In a banter with weatherman Nick Gregory, Anastos laughingly told Gregory to "Keep f---ing that chicken." Anastos later made an on-the-air apology in a later newscast, and the matter was put to bed.
There's an interesting parallel here with the case of former WCBS news reporter Arthur Chi'en, who was heckled on camera by a Opie & Anthony radio show crew. When he thought he was off camera, he whirled around angrily at the two hecklers and shouted, "What's the f-ck's your problem, man?"
Fred Reynolds, president and chief executive of the Viacom Television Stations Group said at the time that "Arthur committed the most egregious incident on air that I have ever seen," adding that "there is zero tolerance" for this breach of the rules."
Apparently, there's tolerance for certain people. So to recap, white newsman Ernie Anastos wasn't suspended or fired by Fox news boss Dennis Swanson. But when Swanson oversaw Viacom and CBS, Asian news reporter Arthur Chi'en was fired. In the words of the sometimes-paranoid-sometimes-oversensitive-sometimes-insightful-but-always-interesting Angry Asian Man: That's racist!
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1 comment:
Mike, my one-degree-of-separation: Arthur and I did Love Boat together in '92. I remember thinking when the story came out that it was an unnecessarily harsh consequence.
I'm not sure I even understand what Mr. Anastos meant by his comment (haven't seen the clip and am not aware of this turn of phrase), but I have to assume that it was not only profane but lewd.
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