Imagine, if you will, this scenario: Mr. Rick Hendrick arrives at the official home of his North Carolina based NASCAR empire. As he walks through the building, with a typical smile on his face, he waves at his employees and greets them with a cheerful good morning.
[media-credit name=”Brad Keppel” align=”alignright” width=”208″]
[/media-credit]The boss is in a great mood. He’s ready to turn a brand new day into a great day and take care of business. Upon arriving at his office, Mr. Hendrick is greeted by his executive assistant who hands him his first cup of coffee of the day. He’s handed the first round of telephone messages and next is informed that his itinerary for the day has been downloaded into his personal computer.
Prior to exiting the office, the executive assistant says: “oh by the way, it seems that your brand new race driver has an issue with breastfeeding.”
That’s right! The final controversy of NASCAR’s 2011 racing season involves mild mannered, everybody loves him, Kasey Kahne. Making this even more amazing is the fact that the issue is indeed over breastfeeding a baby in a public location: an act that has, for too many generations to count, been widely regarded as perfectly natural and to many even beautiful.
This issue stems from a December 27th visit to a super market where Kahne was caught off guard by the sight of a woman nursing her infant. One has to understand that element of surprise here. It’s not exactly something you expect to see while buying groceries. However, most people would simply go about their business and realize that this was nothing more than a woman feeding her hungry child.
Kasey Kahne took this super market experience to the worst possible level. He fired up his cell phone and activated the “T” word. That, of course, stands for “Twitter.” Then it got interesting.
In a series of “Tweets” Kahne wrote: “just walking through the supermarket. See a mom breast feeding a little kid. Took a second look because obviously I was seeing things. I wasn’t”
But it was the next “Tweet” that launched the controversy. In that message, Kahne wrote: “one boob put away one boob hanging. Nasty. I don’t feel like shopping or eating anymore.”
In this age of political correctness that second comment alone was more than enough to light up a public fire anytime anywhere. Compounding the situation was the fact that the very popular Kahne has a reported 100,000 plus followers on “Twitter.” In less time than it takes for a Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet to turn a fast lap at Daytona, the responses to the driver’s observations came fast and furious.
One of those responses, that received a lot of national attention, stated “I hope someday you have a kid and someone tells your wife that feeding your child looks nasty. Stay classy a**hole.”
At this point one would think that Kahne should have realized that some of his “Twitter” followers were angry and this would be a great time to stop sending messages. Wrong! Apparently Kahne’s index finger moves faster than his race car because he responded to this “Twitter” criticism by calling the lady a “dumb b***h.”
A mere matter of seconds after Kahne hit the “send” button to let that message fly, the war was ON and that’s when it hit on a national level.
This was followed by the obligatory statement of apology, published on Kahne’s “Facebook” page, the following day which stated: “I understand my comments regarding breastfeeding posted on “Twitter” were offensive to some people. For that I apologize. It was no way my intention to offend any mother who chooses to breastfeed her child, or, for that matter, anyone who supports breastfeeding children. I want to make that clear.”
Referring to being surprised by what he encountered at the super market, Kahne’s apology went on to say: ” In all honesty, I was surprised by what I saw in a grocery store, I shared that reaction with my fans on “Twitter.” It obviously wasn’t the correct approach. and, after reading your feedback, I now have a better understanding of why my posts upset some of you. My comments were not directed at the mother’s right to breastfeed. They were just a reaction to the location of that choice, and the fashion in which it was executed on that occasion. I respect the mother’s right to feed her child whenever and wherever she pleases.”
In the aftermath, all of Kahne’s “Twitter” messages regarding this incident have been deleted. Obviously he should have hit the “delete” button before he hit the “send” button.
It raises the question: when will Americans realize that one has to be ultra careful regarding what they post on the so called social networks?
When the aforementioned Rick Hendrick began the process of turning a brand new day into a great day, it was assumed that one or two challenges might land in the middle of his desk. Somehow I don’t think that Mr. H ever dreamed that the issue of breastfeeding might be one of those challenges.
Wasn’t an infant he witnessed nursing but a little kid.I don”t think he would’ve said little kid if it was a baby or infant. Sorry but that is nasty.