Teenager made stupid tweets years ago: Why is this a news story, media?

It’s not news. At all. It doesn’t matter who the teenager is or was. It doesn’t matter if a guy who was a 17-year-old idiot eight years ago is now a 25-year-old major leaguer. His stupid tweet from eight years ago is not something the nation needs to know about. Why is that the question that needs to be asked? Because it’s important to recognize that the social media rectal exam now being applied to just about every player in baseball – and soon every player in every other sport, and soon we’ll go on from there – becomes a concern to the teams involved only because these things become media firestorms. And that only happens because the news media makes the absurd decision to treat these things as news stories.

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The latest target is Trea Turner of the Washington Nationals, following similar hubbubs involving Sean Newcomb of the Braves and Josh Hader of the Brewers. And if you never heard of any of the three before they became famous for their ancient tweets, then you’d be wise to ask the question: Why do I need to care what they tweeted years ago when I never even heard of them before people started talking about their tweets? Good question. The media have no answer, and yet they breathlessly report the non-news:

Washington Nationals shortstop Trea Turner became the latest athlete — and the third major leaguer this month — to have old, embarrassing and offensive tweets resurface. Tweets dating to 2011 and 2012 from the then-18-year-old’s account included a gay slur, anti-gay comments and a joke with racist undertones. On Sunday night, Turner issued a statement about the matter. “There are no excuses for my insensitive and offensive language on Twitter,” Turner, now 25, said. “I am sincerely sorry for those tweets and apologize wholeheartedly. I believe people who know me understand those regrettable actions do not reflect my values or who I am. But I understand the hurtful nature of such language and am sorry to have brought any negative light to the Nationals organization, myself or the game I love.”

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In his own statement, Nationals general manager Mike Rizzo said the tweets were “inexcusable” but added that Turner “has been a good teammate and model citizen in our clubhouse, and these comments are not indicative of how he has conducted himself while part of our team.”

Three questions:

1. Which sports editor established the precedent that we need a hear about it every time a ballplayer’s untoward old tweets are dredged up? Why is this important? And don’t tell me it’s news because it reflects the clubs’ lack of preparation for these situations. That’s circular, BS logic. If the media don’t treat this as news, there is no situation. Why do they treat it as news? Why does anyone need to know about it?
2. Who are the bottom-feeders who are spending time going through these guys’ Twitter histories looking for this stuff? And then, once they find it, what service do they think they’re doing to humanity by publicly calling them out? The left ironically accuses Christians of being judgmental. What Christians actually believe is that people need to be repent of sin so they can be forgiven for it and be reconciled to God. What the secular left apparently believes is that people who commit what they consider sin need to be called out, humiliated and destroyed. Who’s doing the judging here?
3. Do you really want to live in a world where anything you did when you were 17 or 18 can be thrown back in your face at any time? Do you want to be judged by the worst things you did when you were that age? Are you sure?

Because I sure as hell don’t.

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