It's pretty easy to take offence at things these days.
Take England's warm-up match at Alice Spring last week for example, where an over-sensitive Cricket Australia censored the public address announcer for - allegedly - pronouncing Monty Panesar's name with a faux-Indian accent.
Oh yes, Cricket Australia. The same beacon of morality and promoter of cultural diversity that - on day one of the second Ashes Test at the Adelaide Oval – tweeted a picture of four Sikh gentlemen dressed up as Teletubbies accompanied by the caption, "Will the real Monty Panesar please stand up?!"
It was a communication that was deleted less than an hour later, as English and Australian cricket lovers responded to the tweet with shock and anger.
Whilst it's clear that no malice was intended - Cricket Australia later apologising for any "offence caused," - the point is that the tweet was crass in the extreme, and follows a list of unsavoury events that have already taken place on and off the field in this series, and comes after both captains had pledged to clean up the sledging in the middle this week.
What chance do players have when administrators are setting such a moronic example?
How Cricket Australia felt it would be acceptable to post a picture of four Sikh's - dressed as children's entertainers or otherwise - and suggest that one of them must be Monty Panesar simply by virtue of the fact that he too is a Sikh, is baffling. The picture wasn’t even taken at the ground, so a pre-meditated decision to produce the tweet was taken, rather than it simply being a reaction to events unfolding on the day.
“Cricket Australia deemed the conduct of the PA announcer as inappropriate and as such he will take no further part in the match,” Cricket Australia said of the incident at Alice Spring less than a week ago. It makes the conduct of their Twitter account operator in Adelaide even more perplexing and out of step with company protocol – such as it is.
Social media presents an interesting conundrum to 21st century culture. Corporations and companies can communicate one-to-one with their customers with it, and that is of huge benefit to both their business and their customers’experience.
Many will say that by providing quotes, stories and pictures as a game unfolds, Cricket Australia are enhancing the experience of their fans who can't get to the grounds but want to be kept abreast of the action nonetheless. In posting quirky pictures, fans are given a greater narrative than ever before. We should be grateful of the service, of course.
But with this power comes inevitable responsibility. Twitter is awash with users that have their followers roaring with laughter as much as being well informed by their analysis. Cricket is no different, and it’s easy to see why organisations like Cricket Australia want to entertain in a quirky, off-the-wall manner as, we presume, was the intention here.
But #TeleTurbanGate is not just a case of Ashes banter. It’s ignorant and offensive, and really ought to be punished by the organisation.
This Ashes series is finely poised, finer in truth than at any stage during the English summer series that the hosts won 3-0.
Australia are pumped up and want to win – I get that. I don’t particularly mind that Australia skipper Michael Clarke told England’s Jimmy Anderson to, “Get ready for a broken fucking arm,” I mean, it’s a little embarrassing for Clarke to be goading an opponent like that when his team was so dominant in the match, but that’s Pup’s look-out.
But ignorance of the kind shown in publishing this tweet really is disappointing, and another disciplinary issue that Cricket Australia now has to respond to. Whilst it’s clear there was no malice intended, it was ill-judged and in poor taste.
Given recent events, Cricket Australia’s leaders really need to act decisively in response to this.
