Alan Brazil with another Jurassic roar?

Pundit Alan Brazil is trending on social media after a condescending rant about women's football. A while back he was even more disparaging about men's mental health.

Alan Brazil, long-running talkSPORT presenter

Yesterday, during an on-air discussion about Manchester United's new owners, INEOS, and their plans to rebuild the faltering club, talkSPORT broadcaster, Alan Brazil made controversial comments about women's football. What particularly drew Brazil's ire was that as well as setting their sights on delivering United's 21st league title (and first since Alex Ferguson's departure 11 long years ago), INEOS are also targeting the Man U women's team's first WSL title. Brazil suggested the Red Devils' fan base (and by extension, himself) are neither impressed or even interested in women's ability to excel at football.

Brazil has polarised opinions. On the one hand, some say he's simply stating the obvious: the majority of Man U's vast, long-suffering fanbase are focused on their men's team (who he played for between 1983 and 1984). Others despair at yet another example of ageing, entitled chauvinism.

Anyone who follows women's football can accept the facts of life. Biological factors like muscular strength and stamina will always result in male athletes being able to run faster and cover more ground. (Other aspects of the beautiful game, like soft tackles resulting in male players rolling around squealing like K-pop fans have zilch to do with X and Y chromosomes, and everything to do with cheating.)

Robin Williams, the award-winning comedian/actor who lost his fight against debilitating depression.

Stigmatising mental health

When it comes to churlish attitudes, Brazil has form. In 2014, Robin Williams' protracted struggle with depression culminated in his tragic death. Again, live on air, Brazil announced he had no sympathy for the American comedian. This 'diabolical' step had left him 'really annoyed.' I blogged about this at the time: Alan Brazil, stigmatising mental health.

In similarly ill-judged comments about severe depressive illness, broadcaster Jeremy Clarkson once used his column in The Sun to belittle people driven to take their lives, or as he referred to them, 'Johnny Suicide.' I previously blogged about this, too: Jeremy Clarkson: Top Bore. The latter instance was arguably far worse. Brazil is a football pundit, his expertise level hovering around 22 males kicking a ball across a pitch. His doltish views on Williams' demise prompted a response from fellow talkSPORT presenter, Stan Collymore, who has been open about his own experiences of depression. "You're not a doctor, Alan Brazil, so your opinion on mental health issues counts for nothing, to be fair."

Clarkson's opinions are formulated on a far more expansive range of topics, and he is the prolific and often highly entertaining writer of over 20 books. His hand will have been influenced by the platform he was writing for at the time, a red-top for which weaponising controversy is key to generating sales. (Although the usual hastily rescinded apology in a paragraph buried amongst the inner pages didn't quite cut it when The Sun blamed Hillsborough on fans. The tabloid remains widely boycotted in Liverpool.) However, Clarkson's comments in his article went way beyond the exclusion zone of 'merely being tongue-in-cheek.' Without a smidgeon of empathy towards loved ones left bereft by these tragedies, he described the aftermath of such events with comedic relish. That's borderline sociopathic.

The Samaritans' response

Catherine Johnstone, chief executive of The Samaritans (who answer a call for help every 10 seconds) responded. "While purporting to express sympathy for people who die this way, his remarks about their bodies constitute gross intrusion into the grief and shock of bereaved families and friends. His notion that suicide is a selfish act shows how little he knows about the subject because, if he did, he would know that when a person attempts suicide they are so distressed that they genuinely believe their families will be better off without them. The concept that their actions could be construed as selfish is the furthest thing from their mind. Fortunately, most of us will never experience the mental torture that leads someone to die by suicide."

The problem is, suicide has been the biggest killer of males and females aged 20 to 34 in the UK for every year from 2001 to 2018. That's no laughing matter.