If the NRL wants to build its family friendly profile, then comments like those from Queensland player Sam Thaiday after last night’s State of Origin match need to go.
In a post match interview, Sam Thaiday when asked how the match went replied and said it, “was a bit like losing your virginity, it wasn’t very nice but we got the job done.”
Brad Fittler, who was conducting the interview, was so taken aback by the unorthodox answer he was lost for words. “I’m not sure I’ve got a second question.”
It’s worth noting, his team had a win last night, so imagine the answer if they’d had a loss.
If you missed it, here’s the interview. Post continues after video…
The comment, the joke, the quip, however you want to dress it up, the comment was silly at best and just plain offensive at worst.
Silly and offensive on a couple of levels.
First of all, who says losing your virginity is by definition something that isn’t very nice?
Secondly, “we got the job done” doesn’t sit especially well if you look at it through a gender filter.
Having sex for the first time isn’t a ‘job’ that a bloke ‘has to get done’. This suggests that the male partner is the active participant and the female partner isn’t. (I’m going to go ahead and assume Thaiday was thinking in heterosexual terms when he made the comment.)
In a sex-positive relationship between consenting partners, losing your virginity can be an active, engaging, heartfelt thing for both a male and a female.
Thirdly, I’m glad my almost five-year-old wasn’t watching the footy last night. Comments like that aren’t appropriate for a family time slot. I’m not ready to negotiate negative sex and gender cues with him just yet. I know I’ll have to do it at some point, and probably sooner than I’d like, but not yet.
Compared to Jonathon Thurston, who used his post match interview to offer support to the community of Aurukun, “There’s obviously been a lot of trouble up there, so to all the students there, I just want you to believe in yourselves and keep turning up to school,” Sam Thaiday comes up sadly short.
Thaiday defended his comments today, telling a Sunrise reporter that you can’t make everyone happy. He was asked if he was a family man. “Yes, I am a family man. I’m a human being too.”
True. Thaiday is a human being too, and like all of us he makes mistakes. This was one of them.
Top Comments
Clearly, and unfortunately, we are now fully entrenched in the PC era and seemingly we'll be stuck here for a while yet ....possibly forever :-( .
And accordingly, here we have yet another PC fluff piece designed to fill web space.... something I actually find far more cringeworthy than what was nothing more than a cheeky off the cuff remark.
Heaven forbid what we'd do without these types of articles ....oh that's right...we'd need writers and journalists to produce *real* stories, a task which is obviously too difficult (read: too expensive and not controversial enough) in this day and age.
Instead let's waste people's time and put them to sleep by having a go at individuals for being themselves, rather than a watered-down cookie-cutter version as pre-determined by so-called "media managers".
What a sorry world we live in where people who really aren't hurting anybody else get criticized simply because they (thankfully and bravely) chose not to tow the line and act like another vanilla robot who says and does all the "right things".
Well clearly all the media training and respect for women workshops paid off here! The scary thing is, he probably spent time prior to the match coming up with his post-match quote - and this was it. He should be contracted to keep his mouth shut if he is this stupid and tasteless.