Posted by Scott Clark @ 9:47 am
Jay Glazer Verbally Abuses Kentuckians, Tries to Stereotype New Yorkers, Fails.
Filed under: Lexington KY News, RANT!
Aug
28
2007
28
2007
Recently FoxSports.com Sportswriter and New Yorker Jay Glazer (I’m not linking to him) visited Georgetown, home of the Cincinnati Bengals training camp for a story. For those who don’t know, Georgetown is a few minutes North of Lexington, and is a very small town - home to Toyota Motor Manufacturing, one of the largest auto manufacturers in North America. It’s a blue-collar town, laid back, with a good college, and this is one of the reasons that the Bengals are there.
But Mr. Glazer has decided that he’d do a “Central Kentucky Alcoholic’s” tour rather than talk about the Bengals (I’m not calling Mr. Glazer an alcoholic, for the record.) He could not wait to use the word “hillbilly” in his article. He manages to spend 80% of his writeup talking about alcohol consumption and misspellings of Wal-Mart and Wendy’s signs (forgetting that his article includes spelling errors.) I don’t read sports much - and now I remember why.
He blasts the fact that Scott County (Georgetown) is “dry” (no alcohol sales except in restaurants receiving 70% of their revenues from food.) I think the “dry county” rules are old-fashioned, and they probably should (will) go away. But it’s that community’s right to put it to the vote and then enforce the results.
….First of all, it’s in a dry county. Why is there anywhere in America that is dry? Let’s get real people. Not selling alcohol in one area is the dumbest thing in the world. You know what it does? It forces you to travel long distances to the next county to get drunk and then drive aaaaalllll the way back to Georgetown. How stupid is this rule? It also leads to the freaking hillbilly who was selling moonshine out of the back of his truck. Did I just say moonshine? Did I just say hillbilly? Folks, I’m not making this stuff up…..
…Force you to get drunk? Do you think that everyone wants to get drunk? Do you know the difference between “buy” and “drink?” Did you know that you can actually carry liquor to your home BEFORE you guzzle it down or do you sit down on the sidewalk of the liquor store and pop-a-top? Look…I’ve lived in Kentucky most of my life, and have never seen anyone selling moonshine except on TV. Then again, I’ve never been desperate to stereotype a city in an article….I will admit you cannot gather with friends at a Bar in Georgetown, which is a bummer if this is important to you. You do need to go to Lexington, where Sports bars are plentiful.
But even Fayette County (Lexington) has old, fast-fading rules about alcohol purchases on Sunday. But that’s probably going to change. The Urban County Council has tentatively approved, 13-1, a dramatic change which would allow retail establishments to sell alcohol on Sundays. But Mr. Glazer graced our city with his presence too soon and decided to verbally abuse the employee of a local bar who was following the city ordinances.
Worst bar I’ve been to on the road: The Pub in Lexington, Ky. I’ve written about places I’ve loved but I have to give both sides of it. A few Bengals friends and I drove down to Lexington on a Sunday evening to find a few beers and arrived at The Pub in Lexington at 10:30. We were immediately informed that we could only get one round because as the waitress explained, “The police will come in and grab them right off your table at 11 p.m. sharp.”
Are you kidding me? That’s what the police spend their time on in this town? Are they chasing around bootleggers in old Studebakers? Can you imagine that?Anyway, back to the waitress and her 11 p.m. cutoff. Last I checked I’m good for a little over a beer in a half hour. Last call? Fine, everyone in my party will have three drinks each and we’ll have them polished off at 10:55. Guaranteed!
The waitress, bartender and manager all panicked over this idea as if Elliott Ness would raid the place at any minute. Come on people, we’re all adults here. We’re talking three lousy beers.
That wasn’t the bad part, though. The manager, a total Doogie Howser-looking goober, walked over and the following is the actual conversation that ensued:
Goober Pyle, Manager Extraordinaire: “I understand you ordered three rounds but we can’t do that because all alcohol has to be finished by 11.”
Aggressive New Yawka Glaze: “That’s OK buddy, we’ll have them finished off for you, no problem.”
Goober Pyle, Manager Extraordinaire: “We can’t do that, the police will take them out of your hands. I’m sorry.”
Aggressive New Yawka Glaze: “It’s OK, I’m willing to do the time.”
Goober Pyle, Manager Extraordinaire: “Sorry, it’s not going to happen. I can only give you one. We’re only looking out for your best interests.”
Are you kidding me? This is where I got a little… frustrated shall I say.
Aggressive New Yawka Glaze: “Doogie, you want to protect my best interests, get me a damn 401K plan! Don’t let me buy a dog from Bad Newz Kennels but don’t tell me you’re going to play drink police.”
Goober Pyle, Manager Extraordinaire: “It’s for your own safety, sir.”
Aggressive New Yawka Glaze: “I’m so lucky to have a guardian angel like you at my side. Seriously, where were you when I fell out of that tree house when I was 8, or the time I got my ass choked out in the Octagon or the time I took a blow torch in high school and cut off the roof of my car so I could have a convertible. Thank you so much oh Hillbilly guardian.”
Goober Pyle, Manager Extraordinaire: “(Blank look)”
It shows real restraint by the bar manager that Mr. Glazer didn’t have the remainder of his beer on his head or end up seeing what Lexington Police really do for a living. I think it’s sad that Fox Sports sees fit to let someone like him float into a community and try to establish any sort of perspective by bellying up to bars. If it were his personal blog, that’s one thing, but Fox is seen as an authority news property on the web.
Despite the attempts to drag “New Yawkers” into the mess, he doesn’t fool me. I know better. New Yorkers are NOT at his level. He is not like the New Yorkers I know - who tend to be culturally broad-minded, funny, and adaptive to their surroundings.
UPDATE: Foxsports.com has shown some wisdom by pulling down his posting.
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28
2007
Eh, I could not summon quite as much indignation — what can you say about a guy with a no doubt very good income who makes it his business and evident pleasure to harass an young man who is managing a bar on a Sunday night? Glazer needs little help indcting himself.
4
2007
Dear Scott,
Thank you, that means a lot to know that you read my entire response, and felt that strongly about me posting on your blog. I’m honored to do so in return.
This sort of thing has always gotten my blood boiling. I’m from Southeastern Ky., the region of the state that, unfortunately, recieves the most grief and judgements from other parts of the country. My question was always “why?”. I’ve lived in here my entire life, and have yet to see anything to perpetuate these stereotypes, let alone promote hate. Of course there’s going to be trailers here and there, because of the economy (people here work their asses off and get nothing for it), and we have dirt roads, creeks, and hills (which are beautiful, but to some ignorant people, things like that are ‘redneck’).
I’ve traveled around, I’ve seen many of the states in this union. Trust me, Kentucky is not the only state with ‘redneck attributes’, yet we seem to be the only ones singled out and ridiculed over it. Have these people ever actually gone anywhere themselves? And they say WE are sheltered.
With Jay Glazer’s article, its just the same garbage we’ve all heard before. We dismiss it as ignorance, and just sit back and laugh at the poor soul(s) that believe it, while taking personal satisfaction of knowing it isn’t true. It’s the New Yorkers who should be upset. This guy is representing THEM. HE is making THEM look bad, not us. He wrote an “apology” a few days ago. Can’t remember where I read it, but it wasn’t an apology. He said something along the lines of “It’s upsetting to me to know that this article got the reaction that it did, because making fun of Ky wasn’t my intention.” He never actually apologizes, and almost takes yet another jab at us, subtley suggesting that we need to stop whining, leave him alone, and learn how to read between the lines. What a jerk…
5
2008
I’m from Louisiana, not Kentucky, but I absolutely hate these jerks from regions of the country other than the South or Appalachia who seem to think we spend all of our time either making and running moonshine, engaging in sexual relations with our relatives, or having Klan rallies and stringing up Negroes. This Glazer character is obviously one of those snooty yankees who comes here and expects us to become as idiotic as him and the rest of his urban pals after seeing what a nitwit he is. In this day and age of moronic slaves to political correctness I consider it a compliment to be called a “redneck”. It means I’m not one of those imbeciles who uses long, drawn out words and phrases like African-American for black or Negro, Native-American for Indian, or little person for midget. I also don’t call the guy who cleans a building a janitor, not a sanitary engineer…lol. Now, as for whether a county is dry or not should be determined by the voters of that county, not some smart ass yankee jerk who is mad because he has to drive an extra mile to get drunk. I only wish the manager of that bar that Glazer was giving so much trouble to had dumped a pitcher of beer on his head.