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Washington Post reporter Martin Weil has tweeted just over 2,220 times since joining that site in February 2016. It's likely that none were as glaringly inappropriate as a Michigan-related misstep Tuesday morning.
While sharing a link to his paper's coverage of impact statements by survivors of sexual assault by fired Michigan State sports osteopath Larry Nassar, the journalist added a tone-deaf wisecrack.
"Is there a brighter side? Won't many jail inmates for years to come be able to get their #flu shots from a real MD?" Weil tweeted to nearly 4,000 followers. It stayed online slightly more than 90 minutes, prompting criticism (including from this writer).
The 10:16 a.m. tweet began: "Sentence hearing for #gymnasts' doc reveals disturbing allegations." Though that's unoffensive, and where a prudent person would stop, it's also a bit tone-deaf.
Those are disturbing facts, not allegations, about years of crimes that Nassar admits. He pleaded guilty last November to seven counts of first-degree criminal sexual misconduct in Ingham County Circuit Court and gets a 40-year prison sentence Wednesday under a plea agreement that includes being present for victims' statements that began last week.
Weill explains himself in a direct message at Twitter, responding to a Deadline Detroit request after he yanked the tweet shortly before noon:
There was no intent to offend anyone. People, however, know when they are offended. Therefore, given a lack of any wish to evoke that reaction, I removed it.
If anyone wants to know why it was not removed sooner, the answer is that I was not on Twitter between the time of posting and the time of removing it.
I don't mind saying a word in my defense. The part that offended people was written as a conditional statement. It said: "If there is a brighter side.”
However, when people are offended, their position is generally inarguable. You can not tell them that they are not offended. So, following the principle of "why offend?" I deleted the tweet. And since I do not wish to offend people, I am sorry that I did.
[To clarify: As shown above, the ill-advised tweet actually said: "Is there a brighter side?"]
Weil, The Washington Post's longest-serving current reporter, came aboard Nov. 22, 1965 -- just over 52 years ago.
He declines to reveal his age (beyond "pretty old"), even to a colleague for a 2015 article noting that "the move to a new building is his second since joining the paper." With self-awareness, and what now seems like prescience, he told Joe Heim for that feature: "I'm really not that much of a cyber virtuoso."
Martin Weil: "There was no intent to offend."
(From Washington Post video, 2015)
These are among social media reactions to the attempted levity on a topic unsuited to any:
- I wonder what in his mind led him to ever think this was funny? We all deliver some bad lines from time to time but this is really bizarre. -- Lance Morgan, Beverly Hills
- What an ass. Don't think that he would be making fun if that was his daughter or granddaughter. . . . It's forever now, just like [Trump's] tweets. Can't unsee them. -- Julie Johnston, Dearborn [two posts]
- What an idiotic thing to post. -- Nancy Hanus, Bloomfield Hills
- Whoa. This is really insensitive. Some topics are not funny. -- Sue Burzynski Bullard, former Detroit News managing editor (MSU, '74)
- That's awful. He'd be smart to take that tweet down. -- Meegan E. Holland, East Lansing
- Horrible. -- Clark Communications, Grand Rapids
The writer of this article participated in online discussions about the tweet and tagged two senior Post editors in a comment.
