Bird Cage Liner Apologizes for Barkley Slur

Liverpool clubs, whether Red, Blue, or White are now united in their collective disdain for the—lacking a better word—”newspaper” which shall not be named. The city of Liverpool and the publication have had a long-standing feud over the years, particularly over the gleeful spreading of false narratives and victim blaming during and after the Hillsborough disaster.

The rag has done little in the subsequent decades to make amends for its infamous role in the tragedy and long road toward justice for the 96. Indeed, it has from time to time continued to dig itself into deeper and deeper holes, with management, editorial staff, and a culture of racism and bigotry embedded within its foul ranks.

Although the respective fan bases of Liverpool clubs have stood untied against the journalistic shitheap for years, the clubs have started officially banning them as well, starting in February when Liverpool Football Club acted in an official capacity.

So how did these small-minded fools react? By releasing a horribly racist and bigoted post about Everton player Ross Barkley, of course! Everton Football Club quickly followed Liverpool in banning the rag. Even 5th tier Tranmere Rovers got in on the action, a spokesperson commenting, “As a Club we absolutely deplore the paper's disgraceful reporting of the Hillsborough disaster. The recent story published by the Sun containing comments were made which were both racist and deeply offensive to Merseysiders shows that the paper continues to treat the people of Liverpool with contempt, and as such the de facto ban on the paper will remain in place.”

A week later, the outlet finally released a disingenuous apology, which can be read in full here so our dear readers don’t have to give their website any traffic:

On April 14 we published a piece in the Kelvin MacKenzie column about footballer Ross Barkley which made unfavourable comparisons between Mr Barkley and a gorilla.

At the time of publication, the newspaper was unaware of Mr Barkley's heritage and there was never any slur intended.

As soon as his background was drawn to our attention, the article was removed from online.

We have been contacted by lawyers on behalf of Ross Barkley, who has made a formal complaint about the piece.

The S*n has apologised for the offence caused by the piece.

We would like to take this opportunity to apologise personally to Ross Barkley.

The apology, if it can even be called that, raises more questions than it answers. For one, what exactly would be a favorable comparison to a gorilla look like (particularly to someone with Nigerian heritage)? Also, is ignorance of background ever a valid excuse, especially for a supposed news-gathering organization?

Moreover, it didn’t address the other problem with the column which included bigoted comments about Merseysiders. And the phrase, “apologized for the offense caused” is another dick move, which might as well read, “sorry you snowflakes were so easily offended.”

As always, we leave you with this: DON’T BUY THE S*N.