Monday night, in the wake of the storm that was the reaction to the new Ray Rice tape, the opinion-givers were out in full force, in a tidal wave of hot takes that still hasn’t quite reached land and died yet. This story may go on for months. That said, every time we get a story like this, we seem to get one or two reactions that are just… beyond.
One of those came from Ted Robinson, 49ers, NBC and Pac-12 Network play-by-play man, a veteran game-caller with an otherwise solid history of being a professional broadcaster. He appeared on the radio station KNBR Monday night, and went on a victim-blaming rant captured by the Twitter handle @LOLKNBR that didn’t exactly resonate with listeners.
Ted Robinson on Janay Rice: "How does she marry him after that? How does she go in front of Goodell (stand by him)? That's pathetic to me."
— LOLKNBR (@LOLKNBR) September 8, 2014
Ted Robinson literally just said Janay Rice's decision to marry Ray Rice and stand by him after the fact is pathetic. Said it twice.
— LOLKNBR (@LOLKNBR) September 8, 2014
Ted Robinson also said Ray Rice's actions in the elevator video suggest to him that Rice "must have been in an altered state."
— LOLKNBR (@LOLKNBR) September 8, 2014
Ted Robinson: "The *victim* here … bares some of the responsibility … for not speaking up … that to me is the saddest part of it."
— LOLKNBR (@LOLKNBR) September 8, 2014
Let’s get the most obvious fact out of the way that this is an egregious case of irresponsible victim-blaming and placing assumptions on the victim of an assault that go far, far beyond what we know, which is what was seen on this tape, and completely inappropriate for someone who is supposed to be the voice of a National Football League team. It’s especially disturbing when you consider that Robinson is the voice of one of the major women’s sporting events of the year: the French Open on NBC. Two of Robinson’s employers — the 49ers and the Pac-12 Network — have suspended him, the former for two games, and the latter for the blanket “two weeks.” Here are the statements from all parties, starting with the 49ers President, Paraag Marathe:
“The comments made by radio broadcaster Ted Robinson on Monday were offensive and in no way reflect the views of the San Francisco 49ers organization. We have made the decision to suspend him for the next two games. I informed Ted of our decision earlier today, and we will continue to address this matter with him internally. Our organization stands strongly against domestic violence and will not tolerate comments such as these.”
Pac-12 Networks President Lydia Murphy-Stephans:
“Ted’s commentary on Monday was entirely unacceptable and stands in stark contrast to the core values of Pac-12 Networks. We value Ted as a member of our team, but see this as an important learning opportunity as we work with him through sensitivity training before welcoming him back to our air.”
Finally, Robinson himself:
“I want to unconditionally apologize for my comments the other day. As a professional communicator, I am responsible for my words. My choice of words was careless and does not reflect my true feelings about domestic violence. I understand that the cycle of abuse keeps people in unhealthy relationships. No blame or responsibility should ever be placed on a victim.”
Hopefully, the words of Murphy-Stephans are what turns out to be true, and we all learn from this, and Robinson’s statement at least makes reference to appearing to have understood where he went wrong. Hopefully, we close the book on yet another sideshow to crawl out from under this awful, awful story.
