Is Dean Jones related to Ron Atkinson??

[Ninjaman]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/cricket/5253722.stm

Pathetic!!

[Maranello]

Shocking behaviour from the Australian. Here's Cricinfo report.

Seems somewhat hypocritical for him to go around insulting Muslims...when he is an employee of TEN Sports, a sports channel based in Dubai and owned by Muslim Arab (and Pakistani?) businessmen!

[batoutofhell]

I just seen in the NDTV
jones comments were in real bad taste
he may escape with a word mistake or mispell
but he cannot escape the icc and hopefully asian and african cricket boards(sicne the commenst were made in asia)
its not the first time he makes such a lousy commenst about a colored player
if some of you remember 6 years back he was one of the murali bashers club he infact many times attributed murali as a chucker even after icc announcing murali's bowling legal
i hope some stern action will be taken against him(by australian cricket board also)

[Ninjaman]

The bit that makes me laugh is where he states that,

it was never supposed to be heard over the air

completely ignorant of the fact that what is disgusting that he would even conceive such thoughts let alone express them.

and

The irony is that I am great friends with most of the Pakistan team and they are all Muslims.

a.k.a. my best friends are black

It does not represent who I am, how I think or what I believe.

Then how on earth did you brain tell your mouth to say it?

[Mongoose]

It does not represent who I am, how I think or what I believe.

Originally Posted by Ninjaman

Then how on earth did you brain tell your mouth to say it?

Absolutely. This is the stock excuse from someone who knows that their private views do not sit with the public morality. The only thing I can say is that people can grow up with views ingrained in them, and while they know these views are wrong, it takes a long time to completely throw them off. Even in this case though, someone like Dean Jones shoudl have enough self control. It's a truly deplorable thing to say. I heard a similar comment made by someone I know (no-one on this forum, thank goodness) with regard to Mohammad Yousuf. I felt sick being in the same room.

[greg]

I am pleased that he has been sacked and i hope that he never works in cricket media again.What he said is totally unacceptable.

At least Big Ron had the excuse of being from a generation where it was commonly used and not frowned upon.Not that it was right though.

[Alison]

That was an appalling comment, and to my mind his apology only makes it worse.

To say it wasn't meant to be heard is an absolutely appalling way of trying to excuse a comment like that - it's a dreadful comment whether it was meant to be heard or not, and claiming it wasn't meant to be heard just shows that he knew when he said it that it was a bad thing to say!

And as for claiming he's friends with a lot of muslims, why should that make it any more excusable to come out with a comment like that? If anything it makes it less excusable as he should be more aware of how bad an opinion like that is.

[Quagmire]

Was it meant do be a joke a humourous attemp at a comment that came out wrong or was it ment as a racist comment because no person would be stupid enough to say that on air with so many muslims watching and the owner of the station being muslim. Really dumb

[Maranello]

Originally Posted by greg

At least Big Ron had the excuse of being from a generation where it was commonly used and not frowned upon.Not that it was right though.

Interesting thought there Greg. Maybe Dean's excuse is that he is Australian? No, I am being serious. I have lived all my adult life amongst English (and more generally, British) folk, and can think of a handful of occasions, if that, where I have been subjected to racist name-calling (probably also to do with the fact that I am fairly selective about the areas I venture into and the people I mix with). The "culprits" in all those instances were ill-educated teenage youth, not worth a moment's second thought except perhaps to feel sorry at their lack of education and manners. However, the story is completely different when it comes to Australians - I have been called a "Paki" and/or a "terrorist" on more than one occasion by some very "educated", "dignified" and "well-respected" Aussies, all of whom are cosmopolitan, in their 20s or even middle-aged, upper middle-class and hence should know better.

In the context of Ron Atkinson, I saw a very interesting TV documentary about him. The presenter was some sort of social scientist, who took Ron to see and study various African American museums about slavery and other racist abuse, so he could understand the gravity of what he had said. However, none of that seemed to register with Ron; he was sorry that he had been caught and lost his livelihood, but not sorry for his thoughts and behaviour - he simply couldn't understand why what he had said was deplorable and disgusting.

Maybe some people are just born stupid...and bigoted.

[Mr Hutt]

well im quite shocked, i never thought dean jones was a bigot or a racist, but to hear him say that.. i orignally thought it was a blooper... a sound byte i had heard wrong but then cric info confirmed his sacking.. quite strange really, but the world is a strange place these days. What we must understand is that most of these presentors have an on air personna and the real one off air, i guess his real self fell through on him. Well he certainly wont work in the middle east again. Maybe he and another fellow aussie can set up their own tourney hehe.. he can commentate and the other can umpire.. we can call it the bearded basher series hehe