Floyd Mayweather gives stunningly ignorant response to #MeToo question

Hint: he didn't talk about strong women

Boxer Floyd Mayweather Jr. during a post-fight news conference at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada (REUTERS/Steve Marcus)

Boxer and domestic abuser Floyd Mayweather has apparently not been paying too much attention to the #MeToo movement.

As most people with a cursory knowledge of current events could tell you, the term refers to the torrent of women who have come forward to describe their experiences of sexual harassment and assault, in the process toppling a series of powerful luminaries in the fields of entertainment, media and politics and forcing a national reckoning with sexual violence against women.

But in Mr Mayweather’s interpretation, the term is about him. And money.

Asked in a Men’s Health interview about the movement, Mr Mayweather initially responded: “The who”? When an interviewer explained it was “women speaking out about sexual assault,” the retired fighter uncorked the following:

“When you say ‘me too’ ... When somebody is like, ‘I got a Rolls Royce,’ I be like ‘me too.’” When somebody say they got a private jet, I say, ‘Me too. I got two. Me too,’” he said.

When the interviewer tried to interject, he plowed on: “Well, I didn't know! My Me Too movement from the beginning was whenever somebody said what they have I'm like, ‘me too.’ Somebody say they got a billion dollars, I say, ‘I made a billion dollars, me too’”.

Mr Mayweather has repeatedly been accused of battery and domestic violence. He pleaded guilty in 2011 to a battery domestic violence charge stemming from an altercation with his ex-girlfriend; was convicted in 2004 of two counts of misdemeanour battery after a fight with two women at a nightclub; and entered a plea bargain for domestic violence charges in 2002.