A Tokyo Olympics commentator has been fired after making racist comments on air....
According to The Sun, veteran Greek TV journalist Dimosthenis Karmiris said that he couldn't understand how South Korean table tennis players could "see the ball".
The broadcaster made the offensive remarks when reporting on Greek Olympian Panagiotis Gionis' defeat to Korean Jeoung Young-sik in the men's singles third round on Tuesday, July 27.
Karmiris reportedly stated (translated): "The Koreans don't play table tennis. Their eyes are narrow so I can't understand how they can see the ball moving back and forth," before laughing to himself
According to The Sun, the network ERT later announced that Karmiris' contract had been terminated, with a spokesperson stating (translated): "Racist comments have no place on public television.
"The collaboration between ERT and Dimosthenis Karmiris was terminated today, immediately after the morning show."
This comes not long after a number of other TV journalists provoked controversy when they misgendered non-binary skateboarder Alana Smith by not using their preferred pronouns.
BBC journalists Marc Churchill and Ed Leigh, as well as NBC reporters Todd Harris and Paul Zitzer, used "she/her" pronouns instead of "them/they" pronouns, PinkNews reports.
This faux pas provoked a number of social media users, who promptly took to Twitter to express their outrage.
Trans journalist Britni de la Cretaz stated: "This is journalistic malpractice. No one should have to be misgendered on an international stage like this.
"Sports doesn't know what to do with non-binary athletes. Shoutout to Alana Smith, the first openly non-binary athlete to represent the U.S. in an Olympic Games."
In an official statement, the LGBTQ+ charity Stonewall wrote: "Alana Smith (they/them), American pro-skater in the #Tokyo2020 Olympics has been repeatedly misgendered by journalists.
"We hope there will be swift corrections. All athletes deserve to be respected & celebrated as part of the games. [sic]"
Per Out, a spokesperson for NBC Sports has since responded to the backlash, stating: "NBC Sports is committed to (and understands the importance of) using correct pronouns for everyone across our platforms.
"While our commentators used the correct pronouns in our coverage, we streamed an international feed that was not produced by NBCUniversal which misgendered Olympian Alana Smith. We regret this error and apologize to Alana and our viewers."
