PC has officially run amok: Johnny Miller apologizes to Rocco

[WaylonJennings]

Apparently Italians clean swimming pools???

http://sports.yahoo.com/golf/pga/news?slug=ap-millerapology&prov=ap&type=lgns

 

[Football_Bat]

That's crazy. I remember hearing the quote and thinking nothing of it; I thought of it coming off as like he's a regular dude that hit it big, y'know?

Ridiculous.

 

[hondo]

I don't think Rocco asked for an apology. He and Johnny are both Callaway guys, and they tend to stick together.

 

[PeteyPirate]

When I heard Miller say it, I thought it was just stupid on its face. It made no sense in neither an offensive nor a non-offensive way.

 

[playthrough]

They were dumb comments -- when he made the crack about a name like Rocco being on the trophy, I remember thinking "isn't the name 'Tiger' more stupid?" -- but not to the point of the formal apology, a separate story in papers, etc.

 

[ColbertNation]

When I heard Miller say it, I thought it was just stupid on its face. It made no sense in neither an offensive nor a non-offensive way.

That's not offensive. It's abnormal; but it's not offensive.

 

[pressmurphy]

Add me to the list of people not offended by the remark. In the contact of what was being discussed, Miller was portraying the guy as your average working stuff.

If there's a stereotype out there for a guy doing menial labor around the house, wouldn't it be a Japanese guy with a leaf blower?

And as for the name on the trophy, let's face it: Golf has long been a country club sport, with lots of club titles won by Biff, Stanford, Phillip, Stanley and a slew of gents with "III" or "IV" at the end of their names. Rocco is about as much a "working-class" name as you'll find.

 

[Notepad]

I am not offended, at all by Miller's comments.

But, think for a minute if it had been reversed. What if he would have said Tiger looks like he is a guy who should be cleaning Rocco's pool....it would have turned into a race issue (by Al Sharpton, Jemele, et al) before that round would have even been finished.

Just sayin.

 

[Second Thoughts]

PC has gotten out of hand. I remember Miller saying that and I thought it was odd, maybe inappropriate, though I knew what he meant by it. Still, I didn't think it was offensive and never thought it deserving of a formal apology.

 

[WaylonJennings]

I thought the reason Miller was so giddy about Rocco was because he was likely remembering his own Open at Oakmont. If anybody deserves a pass on empathizing with Mediate that day, it would seem to be Miller, right?

 

[Monroe Stahr]

All Johnny was trying to say, basically, is that Rocco looked like Walter Matthau, the stubbly, pool-cleaning Little League coach in "The Bad News Bears." I don't know how that became "offensive." Alas, these are the times we live in.

 

[Notepad]

Again, read my post earlier in this thread.
If this is the other way around, they are playing the race card...hard core.

 

[beardpuller]

Again, read my post earlier in this thread.
If this is the other way around, they are playing the race card...hard core.

Well, think real hard here: If it were the other way around, it clearly WOULD have been offensive. The implication would have been that black people clean pools. What most of us seem to be saying on this thread is that it is a stretch to turn a reference to menial labor into an anti-Italian slur.
If you want, I'll answer your next question, as well,, which probably is going to be "they call each other 'N-word' all the time, so why can't we?"

 

[Notepad]

Again, read my post earlier in this thread.
If this is the other way around, they are playing the race card...hard core.

Well, think real hard here: If it were the other way around, it clearly WOULD have been offensive. The implication would have been that black people clean pools. What most of us seem to be saying on this thread is that it is a stretch to turn a reference to menial labor into an anti-Italian slur.
If you want, I'll answer your next question, as well,, which probably is going to be "they call each other 'N-word' all the time, so why can't we?"

Just another in a long line of raging double-standards when it comes to this issue.
And for the record, in my part of the world many, many more Italians clean pools than do blacks. I just opened up the phone book and a good 1/3 to 1/2 of the pool cleaners have surnames that end in a vowel.

 

[spinning27]

Miller clearly didn't mean anything derogatory, but there might have been something in his subconscious that made him say "cleaning Tiger's pool" rather than "doing Tiger's taxes." Whatever. The lesson, I guess, is that if you're going to make that type of comparison with an athlete, use a white collar job. I could just as easily see Rocco Mediate as Tiger's orthopedic surgeon as I could his pool man.

 

[DanOregon]

I was surprised Miller had to apologize, maybe NBC just practicing being overly sensitive to prepare for the Olympics, I don't know.
I do agree that when you think of the names that have gone on that trophy, the name Rocco is one of the few that brings to mind someone having to break a sweat when they work.

 

[StaggerLee]

I've said it before and I'll say it again. Every single statement can be found offensive by somebody, somewhere in this world. If they can't take a joke, **** 'em.

 

[D-3 Fan]

Just wonderin', is this as offensive as Jemele's comments? Or is it because people find Hitler worse than someone calling a golfer a pool boy?

It's somewhat hypocritical that Kelly Tilgmann can get ripped and Tiger and her are friends, just like Johnny and Rocco are, but if Johnny gets a pass, so do Jemele and Kelly in my opinion.

I didn't find anything offensive what either all three said. If you can't, turn the channel.

People who demand an apology are people who wants to be offended, even though they were not offended directly or was not targeted. It's ironic that Carlin died last night and we are continuing to let PC dictate what you can't say or do.

 

[beardpuller]

Again, read my post earlier in this thread.
If this is the other way around, they are playing the race card...hard core.

Well, think real hard here: If it were the other way around, it clearly WOULD have been offensive. The implication would have been that black people clean pools. What most of us seem to be saying on this thread is that it is a stretch to turn a reference to menial labor into an anti-Italian slur.
If you want, I'll answer your next question, as well,, which probably is going to be "they call each other 'N-word' all the time, so why can't we?"

Just another in a long line of raging double-standards when it comes to this issue.
And for the record, in my part of the world many, many more Italians clean pools than do blacks. I just opened up the phone book and a good 1/3 to 1/2 of the pool cleaners have surnames that end in a vowel.

Ya know, unless you live in Genoa or North Jersey, I kind of doubt that. Maybe the guys who own the pool cleaning companies are Italian ...
But to try one more time to wrest this sucker back onto the road: Miller thought Rocco looked like a guy who cleans pools because Rocco is kind of a schlumpy-looking guy. If he said he thought Tiger -- a slim, graceful-looking man -- looked like a guy who cleaned pools, the only obvious inference would be that black guys clean pools. Saying that a schlumpy-looking guy looks like he would clean pools might or might not be an anti-Italian slur. My vote, and almost all the votes on this thread so far, would be that it is not.
So please go back to Rush land with your "double standard, let's try to make this a thread about how blacks make everything about race" bull****.

 

[Armchair_QB]

Around here we use Mexicans to clean our pools...