviour plays very badly with yer chardonnay swigging meeja types. And working for Murdoch? If ye flee wi' the craws ye'll get shot wi' the craws!
I've seen the video of the trouser offence. It was meant to be an offline remark which was banter among "friends".
Sugar! Am I about to be sacked for this comment. My wife, like other intelligent women, doesn't understand the offside rule. We laugh about that. The RW, (OMG is that a slight?) admits that she only goes for the pies!
Let's get real guys!
I still reckon Andy Gray is no worse than a lot of the rest of the population.
If every person at my former workplace who ever made a sexist comment, most of them considerably worse than any of these Andy Gray comments, had been sacked then the office would have been close to empty within a few days.
The comments made show the measure of the man, so the offside rule becomes irrelevant. They put him into the category that I call 'Yucky'.
I am sure that the lady in the dangling mic incident has, like many of us, learned to ignore such comments made by guys who often know no other way of speaking to women. That doesn't stop such 'banter' being unacceptable.
Not understanding the off-side rule isn't about being female, it's about only going for the pies and that makes the jokes ok.
RW
Having been chastised by the RW, and indeed, too, by my friend Simon Barrow (http://onlyjustoffside.blogspot.com/2011/01/why-just-banter-defence-is-pathetic-and.html) I will now cede the point.
I do this after the pathetic attempt by Richard Keys yesterday when he tried to make everything OK, failed, and later resigned.
I asked Archie, today, what he thought, as the only other male in this household, and he growled something like, "Let sleeping dogs lie!"
Clever dug!
Missed all this when I was darn sahth - but must leap in at the end to say I was delighted when he was sacked by an employer known to be progressive in its views. You know what happens when someone with a public persona makes a gaffe - and a gaffe like this latest one wasn't likely to be a one-off, was it? Casual bigotry in all areas of life has to be resisted if we're going to make any progress.
There! Rant over - and despite the fact that I canny stand footy, I do understand the offside rule. It's not exactly rocket science, after all ...
;-)
The captcha I had to fill in to make this comment was "mings" which is just about what Gray's and Keys's views do.
The trouser remark was harassment pure and simple and would not be acceptable in any modern workplace, I'd have thought.
To deride a woman official - who must know the laws of the game rather better than most players, pundits and probably, actually, most male refs - purely for being a woman is not merely antediluvian, it's almost prehistoric and is disparaging to all qualified officials.
And do not Keys's remarks about Karen Brady show the depth of his contempt for women in football and by implication women in general?
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