American professional boxer Adrien Broner was recently booed on stage when he dropped a few racially charged and insensitive “jokes” at Filipino boxer Manny “Pacman” Pacquiao during a news conference for their January 19 fight in Las Vegas, Nevada.
At one part of the conference, Broner, while speaking on stage, dropped a lot of “F” bombs and made an Asian stereotype remark that he passed off as a joke.
“Before beating me, he has a better chance of becoming a driving instructor,” said, hinting of that racist stereotype of how Asians are poor drivers, Boxing Scene reported. This resulted in a negative response coming from the crowd, which included many Filipinos.
Subscribe to
NextShark's Newsletter
A daily dose of Asian America's essential stories, in under 5 minutes.
Get our collection of Asian America's most essential stories to your inbox daily for free.
Unsure? Check out our Newsletter Archive.
“(Pacquiao) f—-d up his money, f—-d up his taxes. If you ask me, he’s a black fighter,” the 29-year-old boxer said on stage, which, yet again, earned him a round of boos from the crowd.
In other parts of the conference, Broner called Pacquiao “one of the best ever,” and added, “He did something that no one ever did in the game, you know, under something,” referencing to the unsubstantiated allegation about the boxer using performance enhancing drugs, USA Today reported.
Earlier that day, Broner told the media at the Waldorf Astoria hotel that he is responsible for selling their fight, remarking how limited Pacquiao’s English is and that all he does is just smile to the crowd.
“I got to be the one that sells the fight,” he said. “His English isn’t that well, you know. Isn’t that good. All he do is smile and say one word at a time. So I got to sell the fight.’’
As for Pacquiao, he did smile a lot in the news conference, but he also indicated that his boxing gloves will do most of the talking, unlike Broner.
Featured image screenshot via YouTube / Fight Hub TV
