Recently during the second test match between South Africa and Sri Lanka which was being played in Sri Lanka, one of the most vibrant and energetic cricket commentators of recent time was found making derogatory remarks against a South African player, Hashim Amla. Hashim Amla is a Muslim of Indian origin whose parents migrated from Gujarat to get settled in South Africa. Well, knowing about Hashim Amla and his heroics and rise in the local South African cricket might be of enormous interest but that is not what I am interested in. So I would leave that out here.
During a brief live action on the television, which was supposed to be a commercial break, Joans was found terming Amla as a terrorist because of Amla’s strict and purely Muslim appearance as he maintains a big and long beard for religious reasons. This was supposedly an ad break and supposedly no direct feed was to be provided to any sports channel covering the game but unfortunately for Joans, Cricket South Africa and SuperSport, that takes a feed of the broadcast to South African audiences, were not enjoying the ad break, and the whole incident was broadcasted live on those channels thereby making the remarks very much public.
What happened after that could be anybody's guess. Dubai based Ten Sports immediately sacked Joans from his services and he had to lose his job. The networks of South Africa’s above channels were jammed because of numerous calls from so many media persons and very angry Muslim people. A strong reaction was displayed against this remark terming it to be highly communal in nature by the media, by the fellow commentators and the public.
Ideally speaking, the remark made was not desired and is not acceptable for a commentator who has to do his prime job honestly, which is primarily about commentating on the happenings inside the cricket ground and entertaining people with his superb style of expressing the live actions to all the audiences. After the incident, Ten-sports had no other options but to sake Joans, given that it mainly caters to the large Muslim community prevalent in Asia. A strong reaction by everyone else is also understandable because it was not an incident to make fun of when it leaked out openly. Nobody would accept something like this from anyone. Whenever a person crosses his limits, it is bound to give birth to different kind of reactions from different sections of people albeit in a different form and manner. But there comes a few questions in my mind, which needs some answer.
Some particular group of people termed Joan as being "Racist". Now, how far is that true? Once he realized the happenings, he was very modest in gracefully accepting his mistake before the public and in fact he couldn't have done it in a better way. He also apologized to Amla immediately after the day’s session was over. Later on he along with his fellow commentators confirmed that it was supposed to be an off air joke for the sake of fun. They could hardly realize that it was being aired. Well being apologetic after committing a crime does in no way entitle you for being relieved of the crime. But was this a criminal act?
Sometimes, just for the sake of fun we people pull some XYZ,s legs by calling something which might be derogatory in some sense, but we don't mean it by our heart. For example: we often make fun of those heavyweight Americans who would easily weigh beyond 300 lbs. We term them sick and useless in some senses. But that is just for fun. Does that make us a Racist? Is this in anyway an example of racism? No it is not. It’s only a natural human tendency to seek fun in anything that comes on its way. I wonder if these kinds of remarks qualify someone to be racist, then how many of us would be excluded from the never-ending list of all those racists? Some people also bluntly said that this comment is not a surprise for Joans being an Australian and it is very much in their blood to be racist. Now I do not think this is a very human opinion about the Australian community as a whole if not a racist one?
This matter would now be taken to the ICC, which would finally give a final verdict on Joans career. This might even lead for us not being able to hear Joans again on the TV? Well, this would be really harsh for him if it happens. He has already lost his well-settled job. To add to this, ICC could fine him as it does whenever a player is found playing with the code of conduct. ICC could even ban him for 3-6 months endorsing any other channel as a commentator. All these would be acceptable and a hard lesson for anyone in the future so that the incident is taken seriously enough to be repeated. I hope ICC takes the final decision on Joans and his career considering all these facts and is not influenced by how a particular section of the media or a particular community has reacted to it. Because in doing so, ICC would only be trying to sound like being a racist. The final decision has to be sensible enough by going deep into the possible causes and concerns. As they say, the circumstances under which the crime was committed and the form of the crime must play an important role here. A judgment cannot be taken just on the basis of people's emotions.
Personally speaking, I have enjoyed Dean John's commentary ever since he started his career as a Cricket commentator, very much. His style has been pretty much unbiased towards any particular country or player and he always believes in speaking for the performance and the one who deserves it on the field. These are the attributes on which a Cricket commentator must score high and I think John scores really high on these. His energetic comments whenever a Dhoni or a Kemp hits the ball over the fences would make anyone jump off his seat. Remember his typical enthusiastic way of expressing the moment a ball would be dispatched over the ropes- "goin, goin, goin..gone?". It would really be interesting to see if these core qualities of a commentator would be valued much above a remark that was meant for some kind of fun and will not come on the way of his career. "One mistake and he is gone" will be really too harsh for him. Let us think it some other way. Can Dean Joans or for that matter anyone from any profession is so stupid to make a racism comment on AIR even if he is one? No body would dare it given the well-predicted outcomes of it. Who doesn’t know about the Jehad, the Jehadi’s and the fatwas? Who would like to play with the fire knowing the only outcome is going to be to get burnt?
Why it is not called Racism when Brian Lara plays a role above the on field umpires and actually dictates the decision and NO action is taken. It was also live on TV? Why does ICC modify the rule then? It has also been a common trend to observe a player from subcontinent being fined or suspended for disciplinary actions more often than their non-subcontinent counterparts for the similar sort of on field mistakes under similar conditions. By now we have a long list of such occurrences, which testifies a familiar pattern. Does this show no Racism? Why don't the media provides the same coverage for these issues under the name of racism with the same vengeance? Why don't the people from the subcontinent show the similar strong reaction in these cases? Is it because the issue is not related to a minority given that cricket is most popular in the subcontinent region? Is this the reason this issue doesn’t occupy the same place in the media and doesn’t extract the same attention? So finally what is it? A Minority issue and a few bucks?
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