It will all be over soon
By now we are all aware that the hat we put on with social media comes with consequences. There is no screen or guise which can really protect us from a harmful tweet or post. One man, Chad Shanks took trash talking a bit too far.
Mr. Shanks runs the twitter account of the Houston Rockets basketball team. Last Tuesday night before an elimination game between the Rockets and the Dallas Mavericks Chad decided it’d be funny to toss out a tweet saying “shhh. Just close your eyes. It will all be over soon.” The tweet had a horse emoji with a gun emoji next to the horse’s head.
Chad was fired abruptly. Houston then issued an apology tweet as well as Chad tweeting about his responsibility for the tweet several times.
In an interview with the Sporting News, Shanks explained that he was interested in posting something that would generate fan interaction.
Shanks said, “Once we had the game (and the series) locked up with a minute or so left, I wanted to take a jab at the Mavs (something I’ve done every so often with other teams), and that idea popped into my head. I meant it to just be a play on taking an old horse out to pasture that would get our fans even more pumped up and agitate Mavs fans.”
Shanks further explained that the interpretation and response to the Tweet are not what he intended, but that it was his responsibility to anticipate how the Twitterverse would receive it. He added a caution about underestimating the “power and reach” of social media.
We’ve seen the trouble that social media can cause first hand here at Elder and trust me I know that article has been written many times. This is another example of the impact that social media can have on your life. Especially if your tweets represent an entire professional organization.
I personally think that the tweet was in all in good trash talking fun. People get upset too easily. I can see why it would upset some people but in the end it’s a tweet and not something that’s worthy of getting hot over.
It was stupid but people overreact. I’m sure Mr. Shanks wishes he could take it back. He claims he’s still a Rockets fan for life and has gotten his friends and family to twee the hashtag #BringBackChad to try to get his job back. The Rockets haven’t issued a statement on whether Chad will be hired again.
There will always be rivalries in sports especially for in state teams. Social media helps those rivalries grow through unlimited communication between fans.
We’ll see what this tweet does to other sports team’s twitters and if they become more cautious about sensitive tweets. I personally think people will do less trash talking. Remember no one tweet is worth losing a job or lifestyle and I can’t stress that enough. Or just don’t be a complete idiot.
