FUMBLE: PARROTING THE NEGATIVE, 100-0

“I am not a monster,” he says. “I’m not heartless. I’m not someone who would ever go out and try to humiliate an opponent.” I can see the headlines now: “I am not a monster, says coach” or “Not out to humiliate opponent, says coach” – really, take your pick. And what do those headlines really say? Lets face it. That the coach is a monster. That the coach was out for humiliation. As it was, that exact quote above was “blown up” into the size of a photo to attract people’s attention to a column by Phil Taylor in a recent issue of Sports Illustrated. It was about coach Micah Grimes, whose Texas-based Covenant School girls basketball team beat a girls team from Dallas Academy by a score of 100-0 earlier this year. Two weeks after the game, the private school’s headmaster fired Grimes and put an apology up on the Covenant School’s website. News coverage of the story reached as far away as Australia. Anyway, back to the quotes. This was an interview Grimes did to repair his image. Of course, he would have been asked, “what do you say to people who think that beating that team 100-0 makes you some kind of monster?” Or perhaps “were you trying to humiliate them?” What are the “hot” words in those questions? They are “monster” and “humiliate.” As soon as Grimes repeated them back, he took ownership of them, like they had never even been whispered by the journalist. They were his alone, to be used in blown-up quotes or headlines. Folks, always be careful about parroting back loaded words or phrases. Bob and I can help you with this through our Veritas media training program. There are non-inflammatory ways to respond, and to keep your messages reflecting the language of your choice – not the questioner’s.