I just watched the whole Serena Williams meltdown.

[Svnla]

The Herald Sun replies about the cartoon:

But those who seek to prosecute their antiracial agenda by identifying racism in the Knight cartoon — where it does not exist — completely miss the point of the drawing.
It rightly mocked Williams for her dummy-spit and unsporting performance, which ultimately robbed Osaka of her chance to truly celebrate a terrific, inaugural triumph against a woman she described as her personal hero.

https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/o...t/news-story/bff3c329c6c706b966636620bcb21be7

And a former tennis player/champion says this:

It’s difficult to know, and debatable, whether Ms. Williams could have gotten away with calling the umpire a thief if she were a male player. But to focus on that, I think, is missing the point. If, in fact, the guys are treated with a different measuring stick for the same transgressions, this needs to be thoroughly examined and must be fixed. But we cannot measure ourselves by what we think we should also be able to get away with. In fact, this is the sort of behavior that no one should be engaging in on the court. There have been many times when I was playing that I wanted to break my racket into a thousand pieces. Then I thought about the kids watching. And I grudgingly held on to that racket.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/te...t-serena-got-wrong/ar-BBN9mhY?ocid=spartandhp

 

[Schmide]

Quite a racist cartoon you've got there.

I agree. However, if you look at the body of his work it's more his style. More than a few characters of many races have the same lips and such.

https://twitter.com/Knightcartoons/media
https://twitter.com/Knightcartoons/media
His stuff is actually better than I expected.

 

[HomerJS]

So if the cartoon was not racist then why was Osaka drawn as a blonde white girl?

Trying for that contrast to please audience hoping people are too stupid to look up the truth. Where have I seen that before?

 

[Svnla]

So if the cartoon was not racist then why was Osaka drawn as a blonde white girl?

Trying for that contrast to please audience hoping people are too stupid to look up the truth. Where have I seen that before?

The link with the explanation from the newspaper already posted above (post 101) for all to see but just like the old saying of " can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink".

She was drawn with a blonde ponytail because she has a blonde ponytail.

 

[madoka]

The link with the explanation from the newspaper already posted above (post 101) for all to see but just like the old saying of " can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink".

HomerJS is not the brightest bulb in even P&N! That's saying a lot.

 

[madoka]

"I understand why you may have thought that was coaching, but I'm telling you it's not. I don't cheat to win, I'd rather lose."
- Serena Williams

And here's her coach Patrick Mouratoglou admitting to coaching her during the match:

https://bleacherreport.com/articles...oaching-during-us-open-final-amid-controversy

 

[kt]

She let off steam then was triggered again when she banged her racket and lost a point - something that others don't get called for either as mentioned in this thread. It was just a culmination of everything, which started from something she didn't even do to begin with. And there's a history of it against her at the US Open. You made it sound like this is a one-off where she should just let it go because shit happens... but that's not the case - apparently it keeps happening to her (see 2nd video, post #26).

I am not sure what she is trying to accomplish, or you as a matter of fact by enabling her tantrum. She should've stopped after the umpire gave her the point penalty. She's a professional and should've kept her emotion in check.

Seriously, what I saw out there was my 3 year old throwing a tantrum and testing our limit in public. That's what it amounts too.

 

[dasherHampton]

There's still a lot of confusion out there about what the issue is. Some people think the the issue is racism and sexism, and some think it's an issue of behavior.

It can help to view the whole thing from a different perspective:

Keep everything exactly the same. Same words, actions, etc but reverse the roles: make the tennis player a Latin male and the umpire an African American woman. And be honest - what would the reaction be?

I can tell you without wasting too much thought: The male player would be vilified as a misogynistic monster by the same people defending Williams right now. The entire night would be held up high as an example of how men mistreat and bully women. There would most certainly be calls for the man to be banned for life from professional tennis. The outrage would be deafening in the other direction.

This is about behavior. She bullied that umpire mercilessly for 15 minutes and called him a cheat among others things. There is a huge bullying problem in American schools right now. I wonder what the hundreds of thousands of kids watching the match and aftermath were learning about how to treat other people?

 

[HomerJS]

The link with the explanation from the newspaper already posted above (post 101) for all to see but just like the old saying of " can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink".

Yeah look at all the flowing locks of blonde hair from the drawn white girl. I guess I should believe the cartoon not the actual picture.Osaka the next day. They drew her as a white girl and she is almost as dark as Serena. However if the artist wanted a contrast that's what you do.

 

[Brainonska511]

Yeah look at all the flowing locks of blonde hair from the drawn white girl. I guess I should believe the cartoon not the actual picture.Osaka the next day.

Here is an example of some of his other work: https://twitter.com/noon_chai/status/1027888138444664832/photo/1

 

[Elganja]

it boggles my mind that anyone can defend her behavior... she needs to take responsibility for her actions instead of crying fowl

has Venus every thrown a multiple game/set tantrum like this? graf? sharapova? federer? nadal? djokovic? -- i honestly don't know the answer, but a quick google search didn't result in much of anything besides a few broken rackets

 

[Svnla]

Yeah look at all the flowing locks of blonde hair from the drawn white girl. I guess I should believe the cartoon not the actual picture.Osaka the next day. They drew her as a white girl and she is almost as dark as Serena. However if the artist wanted a contrast that's what you do.

You do know that Osaka did look like this and not as you posted while she played for the US Open Championship, right? Blonde ponytail with visor and black top. OMG, it was in the cartoon. How could it be? <awe shock>

And you do know that it was a satire cartoon and not supposed to be an accurate personal portrait, right? Uh huh.

 

[bigi]

Apparently, some folks here need basic definitions. Well, here is one:

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

IMO, those are the most talented people that do caricatures. They not only have to draw beautifully but also have the ability to show exaggerated nature of the subject.

Serena's one is just perfect. She f'd up like a 4 year old. Period.

Racist? Not really. Let's see next time a white or Asian player throws tantrum when they play Serena and let's see the titles then.

 

[NetWareHead]

It is not a license to do anything, obviously. It was raw emotion and I do not fault her one bit for it given the stakes. Everything you state is from a viewer's perspective. Not someone in her place. That's important, because the audience matters zero in any of this.

Bullshit. The audience is there to watch the US Open, a professional tennis match. Not watch Serena turn it into Jerry Springer. I'm not willing to give her such a pass on this behavior because of her feelings, her motions etc... A real pro knows how to contain him/herself and not make a childlike spectacle in front of millions of people. A real pro know when and where to address a grievance.

 

[Darwin333]

People are expecting tennis players, male or female, to not back Serena? Seriously?

That would be like a golfer taking negatively about Tiger Woods. Only one professional golfer that I know of has ever been critical of TW: Brandel Chamblee.

The result: He's been belittled, threatened, his family has been threatened, a concerted effort was made to get him fired (Woods didn't discourage it), and pretty much every effort imaginable has been made to ruin his life.

Yeah - pro tennis players are really a great source of honest commentary when it comes to stuff like this.

Well who else would have a relevant opinion of what they did or didn't do to draw a penalty? The refs sure aren't going to come out and say "yup, we definitely give more penalties to her or women in general".

 

[Darwin333]

Dude, the video in the OP is like... over 15 minutes. It is just nonstop cuts of Serena doing stupid actions, or making stupid comments... CONTINUOUSLY. I am ALL for giving people a chance if they smash a racket and vent some anger in frustratation. When you nonstop tell a ref that he is a "liar" and a "thief" and that he "stole my points" EVERY. FIVE. MINUTES inbetween sets, inbetween breaks, everytime she walked past the god damn ref she had a comment. You don't get an infinite amount of warnings. You get told a warning, and then you cease the stupid actions. That's a warning. It doesn't permit you to keep making stupid comment after stupid comment.

Add on top of that the nonverbal cues of nonstop eye-rolls, and you're basically disrespecting an authority figure each time. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

Shrug, I really don't have a dog in this hunt but in the US Open freaking final I'd expect him to at least tell her "look, if you keep this up I'm going to give you a penalty and it will cost you a game" before giving an entire game to the opponent. That combined with how widespread coaching is, to make a point of it in the final seems dumb, not to mention that her opponents coach was doing it as well. Without the initial coaching call the rest wouldn't have happened at all.

For the record, I'm not trying to excuse her behavior. I'm just arguing that the ref handled it poorly from the start to finish.

 

[DrunkenSano]

Can't believe the racism card was played for that cartoon, can't help but shake my head at it. Seems like anything involving an African American will just be labeled as racism these days. Hell, I would play the sexism card way before the racism card in this situation.

 

[Darwin333]

The funniest and ironic thing in all this is Osaka’s father, Leonard Francois, is a coach and seems to know he can't even be there and must wander the grounds for fear of affecting the match.

Equally ironic is that Serena doesn't accept coaching during matches in the tournaments that it is allowed.

 

[Darwin333]

ESPN... I mean, they don't have a clear bias these days or anything on political stances....

That's news to me but I don't follow that sort of stuff. What kind of political stance/bias does ESPN have that would affect that story?

 

[s0me0nesmind1]

Can't believe the racism card was played for that cartoon, can't help but shake my head at it. Seems like anything involving an African American will just be labeled as racism these days. Hell, I would play the sexism card way before the racism card in this situation.

Sexism is just as stupid. How can you be against a woman when penalizing one woman helps another woman?

 

[Cozarkian]

Yeah look at all the flowing locks of blonde hair from the drawn white girl. I guess I should believe the cartoon not the actual picture.Osaka the next day. They drew her as a white girl and she is almost as dark as Serena. However if the artist wanted a contrast that's what you do.

Look at the picture behind her on the left (her right) - you can see the end of the blonde ponytail she had on court.

Also, her skin tone in that cartoon is not white. It was a brownish-grey, making her look nearly as dark-skinned as Serena. Compare the skin of the umpire, which does look white in that cartoon.

 

[Darwin333]

"I understand why you may have thought that was coaching, but I'm telling you it's not. I don't cheat to win, I'd rather lose."
- Serena Williams

And here's her coach Patrick Mouratoglou admitting to coaching her during the match:

https://bleacherreport.com/articles...oaching-during-us-open-final-amid-controversy

He may have been trying but he even said that she didn't look towards him and even when she can receive coaching in certain tournaments she refuses.

 

[Darwin333]

it boggles my mind that anyone can defend her behavior... she needs to take responsibility for her actions instead of crying fowl

has Venus every thrown a multiple game/set tantrum like this? graf? sharapova? federer? nadal? djokovic? -- i honestly don't know the answer, but a quick google search didn't result in much of anything besides a few broken rackets

Taken in context she has a very long history of being fucked over by refs and the first call was honestly bullshit, especially since her opponents coach was doing it as well.

 

[manly]

Yeah look at all the flowing locks of blonde hair from the drawn white girl. I guess I should believe the cartoon not the actual picture.Osaka the next day. They drew her as a white girl and she is almost as dark as Serena. However if the artist wanted a contrast that's what you do.

As usual, Svnla misses the forest for the trees. The fact that the blonde girl in the cartoon has the barest resemblance to Naomi Osaka is secondary. The way that Serena is caricatured can be seen as highly offensive to some in American society for aforementioned historical reasons. Dudes like him don't understand an innocent mistake is still a mistake, regardless of intent. It's always someone else being overly sensitive about a nothingburger. It's almost like you'd have to put a KKK hood on the chair umpire for Svnla to even wonder if there's a racist overtone present.

Not too many here are outright defending Serena (although some in the media certainly are). What she did was unprofessional/unsporting and by the letter of the law, Carlos Ramos penalized her accordingly. He has a history of being a stickler and annoying top players, so it's hard to definitively make a case for bias against Williams. What Darwin333 is saying is that if you know her tennis history at the US Open, and her life history, you would at least understand why she flipped out. How sick is it that a lot of this stuff happens at the biggest tournament in her home country? Some of us are sports fans and believe in fair play, and letting the athletes decide it on the field. No matter who you root for and in what sport, most of us don't want match outcomes decided because a referee decided to dot his i's and cross his t's. That does not mean we excuse Serena's reactions as she definitely Diva'd it up and then doubled down with sexism claims.

It's hilarious that some here are outraged at Serena's boorish behavior, when they probably watch women's tennis once a year. But when tennis pros or retired players state they've never had the book thrown at them (and for worse verbal abuse), it's circling the wagon and we shouldn't care about those informed opinions. I'll take James Blake and Andy Roddick's words over some nerds on ATOT.

 

[s0me0nesmind1]

As usual, Svnla misses the forest for the trees. The fact that the blonde girl in the cartoon has the barest resemblance to Naomi Osaka is secondary. The way that Serena is caricatured can be seen as highly offensive to some in American society for aforementioned historical reasons. Dudes like him don't understand an innocent mistake is still a mistake, regardless of intent. It's always someone else being overly sensitive about a nothingburger. It's almost like you'd have to put a KKK hood on the chair umpire for Svnla to even wonder if there's a racist overtone present.

Anything from anywhere at anytime can be considered offensive depending on who heard what and how they interpreted it. Please get off your politically correct soapbox of acting as-if there is some magical universe with rainbows and unicorn farts where everything is never considered offensive to anyone.

The cartoon wasn't meant to be racist or sexist in anyway. Quit painting your brush over other people's thoughts as if you are the grand wizard interpreter of offensiveness.