“If we have decided that juvenile records are sealed and should never be public – ACTUAL CRIMES – then why are we covering tweets that a 14-year-old sent before they became famous as new stories?”
-- Clay Travis.
Oklahoma quarterback Kyler Murray defeated Alabama’s Tua Tagovailoa in one of the closest votes in Heisman Trophy history, yet the most notable storyline was something completely unrelated to football.
Hours after Murray’s incredible victory, a series of lewd tweets the OU star made were uncovered as a part of a Yahoo Sports breaking news story that exposed a collection of messages Murray had tweeted from his account as a 14-year-old that included bad language.
Murray was responding back and forth with friends on his public twitter in February of 2012 when he referred to them as ‘Qu**rs’ more than a couple times, a term universally deemed offensive in the gay community.
Murray quickly issued an apology to try and defuse the trending story, but it still dampened the moment for Murray, who’s improbable run to defeat Tagovailoa for college football's most prestigious was suddenly not the main focus.
Clay Travis says the ‘GOTCHA’ journalism that has become prevalent the last few years is one of the most pathetic methods of our modern media, where individuals try and spoil a breakout athletes’ achievements by exposing tweets they made when they were children.
Not only have athletes like Josh Hader, Josh Allen, and Donte DiVincenzo become prey to the ominous watchdog, but even A-list celebrities like Kevin Hart have fallen on the sword, as Hart had to step down as host of this year’s Oscars because of homophobic tweets he made over a decade ago.
Clay says this isn’t real journalism, nor should it ever be considered breaking news, and says if the justice system wipes away the criminal records of juveniles when they move into adulthood, why don’t we treat the usage of social media the same way, and not be judging athletes and celebrities on crude impulses they may have tweeted during adolescence?
Listen to the full audio below as Clay says we should be more sickened, not by Murray’s ancient tweets, but by the people who actually went through thousands of his tweets the night he won the Heisman just to try and sabotage the proudest moment of his life.
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