I deserved sack, says Myers in apology for ‘anti-Semitic’ column
JOURNALIST Kevin Myers has apologised for writing a hugely offensive article and insisted that he is not anti-Semitic or misogynistic.
The columnist admitted that he deserved to be sacked for writing the piece in the Sunday Times, and took responsibility for what he wrote.
Speaking on Sean O’Rourke’s RTE Radio One show, Mr Myers said: “It’s over for me professionally as far as I can see. I am really, really sorry.”
The writer apologised profusely for the column, which was printed over the weekend.
It saw the newspaper forced to say sorry for causing “offence to Jewish people”.
“It was stupid of me, the encapsulation of such a complex issue in a single sentence,” Mr Myers told RTE.
“One of my flaws is to deal with major issues with throwaway lines.”
Mr Myers said he believed his journalistic career was “over”. “I’m not sure if there’s any retaking demption for me now, which will give a lot of people satisfaction,” he added.
He also claimed that “five or six” other people would have overseen the column — some in Dublin and some in London — before it went to print.
“A number of people nodded on duty and let something through that shouldn’t have gone through”, Mr Myers said, adding that he felt he was the “author of his own misfortune” and took responsibility.
“You can have a purge, a lot of people would love a purge. I’m responsibility for what I wrote,” he explained.
Under the headline ‘Sorry ladies, equal pay has to be earned’, Mr Myers wrote: “I note that two of the best-paid women presenters in the BBC — Claudia Winkleman and Vanessa Feltz, with whose, no doubt, sterling work I am tragically unacquainted — are Jewish. Good for them.
“Jews are not generally noted for their insistence on selling their talent for the lowest possible price, which is the most useful measure there is of inveterate, lost-with-all-hands stupidity.
“I wonder, who are their agents? If they’re the same ones that negotiated the pay for the women on the lower scales, then maybe the latter have found their true value in the marketplace.”
Mr Myers yesterday said he deserved to be let go. He added of the column: “It’s not misogynistic. I am a critic of political feminism, but I’m not a misogynist. I do believe men and women behave very differently, and men are driven by ambition and urges that women don’t have, generally speaking. I don’t believe in equality.”