Celebrities, i.e. actors and sportsmen alike, receive a lot of hate and trolls apart from the obvious fan-love from all over the world. Most of the times, they know how to ignore it or to shut them down. They either use heavy sarcasm, like Disha Patani, to get back at them or simply school them to change their thought process.
Using humour as a comeback for something someone says to you has become acceptable today. But using insults, low-blows and jibes is really uncalled for. Especially if you bring up something from decades ago that really holds no importance anymore.
Indian cricketer Ashwin Ravichandran took a dig at South African player Herschelle Gibbs on Twitter and received a lot of backlash for it. It started when the Indian player tweeted a promotional video of his new Nike shoes.
To this, Gibbs playfully replied saying,
Hopefully you will be able to run a bit faster now ashwin 😂
— Herschelle Gibbs (@hershybru) February 19, 2018
All was well until here and it was received as a joke by fans too since Ashwin is known for his poor fielding skills. But R Ashwin took the comment to heart and replied nastily by bringing up the SA player’s involvement in match-fixing decades ago.
The tweet has been deleted since then but thank god for screenshots!
The savage burn didn’t go down well with fans who clearly stood up for Gibbs. After all, he was really only joking. But Twitter couldn’t keep calm, of course.
1. Hypocrisy much?
Lmao, maccha himself had his boss and team CSK banned for fixing and is giving sermons to other about fixing. #TeamGibbs
— Artetaahhh (@Artsenall) February 19, 2018
2. This guy who schooled him on being calm.
https://twitter.com/magnifying_lens/status/965575790036480000
3. Show brands should come with that feature too, no?
Do they prevent from Overstepping??!!! 🤔🤔
— असा मी चीनी विरोधी! (@beingtolerant) February 19, 2018
4. R Ashwin got personal here, tbh.
It's not hate mate.. it's about taking a joke.. there is a very thin line between a joke and getting personal
— Pransshu Shukla (@prranshu) February 19, 2018
5. A reminder of your own misdeeds…
https://twitter.com/parakh52/status/965528102309974017
6. Listing it all down, just to be clear.
Ashwin does really need a chill pill – Firstly, it was simply a joke by Gibbs. Secondly, he has the CSK history.
— Kalim Khan (@Kallerz37) February 19, 2018
7. Show some sportsman spirit ya.
Rude & uncalled for @ashwinravi99 Should've taken sportinlgly.. It was just a joke by @hershybru
— KCJain (@K_cjain) February 19, 2018
8. Absolutely agree with this one.
https://twitter.com/gaurav_2988/status/965646156742225920
Fans didn’t approve of his unnecessarily mean comeback. But Gibbs, being the senior among the two, acted maturely and replied simply yet again. He said,
Can’t take a joke i see😉 anyway moving swiftly on..
— Herschelle Gibbs (@hershybru) February 19, 2018
Ashwin tried to save his ass by claiming he was joking too, but we all know that’s not true.
I totally believed my reply was a joke too, but look how people and yourself perceived it. I am totally game for this sort of fun mate, we shall dine over this sometime.😂 https://t.co/Z7YdXQnxeD
— Ashwin (During Covid 19)🇮🇳 (@ashwinravi99) February 19, 2018
Owing to the hate he got because of his rude reply which he thought was funny but Twitter didn’t, he deleted his tweet. And put up another which said,
What’s sensitive to me isn’t to someone else, and what’s sensitive to you isn’t to me. I want to respect my family of fans and hence pulled the tweet down, and now entertainment over for all my haters. See you later😂
— Ashwin (During Covid 19)🇮🇳 (@ashwinravi99) February 19, 2018
Where’s your sportsman spirit, Ashwin? If Indians can boast of housing a team of some of the best cricketers, it’s time we demonstrate the real spirit of the game too. And let’s not forget our own past while we jump at others’ for the same, yeah?