After apparently discovering that publicist-written apologies don’t work so good, Tracy Morgan is back with a more personal apology for his recent homo-hatin’ rant which he relayed to Marc Malkin of E!Online exclusively (because he wouldn’t dare tell anyone else).
“I know how bad bullying can hurt,” Morgan tells me exclusively. “I was bullied when I was a kid. I’m sorry for what I said. I didn’t mean it. I never want to use my comedy to hurt anyone. My family knew what it was like to feel different. My brother was disabled and I lost my father to AIDS in 1987.
“My dad wasn’t gay, but I also learned about homophobia then because of how people treated people who were sick with that,” he continued. “Parents should support and love their kids no matter what. Gay people deserve the same right to be happy in this country as everyone else. Our laws should support that.
Tracy’s apology tour will continue with a trip to Tennessee to help GLAAD protest the state’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill, as well as filming an anti-bigotry PSA, and sitting down with people who have lost family members to gay violence. Will that be enough to put this incident behind him? Maybe he should ask Michael Richards.
I think your apology should always be invalidated if you say you’re not sorry during your original rant.
I think this apology was really nice… but to be honest all I really want is for him to explain the reasoning in his head for saying what he did in the first place.
Yeah, I would have been way more persuaded by something that said he was trying something edgy or making some kind of performance art meta comment whatever, rather than disavowing the plain language of what he rather unambiguously said, both on stage and on his DVD.
Also, he needs to donate his profits from Goregasm: The Legend of Dongslayer, which I believe grossed $3,660,000,000. I’m sure GLAAD would cash the check.
btw I just read Tina Fey’s response, and it was awesome:
“I’m glad to hear that Tracy apologized for his comments. Stand-up comics may have the right to “work out” their material in its ugliest and rawest form in front of an audience, but the violent imagery of Tracy’s rant was disturbing to me at a time when homophobic hate crimes continue to be a life-threatening issue for the GLBT Community.
It also doesn’t line up with the Tracy Morgan I know, who is not a hateful man and is generally much too sleepy and self-centered to ever hurt another person.
I hope for his sake that Tracy’s apology will be accepted as sincere by his gay and lesbian coworkers at 30 Rock, without whom Tracy would not have lines to say, clothes to wear, sets to stand on, scene partners to act with, or a printed-out paycheck from accounting to put in his pocket.
The other producers and I pride ourselves on 30 Rock being a diverse, safe, and fair workplace.”
http://www.deadline.com/2011/06/nbcs-bob-g…
If Morgan’s “way too self-centered” to hurt another person, he’s equally too self-centered to devise this entire apology campaign himself. The gestures are noteworthy, but they (his PR team) noticed the first “equal opportunity jokester” apology wasn’t damage control enough so they tried more. They used the AIDS card and scheduled the tour so they wouldn’t have to issue a third apology, but the details of the third apology, if all true, are exactly why (you’d think) one would never say that shit. Ever. Right? That’s what sucks-this all seems so disengenuous. I want to say fuck him. I’ve no tolerance for abuse of a fame platform like that. Strip it all away and he’d be nothing but another “Burn in Hell!” lunatic ranting on the street corner.
dont apologize own it and move on maybe you can get on two and a half men