Florida State sorry for Martin Luther King graphic
Florida State‘s football recruiting department issued an apology Monday after tweeting and subsequently deleting an image of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. inside a graphic containing the team’s slogan, “Do something,” to celebrate the holiday honoring the civil rights icon.
In the since-deleted tweet, King appeared to be doing the school’s popular tomahawk chop celebration with a Nike glove edited onto his hand. The tweet read: “Happy MLK day! #GoNoles #DoSomething #MLK2019.”
Within an hour — after a number of college football fans had mocked the image online — the tweet was gone, and the account later responded with a written statement.
For those who didn’t see this Florida State tweet before they took it down … How does this happen? pic.twitter.com/bWsVURkHX8
“In a well-intentioned effort to recognize Martin Luther King, Jr. on this special day, a member of our recruiting staff created a graphic using one of Dr. King’s quotes — ‘If I cannot do great things, I can do small things in a great way.’ The quote resonated with our program’s Do Something mantra,” the tweet read.
“However, in our attempt to more closely connect the message to FSU, we foolishly posted a graphic that was not in line with our intent. We are sorry for missing the mark in our attempt to celebrate Dr. King’s legacy.”
The @FSU_Recruiting twitter account, which has about 37,000 followers, is mostly dedicated to promoting the team’s incoming recruits, current players and coaching staff members.