I know our readers don't want a to read a lot about Tiger's latest sexpacades story and I'm not commenting on any of that here. I have been checking out the Sports Villagers to see how they have been handling it, and that's been pretty fascinating to watch, since golf makes so much money from Tiger. This post is a twofer and the first comment I have is that the new Nike ad really creeped me out.
How many focus groups were used by Nike on this ad for them to believe this was a good spot? Was it Ari Fleischer's idea to use his dead father's voice to try and convince people that they should have some pity and sympathy for Tiger after he crashed and burned. Using Earl Woods' voice to sell Nike products was really egregious.
Second, the holier-than-thou head of The Masters, Billy Payne, sounded like a teabagger when he blasted Tiger publicly too. A nice old white Master telling Tiger how bad he is. Jesus. This is the club that didn't allow blacks into their midst until 1990 and still doesn't allow women in. When you have a shred of ground on which to claim moral superiority, then maybe you can talk. Until then, please STFU.
George Vecsey ripped them apart.
They are worse than we knew.
The people who run the Masters are not just stubborn rich guys who don’t want female members cluttering up their precious fairways, although that is bad enough.
Members stood around Wednesday and listened to Billy Payne, the grand pooh-bah of the Masters, deliver a mean-spirited lecture about the private life of Tiger Woods. The other members in attendance did not rush up and sedate Payne, or slap duct tape over his rude mouth, or jeer him down. They let him continue. Ol’ Billy probably wasn’t saying anything the other men in the green jackets hadn’t thought.
Without being asked, Payne launched into a prepared statement at his annual pretournament news conference, saying Woods had “disappointed all of us, and more importantly, our kids and our grandkids.”
He added: “Our hero did not live up to the expectations of the role model we saw for our children.”
Remind me again why we are supposed to talk in reverent tones about the Masters. Because it stands for money and power and the exclusion of women and goodness knows what hidden messages in the public rebuking of “our hero,” who is part Thai and part African-American.
Just asking, but would Payne have been so quick to deliver his little sermon to a white golfer who was caught straying? My guess is that some kind of double standard whacked Tiger Woods on the backswing. How dare he stray after all they’ve done for him...read on
Is that the reason they call it "The Masters"? Or should it be "The Massuhs"?
