We’ve all done things we regret. For some of us, that thing is just something stupid that has little no impact on our lives. For others, that dumb mistake may have ruined a relationship or landed them in jail. And for a few, there was no coming back from the mistake.
In today’s world of social media, there are way more opportunities to do or say something stupid. With Twitter, Facebook and Instagram being right in your pocket at almost all times, it is incredibly easy to have a few beverages and write a dumb post that you otherwise wouldn’t have. I know, I’ve been a victim of it. As I’m sure the majority of my readers have.
This phenomenon is not just for the common folk. Media members, celebrities and politicians have all fallen victim.
A few years back, comedian and sitcom star Roseanne Barr was fired from her show for tweets referring to Valerie Jarett referencing the Muslim Brotherhood and “the planet of the apes.” I think we can all agree that this was stupid. Not only was it quite crass, but it wasn’t funny. What was funny, was Barr’s “reason” for the offensive tweet. Roseanne opted to blame sleep aid Ambien. That’s embarrassing to say the least. A classic attempt to deflect the blame on a drug.
Now this is a pathetic excuse, but honestly, one most can relate to. Like I said before, we’ve all had a few drinks in us and said some dumb stuff. Not a good excuse, but a relatable one.
That brings us to the past couple days and ESPN basketball analyst Jay Williams. In response to the Boston Celtics bringing in Ime Udoka as their new head coach, Williams took to Twitter. Williams commented on the worthiness of Udoka’s hiring, which I know nothing about. To be completely honest, I had never heard of him. But, what Williams put next in his since deleted tweet even I, a non-basketball sports fan knew wasn’t true. Jay Williams went on to say that Udoka was “the first head coach of color for the Celtics.”
Not trusting my subpar basketball knowledge I had to take a quick look. Williams, I assumed, knew more about this than I did. But, I could’ve sworn Doc Rivers was the Celtics head coach in my lifetime. And I may be blind, but I’m pretty sure he was a person of color…
Turns out, I was right (like I usually am). In fact, with a little more research, the Celtics had the first Black head coach in NBA history with player-coach Bill Russell. A fact that I didn’t know. But also a fact that a basketball reporter should probably have known.
Now like I said, we all make mistakes. We forget stuff and react too quickly to things. I’m sure this is what happened to WIlliams. He just threw something out there without thinking it through. It could’ve ended there. Yeah, he would have been mocked on Twitter. But that would’ve been it.
Then Williams took to twitter again. And he clearly hadn’t learned from his previous mistake. While trying to do damage control, he tweeted this: “As it relates to the Boston Celtics tweet that came from my account a couple of hours ago… I did not post that & my passcode has now been changed.”
Apparently, Jay Williams went to the Benjamin Allbright school of lying on twitter. For more info on that, go here: https://www.bli
Come on Jay. Literally nobody believes you. You think someone took your twitter “passcode” (who calls it that by the way) and tweeted a simple mistake? Not a chance. This one is almost as bad as MSNBC host Joy Reid claiming anti-gay blogs she wrote were “retroactively hacked.” Which nobody believes.
A piece of advice to Jay. If you had just retweeted your own tweet saying something like, “My dumbass forgot the great Bill Russell and Doc Rivers.” This all would have disappeared quickly. Even Joy Reid eventually took ownership of her homophobic blogs and is still employed by MSNBC and it’s all been forgotten. WIlliams’ tweet is nothing compared to some of the things Reid had written.
In this world, if people could just own their mistakes and move on, they’d be a lot better off. Instead of laughing off a simple, dumb tweet and continuing with his day, Williams is now going to be a punchline in sports media when someone makes an error. His attempted cover-up of the tweet is much worse than the crime.
I’ll reiterate to Mr. WIlliams: just own it dude. You’ll be forgiven for messing something up and nobody would have cared. But now, you’ve made it worse.
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