Who's the racist?

NASA decided to send a shuttle into space with two monkeys and an astronaut on board. After months of training, they placed all three in the shuttle and prepared for launch.

Mission Control Center announced, "This is Mission Control to Monkey One. Do your stuff."

The first monkey began frantically typing and the shuttle took off.

Two hours later, NASA's mission control center announced, "This is Mission Control to Monkey Two. Do your stuff."

The second monkey started typing like mad and the shuttle separated from the empty fuel tanks.

Another two hours later Mission Control Center announced, "This is Mission Control to Astronaut... "

At this, the astronaut shouted "I know, I know -- feed the monkeys and don't touch anything."

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It's an old joke - and granted, we don't know the exact words Roy Hodgson used, but IMO, he must have been holding Andros Townsend in the highest esteem to liken him to a monkey in that story.
Yet the press, and organisations like the Society of Black Lawyers jump all over it. Recommending that the FA should hold thorough investigations and to 'educate' Roy Hodgson.

I'm actually quite angry that Hodgson should be lambasted in this way. And to be told he needs educating is condescending in the extreme.  I'm not sure I'd be able to keep my cool if the SoBL said that to me. 

Or am I out of touch?

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Comments

  • I agree with you Runny.

    Hodgson is a well travelled, well educated man. For certain circles to jump on this as having racist connotations is laughable at best.

    The next thing you know there will be a campaign to call monkeys by their latin name to avoid such incidents.

    Farcical.

  • As far as I can see, this has nothing to do with racism. The "monkey" isn't representing the player it's representing his position in the team.

    There's a reason why the story is about monkeys ( because monkeys were actually sent into space) and a reason why he used the story in his team talk.

    The fact that Andros Townsend is black is neither here nor there - had he been a white player the story would have been an equally valid one for Hodgson to use to make his point.

     

  • I largely agree, though I think he might in hindsight see it as a silly thing to say in the circumstances. But I rather think this post in a football forum about it has an interesting spin...

    "I would say, no Roy, don't apologise. Instead say something like 'You know what fellahs I have been part of the most multi racial industry in the country for 50 years and I get that it is hard for the more middle class professions like journalism to get this, because apart from the fellah from the voice I make it 30 white boys for every black man in the room, but for us from the age of about 7 we're all just players so no, whilst I vaguely remember Love Thy fecking Neighbour the word monkey for me is not a symbol of embodied racism, its a bit part in a pony and trap joke. I tell you what is a symbol though, the fact that none of you or indeed I have a black boss. Now cattle truck off, especially the berkshire hunt from The Sun.'"

  • it's daft. but i think he might have spotted how it could have been construed. i like hodgson, but it's a bit of an alan partridge moment.

  • I reckon there's not a racist bone in his body. It was a 66 year old man forgetting his audience!

  •  

    the dude abides wrote (see)

    it's daft. but i think he might have spotted how it could have been construed. i like hodgson, but it's a bit of an alan partridge moment.

     

    Peter Collins wrote (see)

    I reckon there's not a racist bone in his body. It was a 66 year old man forgetting his audience!

    These bits I've made bold there make me dispair.

    Like you say, Peter, I doubt there's a racist bone in his body (even though every single one is white), and anyone with a brain can see that the analogy is nothing to do with race  -  so if people in his audience take offence... it's THEIR  problem.

    Forgive me for stereotyping here, but I think that any black people who have taken offence (and I bet it's a tiny tiny minority) at Roy's comment are misguided. Oversensitive. Maybe I should give some latitude because they may have seen nasty racism in the past... but they are misguided here.    Unfortunately, I think that there are a few of them whose motive is more about self publicity than moral outrage.

    And for white people complaining about perceived racism... I think many of them must be racist.  Surely it's them who have made the mental link between the word monkey and a black footballer?

    Good point about the white press, by the way.

  • Absolute joke, pathetically highlighted by the media.

  • By the way, Peter... your comment "it's a 66yr old man forgetting his audience" is not far from being as condescending as the SoBL's comment that he "needs educating". 

    Hodgson didn't (IMO)  "forget his audience".

    Sorry if I'm a bit hot under the collar.. Like most of us - I'm certain you included, I get wound up by genuine racism.  But I see this sort of sh*tstorm as being damaging to anti-racism and bad for society.

  • I'm inclined to agree that if anyone immediately makes a link between a monkey and a black footballer then it is them that has the problem.

    If the monkeys had been cats no-one would have been offended would they? 

     

  • MillsyMillsy ✭✭✭
    I've never quite understood what "the Society Black Lawyers" are all about.

    You only seem to hear of them when they are trying to blow things all out of proportion and trying to construct a racist incident when there wasn't one in the first place.
  • Screamapillar wrote (see)

    I'm inclined to agree that if anyone immediately makes a link between a monkey and a black footballer then it is them that has the problem.

    If the monkeys had been cats no-one would have been offended would they? 

     

    Yes I had to read through the whole story to even begin to understand what the problem was. 

  • DeanR7DeanR7 ✭✭✭

    not even close to being racist.

    notice the sun had this "story" on its front and back pages yesterday but today its a small section on the  inside, clearly a response that the public disagree with their findings.

  • A bizarre thing to say and he should have known better that to use that analogy in those cicumstances. It was totally Alan Partridge. Racism perhaps not but very stupid. 

  • Who cares? Media beat up ......... and all that will happen is everyone will feel sorry for Hodgson ..... and ummm, thats it!

     

  • skottyskotty ✭✭✭

    i don't envy people in public positions at all these days. the can't say a word (not even in private it seems) without it being analysed to death and people taking offence. then everyone complains about all the blandness and talking in cliches.

    soon he will have to run half time team talks (perhaps plan A,B,C) past spin doctors and lawyers before going ahead.

    as for the complainers. f***ing monkeys.

     

  • I think the £5 million Roy is getting from the FA helps cushion the blow of being in the public eye ...... so dont be too quick to cry him a river.

     

  • Sussex Runner NLR wrote (see)

    A bizarre thing to say and he should have known better that to use that analogy in those cicumstances. It was totally Alan Partridge. Racism perhaps not but very stupid. 

    I disagree. It wasn't stupid. There was nothing at all wrong in what he said - unless it's racist to mention monkeys in front of black people under any circumstances which would, frankly, be ridiculous.

     He wasn't inferring that anybody was a monkey - the story just happened to be about monkeys.

  • skottyskotty ✭✭✭
    Screamapillar wrote (see)
    Sussex Runner NLR wrote (see)

    A bizarre thing to say and he should have known better that to use that analogy in those cicumstances. It was totally Alan Partridge. Racism perhaps not but very stupid. 

    It wasn't stupid. There was nothing at all wrong in what he said - unless it's racist to mention monkeys in front of black people under any circumstances which would, frankly, be ridiculous.

     

    spot on.

  • Also stupid that it became part of a media circus in which we are now all part of. Is Hodgson's private monkey joke the same as that UKIP guys whore quip, I wonder? 

  • skottyskotty ✭✭✭

    not in the same league.

  • Sussex Runner NLR wrote (see)

    Also stupid that it became part of a media circus in which we are now all part of. Is Hodgson's private monkey joke the same as that UKIP guys whore quip, I wonder? 

    No

  • Seems to be a bit of double standards here depending on how you like the person involved. Both cases fit the scenario of said something in private, used colourful language and storm by the media. 

  • The user and all related content has been deleted.
  • "There was nothing at all wrong in what he said - unless it's racist to mention monkeys in front of black people under any circumstances"

    What this fails to take into account is the long history of black football players being subjected to monkey chants at games (not so much in this country nowadays, but still abroad).  That's why it was a bit of a daft comment for RH to have made in the circumstances.  I don't suppose he meant to be derogatory, but it was a bit unfortunate.

  • What about Yids? I don't think it was merely mentioning monkeys. It was an analogy where the black man was the monkey. To say he was merely mentioning a monkey in front of him was inaccurate.

  • DeanR7DeanR7 ✭✭✭

    lets not forget that it was another black man who was the astronaut (chris smalling, the RB who was being told to get the ball to townsend at every opportunity)  The telling of the story had no relevance to the colour of anyones skin. 

  • Astro means star and the star is the sign of the Jew

  • ChimneyChimney ✭✭✭

    Dean, I wish that had been brought to the fore in all the media stories, but if it had been there wouldn't have been a story I the first place.......

    If reality matched intention I'd know I was dreaming
  • I don't think your ukip man said whores NLR, I think he said sluts, I'm prepared to bow to your more intimate knowledge of the subject but I'm not quite sure the words have the same meaning?  

    Even ukip have the right to be quoted accurately, haven't they?

     

  • RicFRicF ✭✭✭

     

     

    White DC Mayoral Staffer Loses Job for Saying "Niggardly"

    http://www.adversity.net/ttl_final.GIF

    Details of the Niggardly Controversy

              Washington, DC's black Mayor, Anthony Williams, gladly accepted the resignation of his white staff member, David Howard, because Mr. Howard uttered the word 'niggardly' in a private staff meeting.

              Webster's Tenth Edition defines the word 'niggardly' to "grudgingly mean about spending or granting".  The Barnhard Dictionary of Etymology traces the origins of 'niggardly' to the 1300's, and to the words 'nig' and 'ignon', meaning "miser" in Middle English.  No where in any of these references is any mention of racial connotations associated with the word 'niggardly'.

              In other words, it's a perfectly good and useful word.  But there is the unfortunate coincidence that it starts with the same four letters as the word "nigger".  The news media are so loathe to use the "N" word, that they've been substituting the phrase "racial slur", as in "...they mistook the word 'niggardly' for a racial slur..."

              Washington, DC's population is 60% black, and it's citizens have been very critical of Mayor Williams for "not being black enough" -- especially because he hired several well-qualified whites to help him run this troubled city.

              Racial intolerance, ignorance, and misplaced political correctness have cost a white mayoral aide his job in Washington, DC.   And, as many of the other stories on Adversity.Net clearly illustrate, the "niggardly" controversy is only the tip of the "intolerance iceberg".

     

     

    🙂

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