Did anybody else know this?

Although if that story about Alonso and the Portuguese village is true, that's beyond the pale.

 

I don`t think that it would be that much of a problem for young children as they shouldnt have a twitter account or be looking at twitter.

As for his mistake he has suffered lots of racial abuse over the years, let alone any abuse, so it for me is understandable that he felt angry when writing this in the heat of the moment of something.

I am pretty sure that you and other people here had been through what he had been through would have done the same.

Also the tweet was removed and an apology was given.

 

Yes, a good point ASChris.
The trouble is that corporate business makes demands upon its participants and especially its representatives.

An indiscretion need not be an example of unprofessionalism, so long as it is perceived as 'being human' (a human failing) rather than letting the side down. Of course this distinction can blurred. All professionals need to beware of drawing negative attention if they venture close to the edge of this blur: it's fraught with danger!

 

Of course people are allowed to have indiscretions. However, being a celebrity, sporting or otherwise, means that people pay more attention to your words and actions, especially children and teenagers. To pretend otherwise would be naive. As for parenting, you can't be in control of what your child sees or hears 24/7, it's just not possible. The fact that we're talking about it now shows that you don't need to have seen the "tweet" in question (as I didn't) to then hear about it and discuss it.

Therefore, it is grossly inappropriate behaviour to use such language on a website that is used on such a global scale, just as it's inappropriate to tell reporters that you will ruin a towns economy and thus, people's jobs and lives.

With regard to the "Nanny State" etc preventing people from speaking their minds, I would hope that comments such as the ones in question would seem obviously inflammatory regardless of the medium in which they were voiced. I really don't see what the "Nanny State" has to do with anything as both comments were blatantly unsavoury.

The media in general, as I previously mentioned, is a worldwide communication network. Twitter for example is no different to a TV channel in terms or coverage, in fact if anything it's a global network as opposed to a TV channel that can only be viewed in a specific country, and one would hope never to hear such things when watching something on the box so why would it be ok on a blogging site?

Thankfully, Lewis deleted his comment and apologised, which was the right thing to do. Obviously, he will have learned from the experience and that is the mark of someone who has acknowledged their indiscretion and genuinely is sorry for it. This is a case where respect is maintained for the individual in question (at least in my mind). I have to admit to not knowing much of the aftermath of Alonso's comments. Can anyone tell me if he suffered any repercussions and/or apologised?

 

Hi Westy! - Good to see your reappearance.

I have not been made aware of any apology from Alonso, nor have I heard of any sanction taken against him (for example: for bringing F1 into disrepute). However, it is clear that there must have been repercussions in the way that he is perceived by some; he didn't win any friends by this and would only seem to have galvanised the unbalanced, more fanatical elements: something I'd prefer to see remain out of motor sport altogether.

He crossed the blurry boundary, just as Hamilton did. The difference seems to be that Hamilton has the grace to apologise when he's sees that he's wrong, whereas Alonso finds this rather more difficult - and not for the first time with either of them!

 

Hey, Westy. Great to see you here. Hope to see much more of you. Sadly, though, our first interaction has to be a (friendly) disagreement.

I disagree with your description of Twitter. There are different types of celebrity Twitter users. Many (a great many) celebrities employ a secretary to post their Twitter messages. Others (very few) use it the same way you or I might use it - to allow our 'followers' access to our personal thoughts and messages. There is also a midway celebrity, who may post their own messages but only ever post on a professional basis.

Clearly, Lewis Hamilton has elected to use Twitter as a personal medium, much as you or I might use it. His tweets are clearly about him, not about McLaren or Johnnie Walker or his contract negotiations, clearly written by him, and very clearly express his personal opinion.

Twitter is most definitely not an advertising medium. It's not a post-race press conference, it's not a corporate event, and it's not a Head and Shoulders commercial. It's Hamilton, sitting on his couch, reading his @mentions and expressing an opinion.

Believe it or not, Hamilton is not on duty 24 hours a day. He doesn't have to be McLarenista all the time. Sometimes he can just be Lewis Hamilton. Like you or me, that's when he does his Twitter.

If you are offended by somebody's tweets then stop following them and stop bloody moaning. EOS.

If Hamilton had used a press conference to say, "I don't give a **** about all those racist idiots on Twitter," then maybe you'd have a point. He didn't. He just posted a tweet. IMO he should have let it stand but, very sadly, he knows there are empty souls out there who will accuse him of not being a good role model to 3-year olds when he's masturbating or watching The Evil Dead or saying the '****' word on Twitter, so he deleted it.

In my opinion it's a travesty that any individual is criticised for expressing a ****ing opinion in the way he wants to express it. It smacks of suppression of free speech to me. In fact, I'm going to invoke Godwin's Rule here.

Incidentally, the true language of F1 is not the office-speak of Santander or ING, or the exquisite linguistic feats of sports writers in tabloids. It's the ****ing and ****ing of the mechanics in the garages.

 

Westy, the 'nanny state' was one of a number of issues I threw in, added to it can also be politically correct, another bugbear of mine.

I am ant advocating that everyone goes around swearing at the tops of their voices, but every so often you lose your head and don't think about your actions. If you are a person with a public profile, it is akin to being Hitler it would seem, especially if you are the type of person who would take the smallest piece of scandal as a means to deface Hamilton.

For one line on a twitter page, which was deleted, it amazes me how uptight people got over it.

It's not like he swore in front of a camera being watched live by millions of men, women and children..................

For that, step forward Vettel, Coulthard (though his Aus rant at Massa a few years back was funny 'either he apologises or i'll kick **** out of the little bastard', Frank Williams and am sure a few others. And thats just motor sport! You hear far worse just walking down the street. A sign of the times maybe?

 

I am not sure about the Silverstone thing but I do know that Alonso apologised about waving his fist at Petrov and also the Valencia outburst (although I think that was understandable). Alonso may get the red mist at times but the one thing I have never heard him do is have a go at the team over the radio, not even at Abu Dhabi when they effectively lost him the WDC. It really annoys me when you hear drivers on the radio criticising their team, it sound so petulant and Vettel and Hamilton are the worst at that.

 

By the way Hamilton was not reacting to any racist abuse on twitter, people were just mocking him over his writing style.

 

So it is bad to show any kind of human emotion at all?

Yet when the drivers talk and act like corporate robots, everyone complains they have no personality!

I don't think there is one driver that has not shown that they have a good side and a bad side to them. Alonso has been shown to not criticise his teams (though asm sure he did in his second Renault spell) but he did try and blackmail his own team in 2007. I think they woudl have preferred a chat over the radio instead

 

That's pretty astonishing dedication, to trawl through absolutely every single @LewisHamilton tweet at the time. I can't even follow all the #BBCF1 tweets on race day.

What kinds of things did the critics of his writing style say?

 

I do not go on his twitter page, I just read it about it.

I like it when drivers shows emotion and are not PR controlled, I hate it when a driver is interviewed and they just PR everything (I actually think Hamilton is the most PR controlled driver), but it is annoying when a driver comes on their radio during the race to just petulantly have a go at their team, if they have a problem they should wait until after the race, not act like spoilt brats.

 

So how do you know there were no racist comments whatsoever?

 

So he is too PR when out of the car, but petulant and speaks out of turn occasionally (there have only been one or two occurrences, or can you name more) when in the car? Geez, guess some people just can't win.

I take it when he congratulates the team over the radio after a win this is just being done for PR and the TV audience?

I don't see why a driver cannot question his team. After all, they are working as a 'team'. If everything happened behind closed doors, then no one would hear about it and there would be nothing to talk about between the races

 

Because I am sure it would of been reported, but all was reported was that he was responding to people mocking his writing style and spelling, and if you ask me if you spell cool, kool, then you deserve a bit of ridicule.

When Hamilton and Vettel have their little outbursts they do not question the team, they just have a go at them. You do not hear Webber, Button, Alonso, Massa do it.

 

Button's outburst in the Brawn ( i thin k it was SIlverstone 2009) was quite scathing.

Ever thought that there is a lot of radio transmission that you don't hear? How do you know none of the other drivers don't criticise their teams during a race? Only snippets of conversations are aired. There is a whole race worth of communication that will go un-aired.

 

Button's outburst at Silverstone was more about the car rather than directly criticising the team. However I do take your point about the amount of radio chatter being aired, although I think that if a driver has a go at their team then I would think it is would be aired, but like you said you cannot know 'for sure'.

 

I don;t know this for sure, but can you not listen to radio traffic throughtout the whole race? Either red button on BBC or through the F1 site?

 

Mr Tambourine Man

I dont think you realise how hard it is in the heat of the moment to write or say something that in the cold light of a non grand prix weekend would be unacceptable.

These drivers have lots of emotions going through them all the time and it can be hard to keep them all in check, but having said that you should think before you speak or write or type.

 

That's an idiom, not spelling issuez, unlike using 'of' when you mean 'have'. People who ridicule idiom are illiterate 2@s, dude.