Can you imagine! An athlete flipping the finger at some pissed up and abusive fans!!!

Be still my beating heart. I have to go lie down.

When did we all become so sensitive all of a sudden huh? Well, apparently Canada has become a very politically correct, kinder gentler place than ever before. And that’s saying something!

Upon soliciting responses to a question asking if Theo Fleury should be dumped from the Olympic roster after he was fined and issued a warning by the NHL for said flip-of-a-digit, the overwhelming response was: Moider da bum!

Perhaps that QOD came too close on the heels of the Mike Tyson issue and folks were still all riled up or something. After all, numerous responses compared the two. But folks – let’s get real here:

Mike Tyson = Cannibal rapist

Theo Fleury = Bird flipper

The two aren’t exactly in the same league now are they?

That said – what Theo did was bad – there’s no doubt about it.

Can I understand Theo’s motives? I’ll answer that with a question: Have you ever met anyone from Long Island?

They make the denizens of Dogpatch appear swish.

And besides that – I did the exact same thing to two moronic commuters this very morning. And I still think they deserved it hours later.

No – there has to be another motive for the folks suddenly jumping off the Fleury bandwagon wholesale, and all of a sudden.

Perhaps its as simple as this: With Joe Thornton playing better – we puckheads want to take any advantage we can to get closer to gold.

And poor Theo’s just got in the way of that ambition. And if that’s true, how short sighted can we all get?

Since he could he was representing Canada on the international stage. He was part of the Canadian junior team disqualified from the 1987 world championship after a bench-clearing brawl with Russia. He captained the one that came back to win gold one year later making the junior all-star team. He played for Canada at the world Championships in 1990 and 1991, played for Canada at the Canada Cup in 1991 and played for Canada at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano Japan.

Immediately after losing in the shutout he was quoted as saying:

“Just so, so disappointing,”

“But was it worth it? Absolutely.”

“There’s always 2002, right?”

Right!

There is the concern of possible repercussions if he does indeed go gaga at the games. Four years later and we still scoff at the Americans for trashing their rooms in the Olympic Village in Nagano. I’d truly hate to have Canada become a similar target for world scorn because of what one slightly unbalanced Theo might do.

But considering all that he has done for this country by representing us so well over the all those years…

…it’s easily worth the gamble.