ESPN: Hawaii's McMackin gets 30-day suspension

Good.

Aside to ESPN: That particular homophobic slur is a hell of a lot more than a "gaffe."
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Hawaii's McMackin gets 30-day suspension
July 31, 2009 10:31 PM

Posted by ESPN.com's Graham Watson

Just over a minute into Greg McMackin's press conference on Friday, which was streamed live by the Honolulu Advertiser, he started to cry.

It was yet another thing for which he had to apologize for.

McMackin has spent the past 24 hours apologizing for an homosexual slur he made toward Notre Dame coach Charlie Weis during Thursday's Western Athletic Conference football preview. On Friday, at the behest of Hawaii's athletic director and chancellor, McMackin apologized yet again to a group of reporters and interested parties on the Hawaii campus.

Because of his gaffe, McMackin was suspended 30 days without pay and must take a salary deduction on par with that of athletic director Jim Donovan. Part of McMackin's salary reduction will go toward paying for a student intern at the LGBT center on campus and for campuswide workshops and awareness training.

Chancellor Virginia Hinshaw also announced that McMackin will, "participate in activities directed at improving the environment of our community, to working with the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered community on our campus." That includes McMackin participating in a public service announcement that details the power of offensive language toward the LGBT community.

http://myespn.go.com/blogs/ncfnation/0-9-390/Hawaii-s-McMackin-gets-30-day-suspension.html

Interesting that I had to go six pages into Googling "mcmackin slur" to find out what it was. (Maybe it shows that we've come a certain way in the degree to which we will even tolerate repetition of this stuff in the media, in that finding the precise wording in the news stories wasn't that easy--most of them simply referred to it as a "slur" or "derogatory remark usually aimed at gays." You can find it on msnbc.com if you want to know and don't.)

I think it's the combination of the term AND the fact that he used it to get laughs--and obviously expected that he could expect laughs in the boys' lockerroom that is sports--that really makes it offensive. Using the term is bad enough, but doing it repeatedly as if to say "Hey, we're all manly men here, ha ha, wink wink nudge nudge" makes it worse.

Perhaps he forgot he was working at a university, where tolerance for that kind of crap doesn't really fly.

ed. typo

I'm guessing he's just a bigot.

http://ncaafootball.fanhouse.com/2009/07/30/hawaiis-greg-mcmackin-apologizes-for-gay-slur-aimed-at-notre-da/

What appalled me is that this dipshit is getting paid $1.1 million per year to coach a football team at a mid major university in a mediocre conference.

And yeah I know all about Boise State beating Oklahoma in that bowl game a couple of years ago, but let's face it the new WAC ain't the real WAC.

I enjoy watching football but it's a fucking GAME, yanno? A million bucks? At Hawaii? Sheesh.

Way to demonstrate character and inform eager young minds, Coach McMackin, by not giving half a sh!t about people in the room who are hurt by slurs like the one you used. :sarcasm:

ETA: more SPLEEN!1!