"Tweetarded" Athletes

“How dumb can you be?” is the question I always ask myself when I see a celebrity on the news getting in trouble for saying something inappropriate. I’m not talking about little slip-ups that the media catches just because the person is under a microscope. I’m talking about those idiots who say offensive racial or ethnic slurs when they know it’s going to be documented and reported about on a huge scale.

That’s why I was shocked when reading the article by Rich Thomaselli “When Tweeting Athletes Turn Into Legal Liabilities” which shows that there are that many idiot athletes. The article mentions a handful of athletes who tweeted offensive remarks and got fined, suspended or both because of it. For example, Thomaselli mentions Kansas City Chiefs football star Larry Johnson, who used homophobic slurs on his personal Twitter account, tweeting himself into a two-week suspension from the team. Really? Are you that dumb.

Then, to make matters even worse for Mr. Johnson, when reporters asked to comment about the tweet he told them to get their faggot asses out of the locker room. This guy is unbelievable.

Unfortunately, Mr. Johnson isn’t the only athlete who is unaware that when you say something offensive on Twitter, people do notice. It seems to me that these professionals should a publicist or a manager monitoring their social media profiles just in case they say something stupid. Why these athletes wouldn’t have the same etiquette with social media that they know they need when they are on camera, I don’t know? Perhaps nobody clearly spelled it out for them, although I believe it goes without being said that whatever you put on the Internet is there for all to see.

There are a few examples in this article when I can see how some athletes may just believe that they are venting and not actually doing any harm. San Diego Chargers football player Antonio Cromartie was fined $2,500 back in the preseason for tweeting about the awful food served at training camp. I hope that when Mr. Cromartie tweeted this, who was merely just venting and not acutally trying to taint this food companies brand. There was another instance when Texas Tech University football player Brandon Carter tweeted earlier this season that "this is not how I saw our season" and was suspended by head coach Mike Leach, who also banned players from using Twitter.

I don’t think it’s going to be long before we start seeing more bans on using social networking sites with employers, institutions and sport teams. Social networking sites are not just fun, but they can also be very beneficial. However, there’s always going to be a few who abuse it’s purpose and ruin for the rest of us.