At a small press conference after a game, Cam Newton was at the podium answering reporter’s questions like he usually does. Female reporter Jourdan Rodrigue was one of those reporters, and she asked Cam about fellow teammate Devin Funchess “embracing the physicality of his routes.” Cam started to smile, then said, “It’s funny to hear a female talk about routes.”
For those of you who don’t know, we live in 2017. This is the PEAK of over-sensitivity, overreaction, and misplaced outrage.
With everything going on in this world, are we really going to make a mountain out of a molehill over a simple comment? There are so many other things to be upset about, and yet Cam Newton has received more backlash than any of these other anger-worthy topics.
I admit, I can partly understand how the comment could’ve been interpreted the way it was. But, at the same time, I completely understand where Cam was coming from.
I see it like this: if a guy were to ask me about makeup, I’d probably have the same viewpoint Cam did when a female asked him about plays and routes. Although there’s no problem with guys being interested in makeup, just like there’s no problem with females asking about sports, it basically defies the social norms.
Cam said after the fact that he had meant it as a compliment, and I can see how he meant it as such. At these press conferences, there are predominantly male reporters asking Cam these questions. So when a female stands among a sea of males and defies the norm of females knowing little about sports, I can see how he’d be like, “Wow, this is different.”
After his comment, Cam did continue to answer her question. He didn’t say what he said, then disregard her question completely. If he had done that, then yeah, I’d definitely be a little more understanding of some of the reactions I’ve seen.
On Thursday, October 5, Cam released an apology video almost 2 minutes in length in which he stated that his “word choice was extremely degrading and disrespectful to women.”
Even though I think the situation was blown out of proportion, this video made me gain so much respect for Cam. It wasn’t a tweet of a screenshot of Notes with a short apologetic paragraph, it was a whole video. The fact that he sat down and took the time to apologize for nine little words that were widely misinterpreted shows a lot about his character, in my opinion.
To quote the wise words of RuPaul, “Don’t take life too seriously and have fun. Don’t waste your time on things that your ego will try and convince you are important.”
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