Outspoken US Senator John McCain raised eyebrows online on Feb. 4 when he compared Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to a monkey that the Islamic republic recently launched into space.
“So Ahmadinejad wants to be first Iranian in space – wasn’t he just there last week?” said a message on McCain’s official Twitter feed, followed by the headline and link to a recent story ”Iran launches monkey into space.”
The comments by the 2008 Republican presidential nominee, a strong advocate for tougher sanctions on Tehran for its nuclear program, followed Ahmadinejad’s claim earlier Monday that he is ready “to be the first man in space” under Iran’s ambitious program which aims to send a human being into orbit by 2020.
Photo: EPA
照片:歐新社
The slur by McCain, the senator with by far the most Twitter followers — nearly 1.8 million — elicited swift condemnation on Twitter.
“Wow, way to elevate political discourse,” tweeted @heyitsurban to McCain. Another user, @manolo_loop, wrote:”@SenJohnMcCain is racism funny?”
About 50 minutes after his original “monkey” tweet, McCain posted a follow-up. “Re: Iran space tweet - lighten up folks, can’t everyone take a joke?”
(AFP)
一向敢言的美國參議員約翰‧麥肯,二月四日把伊朗總統瑪穆德‧阿瑪迪尼賈比為伊朗最近送上太空的猴子,讓眾人震驚。
麥肯的官方推特發言表示:「所以阿瑪迪尼賈想成為首位上太空的伊朗人,可是他不是上週才去過嗎?」文後附上一則新聞的標題和連結:「伊朗發射猴子上太空。」
麥肯是二○○八年總統大選的共和黨候選人,強烈主張對德黑蘭當局的核計畫施加更嚴苛的制裁。麥肯此番發言之前,阿瑪迪尼賈在週一稍早聲稱,他準備好成為伊朗野心勃勃計畫中「第一位進入太空的人」,伊朗的目標是二○二○年將人類送入太空軌道。
麥肯是推特追蹤人數最多的參議員,有近一百八十萬人,在他說出這番侮辱的話後,立刻在推特上引起眾人撻伐。
網友@heyitsurban推文:「哇!真是提升政治對話的好方法。」另一位網友@manolo_loop寫道,「麥肯,種族歧視好笑嗎?」
在發布原本的「猴子」推文約五十分鐘後,麥肯又張貼了一則後續推文,「回覆:伊朗太空推文—大家輕鬆點,難道你們都開不起玩笑嗎?」
(法新社/翻譯:陳維真)
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