Comedian Artie Lange has had a wide and weird involvement in the sports world, from dooming Joe Buck’s HBO show in 2009 to making awful tweets (that got him banned from ESPN’s airwaves) about Thomas Jefferson, slaves and sex in reference to then-First Take host Cari Champion back in 2014. It’s the latter that has him in the news again this week, as Lange again brought up Champion (now an anchor on ESPN’s bicoastal noon SportsCenter) and Jefferson in a tweet Thursday:
https://twitter.com/artiequitter/status/794199346665361408
Lange then endorsed a terrible response to this:
@ArtiesCutlets hahahaha. Nice
— Artie Lange (@artiequitter) November 3, 2016
Not surprisingly, there was strong backlash, with ESPN personality Jemele Hill and many others criticizing Lange:
What's funny about slavery and rape? Because I would love to see the humor in this. https://t.co/mYHeNy7hKl
— Jemele Hill (@jemelehill) November 3, 2016
https://twitter.com/DKuzLA/status/794288505388077056
Fetishizing black women, referencing rape, and looking like a trash bag all at once. Yikes. @artiequitter https://t.co/r1tX4hqaZe
— cydney (@cydney) November 3, 2016
BE LIKE JEFFERSON, ENSLAVE HER & RAPE HER @artiequitter what the hell is wrong with you?!? https://t.co/iispl74u4M
— Liza Sabater
In 2014, Lange tried to say this was all a joke, but it’s hard to see what’s particularly funny about it. It’s also weird that he brought it up again, especially as it cost him at least one gig (on Comedy Central’s @midnight) last time. Maybe this will continue Lange’s slide into obscurity, but it’s certainly odd to see him do this again after the backlash he received the last time.
