Sportscaster-turned-pundit-turned-sportscaster Keith Olbermann has been suspended for the rest of the week by ESPN for comments he made on Twitter. Several Penn State students tweeted to Olbermann about a fundraiser in which students had raised roughly $13 million to fight pediatric cancer. Olbermann tweeted back, “pitiful.” He later clarified that his tweet was directed at Penn State students in general, and not cancer fundraising, or kids with cancer. But let’s face it, if you have to clarify that you’re not insulting kids with cancer, the conversation’s gotten away from you.
Olbermann has been highly critical of anything Penn State-related ever since assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky was convicted of sexually abusing several minors in 2011. Olbermann took Penn State students to task for defending Sandusky’s boss, longtime head coach Joe Paterno, who allegedly covered up Sandusky’s actions and was fired in the wake of the scandal. The sportscaster clearly has neither forgiven nor forgotten, but it’s worth mentioning that his blanket hatred includes roughly 98,000 students, many of whom were happy to see the guilty parties punished in the scandal, more than half of whom weren’t enrolled in the school until after Sandusky was jailed and Paterno was fired, and many of whom have helped raise $13 million “pitiful” dollars to help kids with cancer.
Olbermann apologized for the tweets, saying, “I was stupid and childish,” towards students who, “did such a great fundraising job.” He then set the “____ days without offending someone” sign in his office back to zero.