After Jason Williams (I believe) shot a jumper over Yao, and the Rockets called timeout, as the game faded to commericial Kerr commented "Williams shooting over the 7 foot 6 China Man". Now it sounds worst than it was....I think Kerr knew he ****** it up because he hestiated after saying "China" and finished with "man". I think it was a slip of tongue and done without malice or anger, but still he said what he said. Kerr's comments immediately made tons of emails on the way to tnt@turner.com, following are some: .... Dear Sir or Madam: : Today is the holiday to honor Dr. King, who is respectable for his : firmly opposition to the discriminations to any races in America. : Ironically, tonight I was shocked to hear that Steve Kerr used an : extremely offensive word "chinaman" to call Yao Ming during Memphis Vs : Houston NBA game. I don't think any respectful sports analyst would : use "negro" to call Mr. Michael Jordan, or any of the African American : basketball stars in the court, so why does he use such offensive, : hurtful words against a Chinese basketball star? : Mr. Kerr's discriminative words cause the tremendous anger among the : Chinese scociety and even the whole Asian scociety. Mr. Kerr should : apologize for his racist speech, and promise he won't be making the same : conduct again. : At the mean time, I will boycott TNT programming before Mr. Kerr does : the right thing.
more emails: : : Dear Mr. Turner: : : I am extremely dismayed that on this Martin Luther King's Day, your : : analyst Steve Kerr has the guts to call Yao Ming a "ChinaMan" (during : : the Memphis/Houston game). I would like to see disciplinary action taken : : against Kerr to show that a global organization like AOL TIme : : Warner stands up against racism and would not tolerate such behavior. : : Thank you : : Sincerely,
One Chinese called TNT 404-8854538 TNT insisted it was "free speech, they can not control what Kerr will say".
Yeah I also caught that, but didnt think twice about it. But now that I see it, I would get a little offended too if I was chinese. He could have said it a different way. Ive never heard anyone say, yao shoots it over the Whiteman. That wouldnt sound right either....
that sounds kind of odd, since it wasn't kerr who said it in the first place. it was dick stockton...not kerr...come on guys. if you are gonna be mad and organize a protest at least get the facts straight. also...it would seem highly strange that TNT would say something like that since almost every single america company is deathly afraid of offending anyone.
well you do hear white boy thrown around all the time...i think that is kind of why americans have a difficult time understanding that the phrase is offensive. though whatever is considered offensive to a group of people is offensive.
i tivo'ed the game also, but it was cut off due to the late start. was stockton's slip in the 4th quarter? i thought he was doing a terrible job commentating, and even mentioned to my girlfriend that "this guy must be drunk or something". i remember him saying the rockets were playing a zone, when it was a clear man-to-man defense at one point, and also saying how yao was a 52% free throw shooter. Even my girlfriend said that must be wrong (she doesn't follow sports whatsoever, just watches along sometimes when I have the games on).
One, Chinaman is a derogratory turn, not as bad as the chink but still has a history of been used as a degrading word. It is more insulting than white boy. Two, please tell me when is the last time a sports caster say something along the lines of Jordan just dunked over the tall whiteboy? I've never heard a single announcer said anything close and I've watched quite a few games.
there is no rank of words that are derogatory to another. period. something was said that shouldnt have been. im sure he meant no ill will, but he should realize his mistake and issue a public apology.
