Danny Baker Fired After Posting Royal Baby "Monkey" Image

9 May 2019, 08:59 | Updated: 9 May 2019, 11:14

Radio host Danny Baker has been fired after posting an image of a monkey instead of the Royal baby.

He infuriated Twitter users by posting an image of a couple holding the hands of a young chimpanzee, with the caption "Royal baby leaves hospital".

Users were livid, pointing out he was comparing the first mixed-race Royal with a monkey.

He later apologised, writing: "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."

This morning, he tweeted: "Just got fired from 5 Live.

"The call to fire me from 5 Live 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."

Responding to the sacking, James O'Brien said on LBC: "He often talks about chimpanzees dressed as famous people without any racial subtext whatsoever.

"Obviously the subtext changes hugely when the gag is applied to a child of ethnic minority. It changes, of course it does, but I don't think that was even close to Danny Baker's tweet when he sent that tweet because he does loads of stuff about monkeys and apes dressed as human beings.

"The massive racist history of the conflation of gorillas and apes with people of colour is disgusting and I'm afraid it's a matter of historical record. But I don't think Danny Baker did that."

A number of people on Twitter had been calling for his sacking, with one saying: "Sorry, Danny Baker needs to go. There's far too much tolerance of racism - the country is really in danger of slipping into a murky and ignorant abyss, a sludge made up of xenophobia, racial intolerance and insensitivity."

Another wrote: "Is there a petition going to get Danny Baker sacked? My pen is ready."