I waited to write about this story because at first it seemed too insane to be true, but alas, it's come to this.
ESPN pulled Asian-American sports announcer Robert Lee from this weekend's University of Virginia vs. William & Mary football game because they were afraid he might offend people. Why? His name is too similar to Confederate General Robert E. Lee. For the record, Robert E. Lee is white and has been dead for over 100 years.
Fox Sports radio host Clay Travis broke the story earlier tonight. From Outkick The Coverage:
In a story that seems made for The Onion, but is actually true, according to multiple Outkick fans inside ESPN MSESPN decided to pull an Asian college football announcer named Robert Lee off the William and Mary at University of Virginia college football game because they were concerned that having an ASIAN FOOTBALL ANNOUNCER NAMED ROBERT LEE would be offensive to some viewers.
Did I mention that Robert Lee is Asian?
Is this even real life anymore? This might even be worse than MSESPN apologizing for the fantasy football slave draft a couple of weeks ago.
To avoid offending left wing idiots Robert Lee, the Asian college football announcer, not the Confederate General who died in 1870 and shares a name with him, was switched to the Youngstown State at Pittsburgh game and Dave Weekley will now call the William and Mary at University of Virginia game.
ESPN pulled Asian announcer Robert Lee off the UVa home opener to avoid offending viewers: https://t.co/2Oz22i4Vpx
— Clay Travis (@ClayTravis) August 22, 2017
ESPN confirmed the decision to Travis after he wrote about it.
“We collectively made the decision with Robert to switch games as the tragic events in Charlottesville were unfolding, simply because of the coincidence of his name. In that moment it felt right to all parties. It’s a shame that this is even a topic of conversation and we regret that who calls play by play for a football game has become an issue," ESPN said.
Travis also went on Fox News to explain further.
ESPN pulls Asian-American announcer from Virginia football game because he has a Confederate general's name https://t.co/T5KI92NpQm pic.twitter.com/Zs2WtHg8us
— Fox News (@FoxNews) August 23, 2017
The news has been confirmed by multiple outlets.
ESPN just emailed me the same statement Clay Travis got. pic.twitter.com/BE5YCKx3qs
— Alex Griswold (@HashtagGriswold) August 23, 2017
So, here we are.
It sure seems discriminatory, at a minimum, to reassign an Asian-American's job based on him having the same name as a dead white guy. But hey, if it kept a few people from getting triggered, who cares?
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