Is Chris Gayle some sort of perverted misogynist or can everyone just settle down?

[RossTaylorsBox]

Cue the "well why didn't you say anything when it happened" crowd.

 

[Pratters]

She did though. The management apparently sent a mail to every one without naming Gayle that leud behaviour isn't allowed but did not make it public knowledge.

 

[Victor Ian]

It is all Gayle's fault. No need to analyse hypocrisy elsewhere as we like our blame to all be in neat and simple packages. Personally, the problem lies in on field interviews, this bullcrap that has entered into cricket? Players should walk onto the field uninterrupted on the way to the crease and return from it uninterrupted until after the end of play. Remember the old days? Networks will have us believe we like vapid interviews..."Yeah - It's going to be really tough mate. Opposition are good - I'll have to bring my best game and perform 110% mate.". You wont get insight in a 40 second sound bite and networks should dispense with insulting us with this idiocy under the pretense that this is what the public wants. Incidents like this are always bound to happen. For Gayle... Wrong place. Wrong time. For everyone else, wrong thing to give a toss about.

 

[Pratters]

It is all Gayle's fault. No need to analyse hypocrisy elsewhere as we like our blame to all be in neat and simple packages. Personally, the problem lies in on field interviews, this bullcrap that has entered into cricket? Players should walk onto the field uninterrupted on the way to the crease and return from it uninterrupted until after the end of play. Remember the old days? Networks will have us believe we like vapid interviews..."Yeah - It's going to be really tough mate. Opposition are good - I'll have to bring my best game and perform 110% mate.". You wont get insight in a 40 second sound bite and networks should dispense with insulting us with this idiocy under the pretense that this is what the public wants. Incidents like this are always bound to happen. For Gayle... Wrong place. Wrong time. For everyone else, wrong thing to give a toss about.

Nah, I don't buy this. Technology merely exposes the tool.

 

[harsh.ag]

It is all Gayle's fault. No need to analyse hypocrisy elsewhere as we like our blame to all be in neat and simple packages. Personally, the problem lies in on field interviews, this bullcrap that has entered into cricket? Players should walk onto the field uninterrupted on the way to the crease and return from it uninterrupted until after the end of play. Remember the old days? Networks will have us believe we like vapid interviews..."Yeah - It's going to be really tough mate. Opposition are good - I'll have to bring my best game and perform 110% mate.". You wont get insight in a 40 second sound bite and networks should dispense with insulting us with this idiocy under the pretense that this is what the public wants. Incidents like this are always bound to happen. For Gayle... Wrong place. Wrong time. For everyone else, wrong thing to give a toss about.

Incidents like these are always bound to happen because some people are ****s and it's good we find out who they are and it's not good to suggest we stop interviews because ****s can't handle themselves in front of the camera.

If they didn't wish to do an interview, they could just say so - "Let's talk later". Done.

 

[sledger]

It is all Gayle's fault. No need to analyse hypocrisy elsewhere as we like our blame to all be in neat and simple packages. Personally, the problem lies in on field interviews, this bullcrap that has entered into cricket? Players should walk onto the field uninterrupted on the way to the crease and return from it uninterrupted until after the end of play. Remember the old days? Networks will have us believe we like vapid interviews..."Yeah - It's going to be really tough mate. Opposition are good - I'll have to bring my best game and perform 110% mate.". You wont get insight in a 40 second sound bite and networks should dispense with insulting us with this idiocy under the pretense that this is what the public wants. Incidents like this are always bound to happen. For Gayle... Wrong place. Wrong time. For everyone else, wrong thing to give a toss about.

I agree that interviews are generally ****, but what relevance does this have to the issue at hand?

 

[Stapel]

https://t.co/Evo91uyOrc oh dear. Exposed himself to a female worker in dressing room apparently. More truths coming out..

Well, whatever happened there exactly, the question that will be raised is what she was doing there, not?

Edit: Or did he walk inside a women's dressing room?

 

[harsh.ag]

Well, whatever happened there exactly, the question that will be raised is what she was doing there, not?

Edit: Or did he walk inside a women's dressing room?

She walks into the room and he is already naked, fine. The other thing is not.

 

[Victor Ian]

I agree that interviews are generally ****, but what relevance does this have to the issue at hand?

No relevance to the issue at hand. I tackled the issue in the first sentence. No more needs to be said regarding the issue at hand.

The rest was my own hyperbole on how I think no one even needs to know Gayle is a tool or even care, in relation to the second part of the opening post that said 'can everyone just settle down'. I think, "Yes, we can settle down". There are more important things for everyone not involved to worry about. Anyways, I don't disagree with what most are saying. I just think I don't really care about the interview. I treat women with respect. That's all I can control.

 

[sledger]

I wouldn't actually say that the quality of interviewing in relation to professional sports is a more important issue than ***ism in wider society tbh, but ok.

 

[Ikki]

Yeah "***ual harrassment" is definitely way OTT. Don't think anyone is really a "victim" here either. Doesn't mean what Gayle did wasn't extremely inappropriate though.

Yeh, it was so damn awkward. Don't have any feelings on Gayle, but I think he totally misread Mel there. I wouldn't have minded as much if beforehand he had joked about it and she laughed it off. But it looked like she was insulted because she was trying to be professional and this galoot thought he'd try to be the 'big man' on air.

 

[Ikki]

No two wrongs don't make a right.

I'm bringing this up because the attitudes expressed by Gayle, which are being described here as misogyny, are the exact same attitudes which contributed to her hiring. How is that hard to understand?

I don't find a lot wrong with what you're saying but I think there is a distinction here. While we may all like her more because she is attractive (and that makes her better at her job or whatever), it doesn't necessary equate to being okay with someone making her actually doing her job difficult. Gayle could try to chat her up all he likes behind the scenes, but let her do the job as she is trying to do it.

Taking your point to its extreme, we should be okay if Gayle tried to kiss her as well.

 

[Black_Warrior]

This is just so stupid. I am not sure if there is any history between them, but from the interview I watched, he was fooling around, and she should have laughed it off, or perhaps given a witty reply about how he might not be her type or up to her standards. To portray this as ***ual harrassment or make this about ***ism which it what it has become it absolutely shameful. Not saying she is entirely responsible for this, but more the reaction in the media by other journalists. By chastising Gayle, we are going to make sure all such interviews are boring and monotonous and follow a strict code from now on, lest someone gets offended again.

Rogers now talking about Gayle's character was really low. And I really used to like Rogers.

 

[Dan]

I don't find a lot wrong with what you're saying but I think there is a distinction here. While we may all like her more because she is attractive (and that makes her better at her job or whatever), it doesn't necessary equate to being okay with someone making her actually doing her job difficult. Gayle could try to chat her up all he likes behind the scenes, but let her do the job as she is trying to do it.

Taking your point to its extreme, we should be okay if Gayle tried to kiss her as well.

Nah I think you're totally missing his point; he's not at all okay with what Gayle did -- he's reframing what occurred as part of a broader trend in sports coverage and the place of women within it. Essentially that the broader social trend brings about an environment in which Gayle doing what Gayle did is not wholly out of sync with the trend of women-as-eye-candy. And there's a lot of merit to that point -- complementing that a lot of blame must still be apportioned to Gayle for being a dickish creep.

 

[Pratters]

This is just so stupid. I am not sure if there is any history between them, but from the interview I watched, he was fooling around, and she should have laughed it off, or perhaps given a witty reply about how he might not be her type or up to her standards. To portray this as ***ual harrassment or make this about ***ism which it what it has become it absolutely shameful. Not saying she is entirely responsible for this, but more the reaction in the media by other journalists.

Rogers now talking about Gayle's character was really low. And I really used to like Rogers.

This is definitely harassment and not flirting. How would you feel if you asked a question and suddenly the interviewee started asking you about your cheeks? I thought it was brave of Rodgers given the two will share a dressing room in Somerset soon.

 

[Dan]

This is just so stupid. I am not sure if there is any history between them, but from the interview I watched, he was fooling around, and she should have laughed it off, or perhaps given a witty reply about how he might not be her type or up to her standards. To portray this as ***ual harrassment or make this about ***ism which it what it has become it absolutely shameful. Not saying she is entirely responsible for this, but more the reaction in the media by other journalists.

Rogers now talking about Gayle's character was really low. And I really used to like Rogers.

Uh, what?

 

[91Jmay]

This is just so stupid. I am not sure if there is any history between them, but from the interview I watched, he was fooling around, and she should have laughed it off, or perhaps given a witty reply about how he might not be her type or up to her standards. To portray this as ***ual harrassment or make this about ***ism which it what it has become it absolutely shameful. Not saying she is entirely responsible for this, but more the reaction in the media by other journalists.

Rogers now talking about Gayle's character was really low. And I really used to like Rogers.

'Not saying she is entirely responsible for this'. She really shouldn't have brainwashed him to be fair, that was wrong of her.

The lengths people go to to defend a supposedly adult males behavior are embarrassing. People really showing their arses here. Rogers comments superb and enlightening.

 

[sledger]

This is just so stupid. I am not sure if there is any history between them, but from the interview I watched, he was fooling around, and she should have laughed it off, or perhaps given a witty reply about how he might not be her type or up to her standards. To portray this as ***ual harrassment or make this about ***ism which it what it has become it absolutely shameful. Not saying she is entirely responsible for this, but more the reaction in the media by other journalists.

Rogers now talking about Gayle's character was really low. And I really used to like Rogers.

Oh god.

 

[Pratters]

I was watching the sports broadcast of the test in SA and there was a woman reporting. She talked about cricket and wasn't a *** object. The way women are portrayed in the IPL a lot of times is quite different though. That's ***ist in it's own way but that doesn't mean people should indulge in it at all. Two wrongs doesn't justify the second wrong.

 

[watson]

.

Chris Gayle, Mel McLaughlin and why we fight

January 5, 2016 - 9:55PM
Erin Riley


I woke up to a text message from a friend. "What's more ***ist?" he asked. "Chris Gayle hitting on an attractive TV reporter (like an idiot) or the TV network only hiring attractive women for sports reporting when the men can look like a foot and still be on TV?"

"They're two sides of the same coin," I replied. I thought that was obvious, but maybe not.

Then I checked my Twitter mentions and, sure enough, there were men demanding that I acknowledge incidents where women had said ***ual things to men during interviews. "That's a false equivalence," I said. "Hypocrite! Double standard!" they cried. Because they didn't grasp - or chose not to acknowledge - that what Gayle said is part of something much bigger.

There were the men saying Mel McLaughlin should be more outraged, or that those of us who expressed our disappointment with Gayle's actions should be less outraged, the ones who demanded that our responses be exactly what they expected.

And there were the men hurtling abuse at women who spoke out. Vile language, ***ual slurs, outright threats.

All of these things, all of these reactions, are woven together by a single thread: that women's participation in sport must be done in a way that is acceptable to men*. Whether playing or reporting or even talking about sport, women's presence in the arena is closely monitored and policed.

Part of this policing is centring our ***ual attractiveness as part of our value, or lack thereof. A woman's presence in a position of power in sport is more likely to be tolerated if she is conventionally attractive. Consequently, female sport journalists on TV are almost always young, slim, with long hair.*This*isn't to denigrate their incredible talent in any way, simply to highlight they must be both talented*and*attractive, a standard rarely applied to men in comparable positions.

When a man player makes a ***ual comment to a reporter, he is not just harmlessly flirting. He is reminding her - and the audience - that her looks are part of her value. By centring the conversation on her physical attractiveness, it*belittles the rest of what she does. It also places the "right" of the man to make a ***ual advance over the woman's right to be comfortable in her workplace. It re-enforces the idea that we are only here on men's terms.

But that is just one of the ways women's participation in sport is policed by men.

Our conversations about sport are policed. Whether it's men openly telling us to get back into the kitchen or simply attempting to correct us, regardless of whether the correction is accurate, women's conversations about sport rarely happen without men asserting themselves as voices of authority and power. Last night, when we spoke about how we felt about the Gayle comment, we were told how wrong our responses were. "It was just a joke", "lighten up, love", "get a sense of humour", "mountain out of a molehill", "some people have real problems like...". It was belittling-women's-experiences BINGO. The underlying message was clear: that men have the correct response to these incidents and any response that wasn't to laugh it off was incorrect.

Then there was the most vicious form of policing: attempts to silence via abuse. If you're a woman on the internet who talks about sport, there is a very good chance you have been threatened with rape or murder or both. Some dudes have probably speculated about your *** life and the state of your ******. Your appearance has been commented on, usually negatively. You may have been told to kill yourself.

As usual, it happened last night. Female sports journalists and fans alike were inundated with harassment. The harassment has a clear purpose: to make women think before they speak up about such behaviour. We all know that if we say something, we risk abuse. Sometimes, that shuts us up.

So is it any wonder that women don't always call out bad behaviour when they see it? Some deal with it quietly - every female sportswriter I know has their war stories, and we often share them away from public ears. And some adapt by accepting the terms on which their participation is expected - by laughing off such actions as a joke. These are the three options that are available: to fight, to be silent, or to accept.

For me, the fight is important, if exhausting. Sport is both a source of fun and community, and also a cultural force of significant importance and power. Our place as women in the game - as players, as fans, as journalists and as administrators– should not be contingent on male acceptance. It is ours because we cheer, we cry, we write, we play. You can try to keep us from the arena, but we'll be there. And if you try to keep us out, we're going to speak up.

* Yes, not all men. Yes, some men have been great allies in this conversation. But those men usually know enough to know I'm not talking about them.

Erin Riley is a*sports writer.*This article first appeared on her blog.


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