So it appears the “on edge” and intense, hotly contentious political climate we’re undergoing in the United States is global. That is if the recent expulsion of Greek Olympian Voula Papachristou from her country’s official team is any indication. Earlier this week, on her personal Twitter account, Papachistou, a Triple Jumper wrote, “With so many Africans in Greece, the West Nile mosquitoes will be getting home food!!!”
But the real reason for her outster may have to do with the fact that the 23-year old has shown sympathies for the ultranationalist faction, the Golden Dawn party, which many perceive is neo-Nazi because of its anti-immigrant rhetoric and the fact that members give one another a “Nazi” like salute in public. She has also retweeted some of the group’s posts and shared their YouTube videos.
One of her team members told Greece’s Skai TV, “No matter how old you are, when you offend the Olympic values, you can’t be a member of the Olympic team.”
The incident spurred the Greek team to alter its social media policy. It has formally forbidding Olympic team athletes from making any personal statements on their social media accounts unless it has to do with performance or the games until after the Olympics are over. Papachristou posted this apology on Twitter: “I would like to express my heartfelt apologies for the unfortunate and tasteless joke I published on my personal Twitter account. I am very sorry and ashamed for the negative responses I triggered, since I never wanted to offend anyone, or to encroach human rights.”
The bad joke is being called racist, but really should not given that the continent of 1 billion people has over 54 different countries, with thousands of nationalities and includes natural born Africans of European, Spanish, Asian descent including millions of Arabs in Northern Africa. It wasn’t against any one race, even though the predominant race in Africa is black.
It could be considered tacky, tasteless, unfunny and anti-immigrant for certain, but whether it is worthy of Olympic team expulsion is up to debate among many.
For certain, it is largely a political calculus that most likely got her removed. The Greek team, with all the negative press that nation has gotten over its role in the European economy collapse, could be spared more bad publicity. It was most likely a calculated move to oust an athlete with ultraconservative and anti-inclusion ties from their roster.
There are US comparison as recent as this past Fourth of July. Many conservatives got up in arms over comedian Chris Rock making what some deemed were anti-American or “racist” remarks in a tweet, nonetheless.
“Happy white peoples Independence Day the slaves weren’t free but I’m sure they enjoyed fireworks,” he wrote on his personal Twitter account to nearly 1 million followers. It was a mere tweet, but dominated twitter conversations and blog posts for days, including calls to boycott his movies and HBO series. Of course, several African Americans agreed with Rock, saying he was telling the truth. Historically, blacks in America were enslaved in 1776 on the day Americans declared themselves independent from Great Britain and slaves were not freed until 1863. But we’re supposed to forget that and banish all memories and mention of slavery from our memories and history books since no current living person actually held slaves. Riiight!
But actually, it is mostly about selective outrage shrouded in political wrangling. You can poke fun of your own, and could get away with more if you have sympathies, or shared history with the subject group. Had Papachristou been an African immigrant herself or the joke came from a liberal comedian; it may not have gotten the same type of attention.
Similar in the Chris Rock case.
True Rock fans who follow his routines and stand up know he has poked fun at African Americans plenty in his routine. He has chastised rappers for wasting their fortunes on superficial material possessions, compared “good” African Americans to bad behaving ones he referred to using the “N” word. However, there was no outrage then. Not even much from those he was haranguing. They thought it was funny.
But had those jokes been made by a white comedian, the outcome and outrage may have been quite swift and derisive. Though it wasn’t a joke, we saw how irate folks got when then presidential candidate Michele Bachman was reminiscing the “good old” days of slavery when there were more married unions among blacks, albeit married in a state of bondage. Her point was that there were stronger families, but you cannot unilaterally cherry pick the good totally ignoring the horrific setting it was in.
When is a joke not a joke? When it is thought to be attacking a group, not your own, especially when you have a history revealing you may have hostilities towards that group.
Is it worthy of losing a coveted spot on the Olympic team you probably worked hard to attain? The jury is still out on that.
But it’s the sign of the political times. It’s Politics meets Political Correctness meets Olympics meets 2012 era of divisiveness and hypersensitivity. Everyone’s on edge. You need to mind your Free Speech, or risk the consequences.
The public policy message has been sent. Olympic athletes from all teams are probably wordsmithing and self censoring their casual tweets as you read this.
Jeneba Jalloh Ghatt represents small, women, and minority owned business and technology companies at The Ghatt Law Group LLC, the nations’ first communications law firm owned by women and minorities. She's won landmark cases on behalf of her clients which include national civil rights and public interest organizations. In addition to actively authoring several blogs, being a radio show host and sitting on the boards of three non-profits, she is a tech junkie who has been developing online web content since the very early years of the Internet, 1991 to be precise! Follow her on Twitter at @Jenebaspeaks, on her blog, Jenebaspeaks, which covers the intersection of politics and technology or on her Politics of Raising Children
blog at The Washington Times Communities section.
