Kicked out at the World Figure Skating Championships: the commentator talks about the “bitch from Canada”

Kicked out at the figure skating world championships
Commenter talks about “slut from Canada”

03/26/2022, 2:06 PM

At the World Figure Skating Championships, there was a scandal off the ice: two commentators on the live stream were fired by the world federation for insulting former Canadian pair skater Megan Duhamel. Among other things, they speak of “bitch”.

An Olympic gold medalist, two-time world champion, figure skating expert, Canadian – all these are apt descriptions for 36-year-old Megan Duhamel. But now she came to be called “Canadian bitch”. It is now costing the jobs of two commentators: The World Ice Skating Union has split from ISU Simon Reed and his colleague Nicky Slater with immediate effect after a verbal derailment at the Figure Skating World Championships in Montpellier. As announced by the association, Reid and Slater expressed disrespect for former Canadian pair skater Megan Duhamel.

The ISU, headed by Jan Dijkma, did not say anything about the content of the statements. “ISU strongly condemns statements of a discriminatory or biased nature,” it said. There was elsewhere: the two described Duhamel, who reports on the World Cup as an expert for the Canadian broadcasting company CBC, as a “bitch from Canada”, i.e. “slut”, “bitch” among other things. or “bitch” as in “.

The statements were picked up by a microphone that had apparently been triggered by mistake. The ISU was “shocked by the language of the two commentators,” the association said. At the same time, the 36-year-old team Olympic champion from 2018 was apologized for “inappropriate and unacceptable behavior by two commentators”.

The ISU announced that an internal investigation would be launched. The two commentators will never be cast for a federation figure skating event again.

“his big fan”

Reid tweeted after her dismissal: “I spoke to Megan Duhamel. Megan understood that my off-screen joke was referring to something very goofy. Megan admitted that, she knows I’m her biggie fan and it’s a real shame” of reference. We look forward to meeting for a beer.”

Duhamel responded on Twitter without rancor. “I have received a personal apology from Simon Reed and the ISU President and I do not think a public apology is necessary at this time. I appreciate and respect the apology,” the two-time world champion wrote.

Duhamel had been criticized before this scandal. She wrote on Twitter that 63-year-old Slater and 74-year-old Reid had “better choices” than to comment on the World Cup. He had apparently previously admitted that he did not follow ice skating intensely.