Stephanie Rice in a messy soup
Have you heard of Australian swimmer Stephanie Rice? I hadn’t till a few days ago. Apparently she was watching a rugby match between Australia & South Africa and after the Australian team beat the South African team, she tweeted, “Suck on that, f@gg*ts!” Because, you know, the South African team is clearly gay if they couldn’t beat the Australian team, because gays are such losers and not men enough.
As you can tell I’m pissed off with her comment. But there’s more to this story – Stephanie Rice apologised and deleted the guilty tweet and said she didn’t mean it and that she took full responsibility for her actions.
This is unlike a lot of non-apologies I’ve heard in recent times with people not apologising for what they said but for how it made someone feel, (ex. ‘I’m sorry that people were offended that I said something homophobic’ instead of saying ‘I’m sorry I said something homophobic.’).
Of course after this happened the world and it’s uncle was either outraged or saying that ‘the gays’ were making a big deal out of nothing.
Then one of Stephanie Rice’s gay friends spoke up in her defense and said that while it was a stupid thing to say, she wasn’t homophobic. Then Jaguar pulled out of an endorsement deal they had with her.
Now I don’t know what to think. On the one hand, she should NEVER have said that, considering how she’s a role model and a public person with influence. On the other hand, she took full responsibility for her actions and accepted that she would pay for her actions. But is it too steep a price to pay?
What do you think?
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Hard to say Broom – like you I was quite offended when the news broke and part of me was like well she def shouldn’t have said that – it’s completely offensive and horrible no matter what context it’s put in, but the media here in Aus aired her full apology where to me she seemed genuinely remorseful.
I don’t know whether it’s because after Jag pulled their sponsorship that she realised the full weight of her words, because I kind of believe she said them thoughtlessly, rather like when people say “gay” to mean “stupid” (e.g “I can’t believe she said that. That’s so gay.”).
Would it have made it a big deal if she said “bitches” or “motherfuckers” instead? Those words are equally offensive to some, and more mainstream and accepted to others…
I agree with Silvara, it is perhaps different weights to different words when they are all equally as offensive. I was at dinner a few hours ago when the person sitting across from me used the term “Big fat lesbian” as a negative connotation to a well known indian individuals character. Did I sit there and grin ? Yes. Was the person also saying motherf***er a few times ? Sure. I grinned then too.
Both were as ridiculous. But teaching people “Gay does not equal Bad” has to start somewhere – and role models and people in the limelight are as good a place to start as any.
Personally, I do think loosing out on an endorsement deal was a bit too harsh but then nobody ever said that a “sorry” could undo one’s disastrous actions.
Sometimes you get away with murder and sometimes you just get “F*C**K”.
Closer to home though, the Queer community is ridiculed on regular basis; be it in the name of humor, be it religion, or be it in the hands of homophobes. When would things change here? *Sigh!*