A popular British radio host was fired Thursday by the BBC for a tweet that depicted the royal baby as chimpanzee. Danny Baker, 61, posted an image Wednesday of a couple holding hands with a chimp dressed in a bowler hat and an overcoat, and captioned it, "Royal baby leaves hospital." A British radio host lost his job after tweeting an image that depicted the royal baby as a chimpanzee. Getty Images The now-deleted tweet came shortly after the Duke and Duchess of Sussex showed off their baby boy, Archie Harrison Mountbatten-Windsor, to the public for the first time. Download the TODAY app for all the latest royal baby news. The image appeared to mock the heritage of the former Meghan Markle, whose father is white and mother is African American. A BBC spokesperson said that the tweet was "a serious error in judgement" and that it "goes against the values we as a station aim to embody." Baker denied there was any racist intent behind the image in a series of follow-up messages. Once again. Sincere apologies for the stupid unthinking gag pic earlier. Was supposed to be joke about Royals vs circus animals in posh clothes but interpreted as about monkeys & race, so rightly deleted. Royal watching not my forte. Also, guessing it was my turn in the barrel. pic.twitter.com/86cQGbAhDc — Danny Baker (@prodnose) May 8, 2019 Now Sky at the door. Would have used same stupid pic for any other Royal birth or Boris Johnson kid or even one of my own. It's a funny image. (Though not of course in that context.) Enormous mistake, for sure. Grotesque. Anyway, here's to ya Archie, Sorry mate.#Occam #Razor — Danny Baker (@prodnose) May 9, 2019 "Once again. Sincere apologies for the stupid unthinking gag pic earlier,'' he wrote. "Was supposed to be joke about Royals vs circus animals in posh clothes but interpreted as about monkeys & race, so rightly deleted. Royal watching not my forte." In another he wrote, "Would have used same stupid pic for any other Royal birth or Boris Johnson kid or even one of my own. It's a funny image. (Though not of course in that context.) Enormous mistake, for sure. Grotesque. Anyway, here's to ya Archie, Sorry mate." Baker faced swift backlash online. It is completely right that Danny Baker has been fired by the BBC over tweeting that the royal baby is chimpanzee. Anyone defending him is as sick as he is pic.twitter.com/TluuFU2hkX — Stanners (@cheesecakebase) May 9, 2019 Wow that didn’t take long. Royal Baby is just two days old and he’s already being trolled by @5liveSport’s Danny Baker aka @prodnose who has compared him to a chimpanzee...and Baker claims he’s not racist 🤷🏾‍♀️ pic.twitter.com/hDcD2mLlo3 — Eva Akase Simpson (@EvaMSimpson) May 8, 2019 Nah @DannyBaker5Live⁩ Apologises just not good enough. Read yr withdrawal tweet explaining in that smug arrogant non apologetic way. Not good enough. That was extremely racist! You should be sacked from job. @5live @bbc @HuffPostUK https://t.co/qBxoMw4sfR — TheBlogArtist (@blog_artist) May 9, 2019 Baker then tweeted Thursday that the call by the BBC to fire him "was a masterclass of pompous faux-gravity. Took a tone that said I actually meant that ridiculous tweet and the BBC must uphold blah blah blah. Literally threw me under the bus. Could hear the suits knees knocking." He had hosted a weekly show on the BBC radio station 5 Live. The issue of race is one that the Duchess of Sussex has dealt with for a long time. She wrote about the prejudice she has faced in a 2017 issue of Allure. In an essay for her now-shuttered lifestyle website, The Tig, she revealed her frustration about the "countless black jokes people have shared in front of me, not realizing I am mixed, unaware that I am the ethnically ambiguous fly on the wall." The relentless media scrutiny she faced when first dating Prince Harry in 2017 led him to issue a rare public statement, in which he condemned racist and sexist press coverage of her.<doc-sep>See the recovery efforts in Gaza as ceasefire appears to hold 'Is everything I'm trying to do pointless? ': Syrians helpless in face of 'sham' election Brother of journalist detained in Myanmar says family is hopeful Report: US companies may have benefited from forced labor of Uyghurs Residents stand near stalls along a road amidst debris while strong winds batter Balasore district in Odisha state on May 26, 2021 as Cyclone Yaas barrels towards India's eastern coast in the Bay of Bengal. (Photo by Dibyangshu SARKAR / AFP) (Photo by DIBYANGSHU SARKAR/AFP via Getty Images) France's President Emmanuel Macron (L) and Rwanda's President Paul Kagame speak as they walk in the grounds of The Presidential Palace in Kigali on May 27, 2021, after their press conference and prior to their official luncheon. - French President Emmanuel Macron arrived in Rwanda on May 27, 2021, for a highly symbolic visit aimed at moving on from three decades of diplomatic tensions over France's role in the 1994 genocide in the country. Macron is the first French leader since 2010 to visit the East African nation, which has long accused France of complicity in the killing of some 800,000 mostly Tutsi Rwandans. (Photo by Ludovic MARIN / AFP) (Photo by LUDOVIC MARIN/AFP via Getty Images) Relative of detained Iranian-Americans fears they will not survive RABAT, MOROCCO - FEBRUARY 25: Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex walk through the walled public Andalusian Gardens which has exotic plants, flowers and fruit trees during a visit on February 25, 2019 in Rabat, Morocco. (Photo by Facundo Arrizabalaga - Pool/Getty Images) (CNN Business) — BBC radio broadcaster Danny Baker has been fired after posting a racist tweet about the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s new baby. On Wednesday, the BBC Radio 5 Live presenter tweeted a black and white photo of a man and woman holding hands with a chimpanzee in a suit and a top hat, with the caption, “Royal baby leaves hospital.” Amid widespread accusations of racism, Baker deleted the tweet and said he was sorry the “gag” had “whipped some up.” He claimed the connotations had not occurred to him because his “mind (is) not diseased.” In a second message, Baker said that the tweet was “supposed to be a joke about Royals vs circus animals in posh clothes but interpreted as about monkeys & race, so rightly deleted. Royal watching not my forte.” On Thursday, the broadcaster said he made an “enormous mistake.” A BBC spokesperson said: “This was a serious error of judgment and goes against the values we as a station aim to embody. Danny’s a brilliant broadcaster but will no longer be presenting a weekly show with us.” Baker responded defiantly to the decision, saying on Twitter that the calls for his dismissal were a “masterclass in pompous faux-gravity” and that the BBC “literally threw me under the bus.” Prince Harry and Meghan’s newborn son, Archie Harrison Mountbatten-Windsor, was born early on Monday morning. On Wednesday, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex presented the baby, their first, to the world in front of selected media. In a significant milestone for British society, the newborn has made history by becoming the first biracial child in the royal family. Since the announcement of her pregnancy, Meghan has been a target of racist abuse across social media. In March, Kensington Palace staff announced they would devote more resources to deleting comments targeting the Duchess of Sussex, and to blocking abusive Twitter and Instagram accounts. The royal household also issued a set of guidelines for people engaging with its social media channels.<doc-sep>Danny Baker, a radio host on BBC’s Radio 5 Live, was fired after comparing Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s son, Archie Harrison Mountbatten-Windsor, to a chimp on Twitter. According to Deadline, Baker said he was let go due to a “stupid unthinking gag” about the newborn. On Thursday, Baker, who has worked in British television and radio since the 1980s, posted a picture of a monkey holding hands with a couple with the caption, “Royal baby leaves hospital.” You mean to tell me some people don’t find this tweet of Danny Baker offensive? Y’all are just as disgusting. pic.twitter.com/mY6pZrxPVQ — Calvin Mccrimon (@calvinmccrimon4) May 9, 2019 He was terminated after the tweet went viral. The veteran host denied being racist and referred to the tweet as an “enormous mistake.” Addressing his departure from the station, Baker called the British public broadcaster’s decision to let him go a “masterclass of pompous faux-gravity.” A spokesperson for the BBC released a statement in the wake of Baker’s termination. “This was a serious error of judgment and goes against the values we as a station aim to embody,” a BBC spokesman said. “Danny’s a brilliant broadcaster but will no longer be presenting a weekly show with us.” This isn’t the first time the Duke and Duchess of Sussex have been the subject of racially offensive content. A German candymaker came under fire for comparing Markle to a chocolate-covered marshmallow after her May 2018 wedding. Prior to tying the knot, the couple was sent a suspicious package that was deemed a “racist hate crime” by British police.<doc-sep>
The BBC fired a radio personality this week after he posted a racist tweet targeting Prince Harry, Duchess Meghan and their newborn baby, Archie Harrison Mountbatten-Windsor. The New York Times reported that the host, Danny Baker, was fired from the news agency on Thursday, days after he tweeted a photo showing a couple holding hands with a chimpanzee in a suit. The tweet was captioned: “Royal baby leaves hospital.” ADVERTISEMENT Baker had reportedly posted that tweet, which has since been deleted, on Wednesday, shortly after Archie made his debut to the public. The BBC’s Radio 5 Live, where Baker used to host a weekend broadcast, confirmed Baker’s firing in a statement to the Times that was released on Friday. In the statement, the platform condemned Baker’s tweet as something that “goes against the values we as a station aim to embody.” “Danny’s a brilliant broadcaster but will no longer be presenting a weekly show with us,” it added. Baker also confirmed his firing in a tweet on Friday and appeared to express some kind of apology for the racist post in another tweet the night before. “Sorry my gag pic of the little fella in the posh outfit has whipped some up. Never occurred to me because, well, mind not diseased,” he said in the post. “Soon as those good enough to point out it's possible connotations got in touch, down it came. And that's it. Now stand by for sweary football tweets.” Sorry my gag pic of the little fella in the posh outfit has whipped some up. Never occurred to me because, well, mind not diseased. Soon as those good enough to point out it's possible connotations got in touch, down it came. And that's it. Now stand by for sweary football tweets — Danny Baker (@prodnose) May 8, 2019 Baker also attacked his former employer's move to fire him in another tweet as "a masterclass of pompous faux-gravity." The call to fire me from @bbc5live was a masterclass of pompous faux-gravity. Took a tone that said I actually meant that ridiculous tweet and the BBC must uphold blah blah blah. Literally threw me under the bus. Could hear the suits knees knocking. #Fuckem — Danny Baker (@prodnose) May 9, 2019 Since the royal couple introduced Archie to the public this week, several media outlets have also come under fire for posts critics labelled as racist. CNN also faced criticism earlier this week for a publishing a piece touching on racial issues and stereotypes surrounding Archie’s birth that included the subhead, “How black will the royal baby be?" My God @CNN just legitimately asked “How black will the royal baby be?” **and 100% un-ironically warned** “commentators who reinforce dangerous racist stereotypes are totally unaware of the damage”‍♂️ pic.twitter.com/TBd3Amgg7G — Qasim Rashid, Esq. (@QasimRashid) May 7, 2019 “Guys. GUYS. Whether the royal baby is SUPER-DUPER BLACK or whether it’s NORMAL, let’s all agree to not be racist because that’s really really uncool, mmkay?” - CNN pic.twitter.com/bUZ1VQohLK — Eric Haywood (@EricHaywood) May 7, 2019 The Los Angeles Times also faced heat from social media users earlier this week after it shared an opinion piece shortly after Archie's birth, titled: "Will Meghan Markle and Prince Harry raise their baby to be black?"