Cursing often provokes some interesting responses. One of the most notable in a while came from The Messenger columnist and Fox News contributor Joe Concha, who in a Fox and Friends appearance Friday morning, blasted Taylor Swift’s (not broadcast with audio, but seen on the NFL on Fox broadcast) “Let’s ******* go!’ after a Travis Kelce touchdown Sunday. And Concha did that in unusual terms:
“Taylor Swift probably just met Travis Kelce’s mom for the first time. They’re at the game last week. And she’s going ‘Let’s ******* go’ in front of her!” “…I’m sorry, if I heard that and my son was dating a girl who has a mouth like a Teamster, that’s it. Either way, this couple’s already more annoying…”
It’s unclear why Concha’s go-to for cursing is Teamsters, which most people know for the union representing more than 1.3 million North American workers. It’s also unclear why he thinks Kelce’s mother would be offended by Swift’s cursing. After all, Kelce himself has produced some notable televised curses (in actually-broadcast interviews and comments, no less, and he’s also worried interviewers at other times).
It’s also bizarre to think that cursing that’s not actually even broadcast is really going to be a problem for anyone. Even broadcast cursing generally isn’t that big of a deal these days; it receives some negative FCC comments for cursing on over-the-air networks around the Super Bowl in particular, but so many less for cursing on cable, and really isn’t that notable in terms of streaming. (The thing networks actually have to watch out for in terms of fines is misuse of emergency access tones.) Complaining about it at this point is very much a Helen Lovejoy “Won’t somebody please think of the children!” move.
Cursing is still notable when it comes up on broadcasts, especially for network apologies. But it’s more notable as a “Here’s a thing that happened” rather than with moral judgements. And a moral judgement on comments that were just caught visually from a crowd member is particularly strange.
[Lis Power on Twitter]
About Andrew Bucholtz
Andrew Bucholtz has been covering sports media for Awful Announcing since 2012. He is also a staff writer for The Comeback. His previous work includes time at Yahoo! Sports Canada and Black Press.