I’m a Man
Published by punkass marc November 10th, 2007 in Punkass!, Music, Sports for non-idiots, Ze Goggles! Zey Do Nothing!Several weeks ago, Oklahoma State head football coach Mike Gundy had an epic YouTube Hall of Fame meltdown at a press conference. Despite having just pulled out a tough win, he was upset over an article written about the benching of his QB. Here’s the rant:
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Oh, and did I mention that the article he was spazzing over was written by a woman? Kinda sheds an even uglier light on some of those comments.
Anyway, the unintentionally hilarious assholery insipred me to mash it up. Enjoy!
So, let me get this straight, a coach berated a woman, in public, for writing about a male athlete the same way that female athletes are written about every day, on the basis of her not being a parent and is therefore ignorant of the fact that when boy athletes have a bad day they require comfort, not criticism. He is a man, so mans and girls can take it but boys shouldn’t have to? I don’t quite get the connection, but I did like the part where the child is bound to be a boy.
The ostensible reason is that the meanie writer hurt a student athlete’s feelings. But since college players are written about like this all the time, and just from the general gist of the rant (particularly the part about children!), you get the impression that this one stung in no small part because of the gender of the writer.
Thanks to you two for telling me what its about without me having to watch it. Such stuff will haunt me and put my already horrible mood into overdrive, with no one around like that asshat to slug hard.
This happened a few months ago, so I’m not sure why this is coming up now.
However, it might be useful for you to post the orginal article so that your readers can know what the coach is ranting about. Who knows, maybe the article was a nasty hit piece on an undergraduate student-athlete.
“Whose the kid? Whose the kid here?”
Um… the guy in the orange shirt having a tantrum in front of the cameras?
One of the many weird things about this video is that the guy actually has a couple of good points about the way the press treats amateur athletes. Of course, they are completely drowned out by the following:
1) His implicit misogyny.
2) His claim that the views of people who are free from having children should automatically be dismissed, a downright dangerous claim on an overpopulated planet.
3) His generalized hysteria.
People will laugh at him, get angry at him, or both.
I say this out of sympathy for amateur athletes, not out of sympathy for this schmuck.
You would have to be familiar with the OSU football program to appreciate his tirade. The newspaper column he is pissed about was written by a very young sportswriter who did not fully investigate some claims about a player she recounted in her column. It was a sorry display of sportswriting to say the least and he called her out on it.
He had a point that you don’t get. His rant had nothing to do with the gender of the writer. It had everything to do with an attack on a 19 year old football player by a newspaper that does not like the team. He was saying “attack me because I am a mature person that is paid to handle personal attacks. Don’t attack a kid.” That was his point.
I didn’t see what was so objectionable about it. Cringe-inducing meltdown, yes, but absent any context, his rant doesn’t seem all that heavily sexist, with “I’m a man” serving only to contrast with being a boy.
Yeahhhh… I haven’t watched it either, but it reminds of an incident recently when I was at work–we were working with some kind of lame stock photo of a middle-aged woman who looked really crabby, and someone wondered if we should use a different photo (because she looked crabby) and the art director trying to be funny did the woman’s voice like, “Yes, I am bitter and will never have children and I am taking it out on youuuu!”
I was amazed and irritated that he would go there without a thought, and of course took the opportunity to reply, “Oh yes, you are SO right–I for one am SO bitter every time I enjoy my free time, sleeping in on weekends, and using my disposable income for vacations! Man, you’re right! No WONDER we’re so bitter.”
“You don’t have kids” — the ultimate “insult to women.” Lovely.
You would have to be familiar with the OSU football program to appreciate his tirade. The newspaper column he is pissed about was written by a very young sportswriter who did not fully investigate some claims about a player she recounted in her column. It was a sorry display of sportswriting to say the least and he called her out on it.
He had a point that you don’t get. His rant had nothing to do with the gender of the writer. It had everything to do with an attack on a 19 year old football player by a newspaper that does not like the team. He was saying “attack me because I am a mature person that is paid to handle personal attacks. Don’t attack a kid.” That was his point.
julie,
i agree that gundy was making a point about not egregiously going after an amateur athlete, but there are plenty of ways of making that point without resorting to childish, sexist rants.
when did 19 year olds become children who’s parents need to call people up on their behalf to protect them from criticism. I mean unless they’re a 14 year old who committed a crime. Those kids are adults.
But don’t pick on the poor 19 year old? And it’s a friggin’ athlete. So it’s not important anyway… Why the hell did i bother even writing a comment.
Am I to understand that a young sportswriter wrote a critical column in a public paper about a young athlete, so the adult male publicly criticized the young sportswriter because he is a grownup so it is OK when he does to her but it’s not ok for her to do it to the other guy? Maybe being familiar with the OSU football program would make that make sense, but I have my doubts.
This seems like you’re trying to hard to FIND sexism somewhere it’s not. The only evidence of that whatsoever is the fact the the writer was a woman? There’s a lot of assumptions here being made…does the coach have a history of being misongynistic or sexist, cause I don’t see it here.
Alex,
You ever seen a coach talk about how a male writer isn’t qualified to write about athletes because he doesn’t have a child? [And by "talk about" I mean "publicly berate."]
Didn’t think so.
“You ever seen a coach talk about how a male writer isn’t qualified to write about athletes because he doesn’t have a child?”
That is not only a stretch; it’s a non sequiter.
The coach didn’t claim that she “isn’t qualified to write about athletes because she doesn’t have a child.” It’s pretty clear he was asserting that anyone who has a child would not treat a 20 year old as shitty as the sporterwriter did. That is, if she had a child, then she would have more sympathy for young people and not call them pussies in her articles.
Same with the “I’m a man” comments. It was a man vs. boy comparison; not a man vs. woman comparison.
I don’t give a crap about OSU football, but there is some serious misreading (intentional or not) going on here with this episode.
chris,
sorry, i disagree.
did you read the article? what about the treatment was “shitty” to you? that his manhood was questioned? is that worse than what any man has written about bobby reid or any other athlete? and if not, why isn’t a man required to have a kid to write such “shitty” things?
mostly, i just think the rant is embarrassing for him, but i think there’s a sexist sentiment running through it, too.