Lolo Jones Offends With Tweet About Guns And Americans
Lolo Jones did not score any awards for a recent tweet about the London Olympics, in which she seemed to propose Americans would dominate Olympic events involving guns and shooting -- a comment some found insensitive in light of the Aurora, Colo., shooting.
The 29-year-old American hurdler caused controversy with her July 28 post, which said:
USA Men's Archery lost the gold medal to Italy but that's ok, we are Americans... When's da Gun shooting competition?
— Lolo Jones (@lolojones) July 28, 2012
Jones' tweet referred to the women's skeet shooting competition on Sunday, but some users drew a parallel to the July 20 shooting and criticized Jones for her insensitivity.
"Yikes, you're probably gonna get some not-so-nice responses to that last tweet..." replied one Twitter user, according to USA Today.
Love HuffPost? Become a founding member of HuffPost Plus today.
In addition, others noted the athlete should err on the side of caution.
"She's def free to say whatever she wants. Just saying if you're representing a country, you should watch what you tweet," responded another.
USA Today notes that Jones later apologized for the tweet, saying: "sorry u guys only think of violence but I think of all the hunting I do w southerners in da south. Its [sic] impressive."
Despite her apology, Charlie Chase of Yahoo! Sports said Jones should have known better.
"This tweet would have been insensitive no matter when it was sent," Chase wrote in July 28 post. "Even if she meant that Americans are good at hunting, the connotation of violence jumps out to everyone. Coming eight days removed from one of the worst gun massacres in United States history makes it even worse."
Jones is just one more athlete to join the "Twitter Foul" list.
Michel Morganella, a Swiss soccer player, was expelled from the London Olympics for posting what Swiss officials deemed a racist and threatening tweet targeting South Koreans after the Swiss team lost 2-1 to South Korea on Sunday, The Associated Press reports.
Last week, Greek triple jumper Voula Papachristou was also banned from The Games for a controversial tweet that said: "With so many Africans in Greece, the West Nile mosquitoes will be getting home food!!!," ESPN reports.
This article originally appeared on HuffPost.
