Mike Richards’s first and last day as the new host of Jeopardy! was yesterday, Ah, Mike, we hardly knew ye, and did not care to. Let’s look at the man’s many apologies and not-apologies along the journey to not being on our TV anymore, we hope, ever, praise be. Today, Mike, still the executive producer of Jeopardy! (today!), apologized to his staff thusly:

Why is this a bad apology? Here’s a quick reminder of our 6 steps to a good apology:

1. Say you’re sorry
2. For what you did
3. Show you understand why it was hurtful/bad
4. Only explain if it is essential
5. Say why it won’t happen again
6. Make amends

Richards is 0 for 6.

His opening — “It pains me” — is telling. Mike’s talking about how he feels; he’s in pain. And isn’t that what matters? As for “these past incidents and comments” –  what incidents and comments? There’s no specificity there. Without specificity, one possible interpretation is that he’s putting  his own behavior (“past incidents”) on equal footing with what other people have said about him (“and comments”).  That’s why we have Step #2, people!

Moving on: Using the words “cast such a shadow on Jeopardy!” implies that whatever unspecified incidents (WHO KNOWS?) happened, they’ve hurt the show. Not the women he belittled, not the staffers at both The Price is Right and Jeopardy! whom he unjustly fired or insulted or hurt, not Ken Jennings or the guest hosts whose auditions he subverted (by choosing which shows would be shared with focus groups, and by scheduling fan fave LeVar Burton for only one week as opposed to the two that other possible hosts got and further, slating him during the Olympics).

We hate to say that any one word is invariably a mark of a bad apology (though there are enough red-flag words that we’ve made Bad Apology Bingo cards out of them)…but the word “distraction” has never appeared in a good apology. Distractions are sideshows, diversions, divertissements! They take valuable attention away from what’s important! In this case, Mike Richards is saying that what is important is that Mike Richards should be the host of Jeopardy.

Mike Richards’s declaration of “I want to apologize to each of you for the unwanted attention” for the “confusion and delays” serves to blame people who are not Mike Richards. If only no one had paid attention to Mike Richards’s past, there would be less confusion and fewer delays right now! How irksome are the press and public, focusing on the wrong things, getting all distracting and loud and rude, keeping you, my colleagues, from doing your important work! Embarrassing our holy Sony! Preventing people from focusing on the vital task of moving on and also hiring me, Mike Richards, to do this job I am the right man for!

Also, “delays” is an odd word choice. We think he’s saying to the staff and Sony, sorry that this SHADOW, this DISTRACTION, this BROUHAHA not of my making, means we have to tiresomely search for a permanent host again instead of focusing on building our brand and looking forward into a noble future. (There’s a reason the phrase “let’s move on” makes frequent appearances in bad apologies.)

Snarly is a Jeopardy! obsessive; she and her spouse and kids have long watched together. We rarely agree on TV shows, and Jeopardy! is the rare show we all enjoy. We are also inveterate Green Bay Packers fans and were very proud of Our Aaron (he worked so hard! with his pre-hosting training regimen and bright Post-Its all over the podium telling himself to stand up straight and stuff!). Truthfully, Snarly would have been fine with every single candidate who was not Mike Richards, except for Dr. Oz, who should take his pseudoscience and weight-loss scams and go live under a rock.

(Also, now that Snarly thinks that nothing is beneath Mike Richards, she suspects that Dr. Oz only got the temporary guest-hosting gig to make the very green Mike Richards look better in comparison.)

While we’re here, just for fun, let’s look at some of Richards’s earlier non-apologies.

First, this one, from August 9th, which he offered after the news came out that a) he’d put himself into host contention and b) his Price is Right tenure was dogged by a history of sexual harassment and wrongful termination complaints. (All hail The Ringer’s reporting on this story.)

Let’s see, we have use of passive voice. We have “the way my comments have been characterized,” “as a father,” “this is not who I am,” and “a lot going on right now”… in short, what a plethora of Bad Apology Bingo phrases!

There’s no apology here.

But immediately after the publication of the death-knell-producing blockbuster piece in The Ringer by Claire McNear, who threw herself on a grenade for all of us by listening to all 41 episodes of a podcast Richards hosted from 2013-2014, Richards did apologize. But well? Nope.

McNear noted that on his podcast, Richards had hectored his female cohost (formerly his assistant) about her “booby pictures,” and referred to her former job as convention floor model at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas as “booth ho,” “booth slut,” and “boothstitute.” Looking at a picture of her friends, he’d called them “really frumpy and overweight,” saying they “look terrible…they look fat” as they posed in one-piece bathing suits on a girlfriends’ getaway. (McNear had earlier reported that at The Price Is Right, Richards wanted the show’s models to wear bikinis on screen more often.) Richards also used the r-word and called his not-tall colleague the m-word (he used the same word about the actress Kristen Chenoweth). Responding to a guest’s non-specific comment about big noses, he said, “ixnay on the ose-nay, she’s not an ew-Jay.” He made disparaging comments about people on unemployment and criticized his colleague for giving a dollar to a homeless woman because the woman might have bought crack or meth (“that’s the sound of America going down the toilet”), which is ironic given that Alex Trebek was a longtime financial supporter of the Hope of the Valley Rescue Mission, a shelter for those in need, and that Mike Richards was not averse to a nice handout.

When the Ringer’s factchecking department called, all 41 episodes, plus the hosting site, were immediately taken down. (Shocker.) (The Internet is forever, though, so you can find them if you look.)

Richards responded:

“It is humbling to confront a terribly embarrassing moment of misjudgment, thoughtlessness, and insensitivity from nearly a decade ago. Looking back now, there is no excuse, of course, for the comments I made on this podcast and I am deeply sorry. The podcast was intended to be a series of irreverent conversations between longtime friends who had a history of joking around. Even with the passage of time, it’s more than clear that my attempts to be funny and provocative were not acceptable, and I have removed the episodes. My responsibilities today as a father, husband, and a public personality who speaks to many people through my role on television means I have substantial and serious obligations as a role model, and I intend to live up to them.”

Again, this response is all about him. His very first response: “Terribly embarrassing.” And again, woefully unspecific. A “moment of misjudgment”? 41 episodes is not a moment, sir. “The comments I made”? A good apology names the offense. He was just joking around, being funny, being provocative! (Three more Bad Apology Bingo phrases, by the way.) He and his co-host were “longtime friends,” so obviously she didn’t mind this stuff some people are apparently perceiving as sexist or classist or antisemitic! There are two attempts to place the podcast in the dim recesses of the past (“nearly a decade ago” and “passage of time”) but Richards was 38, and 2014 was neither a decade ago nor a time before people knew right from wrong. Plus it’s a little awkward to deploy the “as a husband and father” cliche when you’ve been repeatedly accused of discriminating against female employees for getting pregnant.

Of course, no one is perfect. Some of us might even recall bad apologies by other would-be Jeopardy hosts! Mayim Bialik apologized badly for a New York Times opinion piece she wrote in 2017 that seemed to say that because she dressed modestly and wasn’t conventionally beautiful, she was safe from harassment and assault from the likes of Harvey Weinstein. Intentionally or not, the essay was redolent of “not like other girls” and “they were asking for it.”

Bialik wrote:

I followed my mother’s strong example to not put up with anyone calling me “baby” or demanding hugs on set. I was always aware that I was out of step with the expected norm for girls and women in Hollywood… As a proud feminist with little desire to diet, get plastic surgery or hire a personal trainer, I have almost no personal experience with men asking me to meetings in their hotel rooms…. I still make choices every day as a 41-year-old actress that I think of as self-protecting and wise. I have decided that my sexual self is best reserved for private situations with those I am most intimate with. I dress modestly. I don’t act flirtatiously with men as a policy.

When folks on social media responded with dismay, Bialik’s initial reaction was to double down:

“I’m being told my New York Times piece resonated with so many and I am grateful for all the feedback. I also see a bunch of people have taken my words out of context of the Hollywood machine and twisted them to imply that God forbid I would blame a woman for her assault based on clothing or behavior. Anyone who knows me and my feminism knows that’s absurd and not at all what this piece was about.”

(Anyone who knows me! Another Bad Apology Bingo!)

In a Facebook Live interview with her assigning editor at the Times, Bari Weiss, Bialik used the phrase “not my intention” (SorryWatch often says “intention is far less important than impact”) and added, “I really do regret that this became what it became” — another airy wave of non-specifics and non-taking of responsibility. She continued, “I am deeply, deeply hurt if any woman who has been assaulted, or man, thinks that in any way I was victim-blaming…in 900 words I did the best I could to describe an entire very complicated dynamic that is really best for a thesis and not a 900-word piece.” Her feelings. Her intent. Her bad luck to only have 900 words when she would have been totes clear about not blaming victims if she’d only had a higher word count.

However, to her credit, she did explicitly say in the interview what she didn’t say in the essay: “There is no way to avoid being a victim of assault, and the only people who are responsible for their behavior are the predators.” Good! Finally, shortly thereafter, she ACTUALLY apologized and did it well.

Alas, Bialik was also weaselly in apologizing for her positions on vaccines. In a 2009 interview with People Magazine, she said, “We are a non-vaccinating family, but I make no claims about people’s individual decisions. We based ours on research and discussions with our pediatrician.” And in her 2012 parenting book, she wrote, “We made an informed decision not to vaccinate our children.” Under pressure from the public in 2015, she tweeted, “Honestly, people. Do your research. Do what’s right for you. Let me live my life and you live yours.” She provided a link to now-deleted FB post.

But she also tweeted, “dispelling rumors about my stance on vaccines. I’m not anti. My kids are vaccinated. So much anger and hysteria. I hope this clears things up.” (Calling other women hysterical is never a good idea. I hope this clears things up.) Bialik was explicit that she had been vaccinated against Covid.

But soft! Levar Burton is imperfect too! How dare!

Burton apologized for tweeting insensitively immediately after Philip Seymour Hoffman’s death was announced.

He finally did apologize well. And he elaborated in an interview with the CBC, telling interviewer George Stroumboulopoulos, “I apologize, because I said something that was really insensitive. I made a joke just hours after the announcement was made and it was wrong of me and I certainly did not mean to cause his family any additional harm and I’m really, really sorry.” Bravo for not making any excuses. However, he still wasn’t entirely kind or clear on the subject of addiction, continuing, “Well, as much as a disease as it is, addiction does begin and end with a choice, and it is the strength of will that goes along with ‘by the grace of God therefore I go every day, one day at a time.’” Still pretty hurtful to the family and to anyone who’s lost a loved one to addiction. (Snarly knows many people who fought really hard and bravely to kick their habit, and succeeded for a while, but ultimately succumbed. They weren’t inherently weak; they had a disease.)

Anyhoo: Both Bialik and Burton made public apologies far, far better than Richards’s.

Here’s an idea, though: Maybe let’s not look to celebrities as moral arbiters and role models? We can love LeVar for encouraging reading, and appreciate Mayim for being a super-terrific, smart, positive and graceful guest host (did you watch? She was sensational at the job!) without expecting them never to disappoint us. They’re human. They’re famous in a culture that worships fame. They’re accustomed to adoration and to people hanging on their every word. And they’re gonna screw up. So how about we make it a policy to forgive minor trespasses and accept apologies that seem genuine, whether the sinner is famous or not? And if someone is a full-on jobby-flavored fart lozenge,* how about we agree: Do not let them host a game show.

 

 

*Snarly just looked up some Scottish insults; the Scots are so gifted.