Dear Editor,
On behalf of Chris Gayle and the rest of the male species, I offer my apologies to Mel McLaughlin, the white Australian sports journalist who was asked out for a post-game drink by Gayle on live TV during his Melbourne Renegades match, early January 2016.
Chris might have been a mere victim of the spirit of Twenty/20 cricket, where time is short and one just has to make good of his chances, even at the risk of losing one’s wicket, and in this case, one’s image and career opportunities.
Just as if he was on the pitch, Chris “swung” hard repeatedly at McLaughlin with what was deemed inappropriate interests, which was so merely because it was on air, at least so we are made to believe.
I am now married to a woman who used to be my co-worker, and my subordinate at that, to whom, out of sheer “Freudian sexual frustration”, I had expressed my desire for her — far more suggestively than Chris did with Mel. I could have been let down either as softly as Chris was initially, or with penalties and accusations of sexual harassment as he was eventually. Obviously, I wasn’t.
In her 1984 single, Strut, Sheena Easton’s male counterpart in the song asserted that “nations go to war over women like you; it’s just a form of appreciation”. In other words, although the whole saga distracted attention from her profession and purpose of her interview of Chris, McLaughlin was not being “abused” as a woman.
Furthermore, Chris was a tourist, one of ethnic minority by Australia’s standards, probably doesn’t yet have a sufficient enough rapport with his teammates to “hang out”, and he is human and he is heterosexual. The Big Bash League T-20 cricket tournament organisers say that they want to be representative of respectable values and appeal to certain demographical groups. If these said characteristics of Chris aren’t appreciated, then what are those people truly promoting?
ANDRE O SHEPPY
NORWOOD, ST JAMES
ASTRANGELY@OUTLOOK.COM
On behalf of Chris Gayle and the rest of the male species, I offer my apologies to Mel McLaughlin, the white Australian sports journalist who was asked out for a post-game drink by Gayle on live TV during his Melbourne Renegades match, early January 2016.
Chris might have been a mere victim of the spirit of Twenty/20 cricket, where time is short and one just has to make good of his chances, even at the risk of losing one’s wicket, and in this case, one’s image and career opportunities.
Just as if he was on the pitch, Chris “swung” hard repeatedly at McLaughlin with what was deemed inappropriate interests, which was so merely because it was on air, at least so we are made to believe.
I am now married to a woman who used to be my co-worker, and my subordinate at that, to whom, out of sheer “Freudian sexual frustration”, I had expressed my desire for her — far more suggestively than Chris did with Mel. I could have been let down either as softly as Chris was initially, or with penalties and accusations of sexual harassment as he was eventually. Obviously, I wasn’t.
In her 1984 single, Strut, Sheena Easton’s male counterpart in the song asserted that “nations go to war over women like you; it’s just a form of appreciation”. In other words, although the whole saga distracted attention from her profession and purpose of her interview of Chris, McLaughlin was not being “abused” as a woman.
Furthermore, Chris was a tourist, one of ethnic minority by Australia’s standards, probably doesn’t yet have a sufficient enough rapport with his teammates to “hang out”, and he is human and he is heterosexual. The Big Bash League T-20 cricket tournament organisers say that they want to be representative of respectable values and appeal to certain demographical groups. If these said characteristics of Chris aren’t appreciated, then what are those people truly promoting?
ANDRE O SHEPPY
NORWOOD, ST JAMES
ASTRANGELY@OUTLOOK.COM