Isaiah Washington is No Martyr, He's An Ass

Posted by Guest Blogger at 5:59 AM on July 10, 2007.

This post, written by Jill Filipovic, originally appeared on Feministe

I love me some Grey's Anatomy, but Isaiah Washington sure has a talent for acting like an ass and then feeling sorry for himself.. He did an interview on Larry King Live to clarify his use of the word "faggot" during a fight with McDreamy. He says:

WASHINGTON: He got un -- became unhinged, face-to-face, spittle to spittle, in my face -- first. I did not start it. And I'm asking him why is he screaming at me, why are we doing this? Get out of my face. Several times. Several times. And he just becomes irate. But I'm not understanding why am I being berated to this point in front of our crew, particularly after what we experienced in Seattle. You know, I mean, I think you owe me on apology and I'm being berated.

And by that time I pushed him out of my face and it just took off from there and I began to say a lot of -- a lot of things that I'm not really proud of -- but all referring to myself and how I felt I was being treated.

KING: But how did the bad word come out of that?

WASHINGTON: Well, I said several bad words, as well as he did.

KING: To him?

WASHINGTON: To him about how I was feeling. I said there's no way you're going to treat me like a "B" word or a "P" word or the "F" word. You can't treat me this way in front of our crew.

KING: So you weren't referring to him as being an F person?

WASHINGTON: Never. Never. KING: Or anybody else being one?

WASHINGTON: Never, Larry.

Never, never, never, never,

KING: You said you can't treat me like a --

WASHINGTON: No.

KING: What was the word you used?

WASHINGTON: The "B" word was --

KING: All right. You don't want to --

WASHINGTON: -- indicative of maybe a four-legged dog --

KING: OK.

WASHINGTON: -- or a four-legged dog. And the "P" word would be more like punk, things like that. It's just that I felt at that point there was no place of return --

KING: And the "F" word meaning he was treating you like a gay person?

WASHINGTON: No. Just, in terms of the way I meant it is that any -- the "F" word to me, at that particular time, before this took off in this other direction, in terms of sexual orientation, it meant something -- it meant, to me, someone who is being weak --

KING: Oh.

WASHINGTON: -- a person who is not being treated -- is not deserving of respect.

KING: You weren't referring to any other cast member?

WASHINGTON: No, no, no.

Ahhh ok. So you weren't calling another cast member a faggot, you were just saying that faggots are weak and you are not weak. And you weren't referring to an actual "f-person" (as Larry put it) or anything! And you certainly aren't a bitch or a pussy -- words which you no doubt meant only as references to four-legged dogs* and kitty cats, and which is no way reflect misogyny any more than using the word "faggot" reflects homophobia.

Thanks to Christina for the link.

*Yeah, he apparently thinks that the term "bitch" is related to the numer of legs a canine is walking on. Read the transcript.

Tagged as: homophobia, grey's anatomy, washington, television

Jill Filipovic is a New York-based freelance writer and a law student at NYU. More of her writing is available online at her blog, Feministe.