I'm so glad there are so many pro athletes who are terrible people. It's allowed us to have so many serious national conversations about things lately. Or, you know,
not:
Listen up, ladies, ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith has a message for you, and it’s basically: Stop provoking men into beating you so Smith and his “fellas” don’t have to get your back.
Smith’s point—and it’s a bad one—goes something like this: Men should never hit women, but it’s really on women to make sure they don’t do anything that would trigger a violent response.
If you like watching videos of train wrecks, that one's a doozy.
Smith took to Twitter after the predictable storm of complaints:
Upon hearing what I had to say, although admitting I could have been more articulate on the matter, let me be clear: I don't understand how on earth someone could interpret that I somehow was saying women are to blame for domestic violence.
[...] But what about addressing women on how they can help prevent the obvious wrong being done upon them? In no way was I accusing a women of being wrong. I was simply saying what that preventive measures always need to be addressed because there's only but so much that can be done after the fact....once the damage is already done.
So that'll go well. On the other side, ESPN's Michelle Beadle was one of the people who called Smith out on his remarks. Her reward has been
a steady stream of vulgarities and bile tweeted out from the internet's worst denizens.
This really has been a learning experience, hasn't it?