Eddie McGuire has apologised after suggesting that Adam Goodes could be used to promote the musical King Kong on Melbourne radio this morning.
On Triple M’s Hot Breakfast Radio Show this morning with co-host Luke Darcy, McGuire was responding to comments Darcy had made about a recent promotion for King Kong.
“One of the great promos ever was the hand coming out of the Eureka tower. What a great promo that is for King Kong,” Darcy said, to which McGuire responded:
“Get Adam Goodes down for it, you reckon?”
Darcy replied with a deadpan “No, I wouldn’t have thought so,” before McGuire continued.
“You can see them doing that, can’t you? Goodesy? … you know, the big, not the ape thing, the whole thing… I’m just saying pumping him up and mucking around and that sort of stuff,” he said, seemingly unaware of the gaffe.
McGuire later tried to backtrack from his comments.
“Just to clear up, when we were talking about King Kong there and I was mumbling my way through about Goodesy,” he said.
“I was trying to say ‘Imagine the old days of trying to get people in for publicity’ and I’ve mumbled my way through that.
“So anyone who thought that I was having a go or being a smart alec, I take that back.”
McGuire went on to say he had been “exhausted” at the time and “off on a tangent somewhere”.
The gaffe comes just five days after a 13-year-old Collingwood fan was ejected from the MCG for calling Goodes an “ape” in the Swans’ 47-point win over the Magpies on Friday night.
Ben of Phnom Penh
Guest
You mean like Adam Goodes?
db swannie
Guest
A slip of the Tongue,is inadvertantly slipping in the F bomb or C bomb while on air or TV. What he said was a long way from a slip of the tongue.
matt h
Guest
Good one
matt h
Guest
If Eddie is that prone to early morning sleepiness and stupidity then maybe morning radio is not the place for him
Rita Karamalis
Guest
Eddie has appoogised ! The media are now pushing the issue and frankly people are sick of it!
Nomenclature
Guest
Well another person who can speak for everyone in Western Sydney. The Wanderers said nothing...
Nomenclature
Guest
Best of luck with your sport when this issues arises there...
Minister for Information for the Democratic People's Republic of Football
Guest
Wow! Well said!
Nathan of Perth
Guest
This - it staggers me how he could go through that, and then learn nothing.
Nathan of Perth
Guest
Yep, has to be a cost for what he did. How he can go from one to the other in less than a week is just staggering. Gives me an aneurysm just thinking about it.
Nathan of Perth
Guest
Yep, apologies are meaningless if lessons are not learned. And patently, Eddie has not learned from this experience.
Nicko
Guest
Yeah bc the world and its celebrity are perfect. Oh you didn't know they're human too?
Nicko
Guest
Ed was using humour to make light of a emotionally difficult societal pill to swallow. He didn't think anything funny- his mind wandered in the early am hours and some folks took his words as gospel- news flash when people are tired/ not alert/ in slow wave EEG they make syntactical errors, have poorer attention and concentration. Just look at studies of what neurological environments cause pilots to make very costly mistakes in the air. Just like Ed dud on the air. Oops I mean 'did'- must have lapsed in concentration there. See what I did there(?!) LOL Tall poppy anyone?
Nicko
Guest
Yawn. It wasn't a joke per se. It was his way of trying to make light of how society has evolved over the course of history in direct regard to racism. I don't think you understand the subtext of the gaffe. Granted you'd have to pay close attention to the cues in Eddies voice to appreciate the syntactical errors he made and what Darcy made of them. Darcy didn't help because he made Ed look like he was making a outlandish comment. Ed isn't a racist person. now we are vilifying him because some folks are too lazy to think carefully about what really happened. Ed was also clearly stressed and tired and made an UNINTENDED blunder on an already salient issue which has been primed well within the last fortnight of football. Some folks just don't get IT.
Positive Rugby
Guest
Yes, that is stupid and sounds racist to me. Eddie the idiot. I called for people to back off the 13 year old child but this deserves the full boot.
jay emme
Guest
Eddie's remarks are racist. And they have come from the mouth of a racist. They are not a slip of the tongue. These remarks would never leave the mouth of someone who is educated on the topic. A non-racist individual would never have these thoughts in the first place. For us as a nation to make any headway on racial issues, Eddie and other high profile people like him need to admit that they are, at best, casual racists who need further education on this subject. Set an example to so many Australians who are racists of varying degrees. Eddie spent the whole day - and probably will today - trying to explain what he meant to say. But he never succeeded. Something about the old days... vaudeville days... back in the 70's... (which is not vaudeville days) ...when they made racist jokes for publicity um, er, agh... what Eddie??? You can't finish that explanation, even though you had the entire day to think about it, because if you did it would be made even more transparent that you actually are a racist. And stop repeatedly using the excuse that you were tired, whilst saying it's not an excuse. It is definitely not an excuse so stop dropping it into your apologies to garner sympathy. If you really are tired then stop hogging the media. Here's hoping you are relieved of one or two of your jobs so you can get a little kip and a little time to reflect. And go back to school. PS. What Eddie did after the Sydney game was applauded but all it was, was a president of a club doing what any president would do to put out a fire. You can still be involved in programs and causes that help educate others on racism whilst being a racist yourself. And that's our Eddie. I would like to see him judged on the world stage. Make a comment like this in the US and you'd be out of a job before you finished the sentence.
jimmymac
Guest
anything other than sweep under the carpet. and it turns out they actually are acting on this, so I was wrong about them.
The High Shot
Roar Pro
I know it's hard to see your sport receive all this negative publicity recently, thanks to the racist comments of its coaches, CEOs and fans. But do try to stay on topic mate, deflecting won't help us address the real issue.
catcat
Guest
Eddie McGuire will never understand what it's like to be a black man, or be a black man playing elite sport in Australia.
catcat
Guest
If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck...then it's a duck. Eddie you are a racist and you don't even know it.