Danny Baker

ToneControl

I doubt he meant it as a race-based joke

However, he's an experienced professional broadcaster, with football-ground experience, so he should have thought a bit more carefully

RobDavies

Oh fuck, I’m agreeing with Emp. 

Danny isn’t a racist.  I’m fairly sure of that.  Ignorant? Possibly. Thoughtless? Definitely.  Racist? Nah, not buying it. 
We’ve all said stupid things when we’ve had a drink, and DB likes a drink most nights - and then spends an hour or two on Twitter.  Look at some the shite that people spout on here on Friday and Saturday nights... Alcohol and Social Media is a career ending combo... 

As as for the badly spoken comment?  Seriously? Because he has a regional accent? 

ICBM

Regardless of the intent, sacking him was entirely justified, especially given the total lack of a proper apology. Until I read the report on the BBC site I didn't know that he'd already been fired twice before for other misjudgements - it seems he doesn't learn, and nor does the BBC. Hopefully they will now, and not make the mistake of re-hiring him again.

Emp_Fab

@Heartfeltdawn I didn’t say most people here, I said “there are far too many people”.  It’s not delusional to come to hold that opinion when the evidence is here; multiple comments about how the poster dislikes him, focussing on ad-hominems and criticism of his radio show.  That’s not delusional - that’s fact!

As for those saying there is no way he didn’t know what he was doing, what is your answer to the question “Why did he do it then?”.

Bridgehouse

RobDavies said:

Oh fuck, I’m agreeing with Emp. 

Danny isn’t a racist.  I’m fairly sure of that.  Ignorant? Possibly. Thoughtless? Definitely.  Racist? Nah, not buying it. 
We’ve all said stupid things when we’ve had a drink, and DB likes a drink most nights - and then spends an hour or two on Twitter.  Look at some the shite that people spout on here on Friday and Saturday nights... Alcohol and Social Media is a career ending combo... 

As as for the badly spoken comment?  Seriously? Because he has a regional accent? 

I don’t think the question is whether he’s a racist or not.

The question is whether in making the joke it really didn’t occur to him that it could be taken as racist or not.

Given that many who listen to him are football fans, and let’s face it, football has been dogged by racism for years to a greater extent than many other sports, it’s only right that his position as a public broadcaster is taken away from him if he can’t either a) recognise that what he did was very poorly judged or b) knew it could be misconstrued but said it anyway. 

As as others have pointed out - regardless of the above, his response to the decision just highlights his total lack of judgement.

WiresDreamDisasters

Emp_Fab said:

As for those saying there is no way he didn’t know what he was doing, what is your answer to the question “Why did he do it then?”.

Because he's a racist. He collects Golliwog dolls and has the Kia-Ora advert as his ringtone.

Bridgehouse

Emp_Fab said:

@Heartfeltdawn I didn’t say most people here, I said “there are far too many people”.  It’s not delusional to come to hold that opinion when the evidence is here; multiple comments about how the poster dislikes him, focussing on ad-hominems and criticism of his radio show.  That’s not delusional - that’s fact!

As for those saying there is no way he didn’t know what he was doing, what is your answer to the question “Why did he do it then?”.

Total lack of judgement, and going on past history a desire to prioritise his own mouthpiece rather than actually considering the implications of the things he says.

Why do I think this? The nature of his response to it all - which is just yet more self serving self prioritising rhetoric

Heartfeltdawn

Emp_Fab said:

@Heartfeltdawn I didn’t say most people here, I said “there are far too many people”.  It’s not delusional to come to hold that opinion when the evidence is here; multiple comments about how the poster dislikes him, focussing on ad-hominems and criticism of his radio show.  That’s not delusional - that’s fact!

As for those saying there is no way he didn’t know what he was doing, what is your answer to the question “Why did he do it then?”.

What's the definition of 'far too many people' then? What is this boundary where it goes from acceptable to far too many? 

There are people who say they dislike him. No question. But these people aren't most people here as you say above. It's a small percentage. The majority here seem to favour that he's not a flat-out racist but is guilty of being utterly dense. 

"As for those saying there is no way he didn’t know what he was doing, what is your answer to the question “Why did he do it then?”."

As I haven't claimed that, I can't speak for other people.

As I've said multiple times, I find it incredible that a guy with a long history of working for the main state broadcaster on screen and on radio, someone who follows football passionately and who surely can't be unaware of racial issues within the game historically and in recent times, decides to put up a tweet featuring a chimp that represents a mixed-race child born as part of the most famous British family in the world. 

But tweet he did even when he says afterwards that he didn't even know who had given birth: 

"I didn't know which of our royal princesses had given birth. Otherwise you'd got to be thinking I'd been secretly waiting to make this grotesque joke. There's no truth to it. I've been doing a thing on the radio for years of famous people dressed as monkeys with fairground music. My go-to photo when any posh people have a baby is this absurd chimpanzee in a top hat leaving the hospital. Had it not been Meghan - perfectly good joke. I was trying to make a point about class and it's just preposterous."   

Whether these words are him admitting that he's spent the last six months inside a cave hibernating are unclear. To have been oblivious to the Royal maternity and birth requires a quite considerable effort really to avoid print and television media. Even ignoring that period of time, to have managed to miss everything on the telly and the inkies and online since the kid was born a few days earlier and to be unaware of whom had actually given birth is quite an achievement. It leaves me waiting for future tweets in which Baker expresses shock at the Beatles splitting up. 

His point about class: wooo. So I take from this that posh people having a baby becomes a circus in Baker's mind. The media fawn over them and their lives and perhaps Baker feels this is vastly overblown and daft, that these people are uninteresting and the attention isn't warranted. But then I think of Baker as a writer. This is a guy who's written three volumes of autobiographical material and who managed to get a sitcom on BBC2 produced about his life. That would suggest he thinks his life has been interesting enough for the general public to be interested in. The class element of his gag seems very shallow. 

tony99

Heartfeltdawn said:

Emp_Fab said:

@Heartfeltdawn I didn’t say most people here, I said “there are far too many people”.  It’s not delusional to come to hold that opinion when the evidence is here; multiple comments about how the poster dislikes him, focussing on ad-hominems and criticism of his radio show.  That’s not delusional - that’s fact!

As for those saying there is no way he didn’t know what he was doing, what is your answer to the question “Why did he do it then?”.

What's the definition of 'far too many people' then? What is this boundary where it goes from acceptable to far too many? 

There are people who say they dislike him. No question. But these people aren't most people here as you say above. It's a small percentage. The majority here seem to favour that he's not a flat-out racist but is guilty of being utterly dense. 

"As for those saying there is no way he didn’t know what he was doing, what is your answer to the question “Why did he do it then?”."

As I haven't claimed that, I can't speak for other people.

As I've said multiple times, I find it incredible that a guy with a long history of working for the main state broadcaster on screen and on radio, someone who follows football passionately and who surely can't be unaware of racial issues within the game historically and in recent times, decides to put up a tweet featuring a chimp that represents a mixed-race child born as part of the most famous British family in the world. 

But tweet he did even when he says afterwards that he didn't even know who had given birth: 

"I didn't know which of our royal princesses had given birth. Otherwise you'd got to be thinking I'd been secretly waiting to make this grotesque joke. There's no truth to it. I've been doing a thing on the radio for years of famous people dressed as monkeys with fairground music. My go-to photo when any posh people have a baby is this absurd chimpanzee in a top hat leaving the hospital. Had it not been Meghan - perfectly good joke. I was trying to make a point about class and it's just preposterous."   

Whether these words are him admitting that he's spent the last six months inside a cave hibernating are unclear. To have been oblivious to the Royal maternity and birth requires a quite considerable effort really to avoid print and television media. Even ignoring that period of time, to have managed to miss everything on the telly and the inkies since the kid was born a few days earlier and to be unaware of whom had actually given birth is quite an achievement. It leaves me waiting for future tweets in which Baker expresses shock at the Beatles splitting up. 

His point about class: wooo. So I take from this that posh people having a baby becomes a circus in Baker's mind. The media fawn over them and their lives and perhaps Baker feels this is vastly overblown and daft, that these people are uninteresting and the attention isn't warranted. But then I think of Baker as a writer. This is a guy who's written three volumes of autobiographical material and who managed to get a sitcom on BBC2 produced about his life. That would suggest he thinks his life has been interesting enough for the general public to be interested in. The class element of his gag seems very shallow. 

What was the sitcom?

Heartfeltdawn

Cradle to Grave.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cradle_to_Grave

boogieman

He’s an intelligent guy, but even bright people make mistakes and he does have form for doing stupid stuff. Personally I don’t think he’s a racist but (IMO) he IS incredibly arrogant; he was probably thinking about how witty his tweet was and slapping himself on the back for being so out there and edgy, without really considering the consequences.

Bridgehouse

boogieman said:

He’s an intelligent guy, but even bright people make mistakes and he does have form for doing stupid stuff. Personally I don’t think he’s a racist but (IMO) he IS incredibly arrogant; he was probably thinking about how witty his tweet was and slapping himself on the back for being so out there and edgy, without really considering the consequences.

Given his background, the types of shows he does, the writing he has done and who he has worked with, I just don’t buy the whole “I was being so witty and clever and I just didn’t consider the racial angle to this”

tony99

Bridgehouse said:

boogieman said:

He’s an intelligent guy, but even bright people make mistakes and he does have form for doing stupid stuff. Personally I don’t think he’s a racist but (IMO) he IS incredibly arrogant; he was probably thinking about how witty his tweet was and slapping himself on the back for being so out there and edgy, without really considering the consequences.

Given his background, the types of shows he does, the writing he has done and who he has worked with, I just don’t buy the whole “I was being so witty and clever and I just didn’t consider the racial angle to this”

Do you think he was being intentionally racist and thought that he would get away with it?

EricTheWeary

Heartfeltdawn said:

Cradle to Grave.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cradle_to_Grave

There is a Squeeze song of the same name,IIRC, was that the theme tune? 

I remember trailers for this and I think the presence of Peter Kaye probably put me off. Probably a lovely man but I do not find him at all appealing as an entertainer. 

Bridgehouse

tony99 said:

Bridgehouse said:

boogieman said:

He’s an intelligent guy, but even bright people make mistakes and he does have form for doing stupid stuff. Personally I don’t think he’s a racist but (IMO) he IS incredibly arrogant; he was probably thinking about how witty his tweet was and slapping himself on the back for being so out there and edgy, without really considering the consequences.

Given his background, the types of shows he does, the writing he has done and who he has worked with, I just don’t buy the whole “I was being so witty and clever and I just didn’t consider the racial angle to this”

Do you think he was being intentionally racist and thought that he would get away with it?

No, I don’t actually.

Of course I don’t actually know what he was thinking, but my take on it is he meant it as a “performing monkey” joke - knowing full well it would have racial overtones (or at least that someone might have called him on it) and in his smug arrogance he would just rebuff by saying “you’re stupid to think that, I’m smarter than you as it was actually a joke about class and privilege”.

Once called out, he tried the line but it didn’t wash

p90fool

I honestly don't think he's racist, but if I'd said something publicly which was meant as a performing monkey jibe and then realised I'd said it about someone who was mixed race I would've been horrified and deeply, deeply embarrassed and could not have apologised enough. 

Not Baker though, he's too smug, too important and too self-centred. So saying that him being a smirking, loathsome prick shouldn't be relevant to whether is fired or not, well I'm sorry, it IS relevant when it prevents a meaningful apology. 

Bridgehouse

p90fool said:

I honestly don't think he's racist, but if I'd said something publicly which was meant as a performing monkey jibe and then realised I'd said it about someone who was mixed race I would've been horrified and deeply, deeply embarrassed and could not have apologised enough. 

Not Baker though, he's too smug, too important and too self-centred. So saying that him being a smirking, loathsome prick shouldn't be relevant to whether is fired or not, well I'm sorry, it IS relevant when it prevents a meaningful apology. 

Totally agree. My thoughts are only based on what I’ve read of his response - far too smug 

amarok1971

i rather believe he threw himself under a bus, the pillock

Paul_C

He's offered up a new, more fulsome apology:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-48226247

tony99

amarok1971 said:

i rather believe he threw himself under a bus, the pillock

Not literally though.