The Los Angeles Kings have the best Twitter feed of any sports team in North America, and that’s not really up for debate. But they certainly gave us all something to debate on Tuesday night when they invited morning radio host Kevin Ryder to guest tweet for them during the second period of Game 4 against San Jose.
Kings’ Twitter genius goes wrong as Kevin Ryder makes rape comment
Letting a morning radio show host run your Twitter feed is a risky move. It didn’t pay off for the Los Angeles Kings.
Harry How
It didn’t go so well.
.@thekevinryder is taking over @lakings for the 2nd period.... we've made a huge mistake.
— LA Kings (@LAKings) May 22, 2013
Yes. Yes you have.
Hey @lakings--screencapped that rape joke for you. Thought you might misplace it. twitter.com/seangentille/s…
— Sean Gentille (@seangentille) May 22, 2013
We apologize for the tweets that came from a guest of our organization. They were inappropriate and do not reflect the LA Kings.
— LA Kings (@LAKings) May 22, 2013
(1 of 2) My apology. I made a poor choice in the wording of my tweet. I wish I had used different words. If you were hurt by me, I'm sorry.
— Kevin Ryder(@thekevinryder) May 22, 2013
As you can see, the offensive tweet was deleted and both the Kings and Ryder apologized. But it all felt a bit too little, too late. The Kings allowed Ryder to continue taking over the account for the remainder of the period, and it took more than a half hour -- an eternity in Internet time -- for the Kings to apologize after they deleted the tweet. They deleted the tweet almost immediately, clearly knowing it was wrong, and then failed to apologize right away while also letting the guy continue.
Ryder apologized -- two hours later -- but not without a caveat:
(2 of 2) I get angry when groups like Deadspin see it as kindling to make a fire for themselves. That's worse than my choice of words.
— Kevin Ryder(@thekevinryder) May 22, 2013
Couple this with the fact that a ton of people vocally supported him on Twitter and were angry at the Kings for apologizing because we’re all “too PC” or whatever, and it’s pretty clear that not everybody realizes sexual assault jokes are bad things. If you’re somebody who doesn’t see what the big deal is here, maybe read this or this or this and think about it for a minute.
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