Two American sports commentators were immediately fired for body-shaming high school girls during basketball match
What happened:
The Washington Post reported on Jan 24 that after making insulting remarks about two female high school basketball players’ physique, two long standing sports commentators named Jim Carter and Steve Shaw in northern Maine were fired.
Details:
Grant, the owner and manager of a tiny radio station in Houlton, Maine, was not watching the girls’ junior varsity basketball game on WHOU 100.1 FM’s website, which was being broadcasted live. However, a few fans who were watching the game on Jan 14, called Grant to complain about an on-air discussion between two of his station’s broadcasters. Some of the high school athletes were labelled overweight by Carter and Shaw as they laughed about it. In a 34-second video that was eventually shared on social media, one of the men was overheard remarking, “Two gals out here, incredibly overweight. Awful.” “How come you can’t buy uniforms that suit the girls?” inquired the other announcer, to which the other broadcaster responded with laughter.
What else:
Grant stated in a Facebook post a day after the incident that both men have been fired for making “comments that were not just disrespectful,” but also “blatantly wrong.” He apologised for the broadcasters’ actions in the statement and advised the rural community to focus on uplifting the students who continued to play sports during the pandemic.
