Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
Donate your vehicle during the month of April or May and you'll be entered into a $500 Visa gift card drawing!

'That's A Clown Question, Bro' Or The Rhetorical Comeback Rounding Twitter

Washington Nationals' Bryce Harper prepares to bat during a baseball game with the New York Mets on June 5 in Washington.
Alex Brandon
/
AP
Washington Nationals' Bryce Harper prepares to bat during a baseball game with the New York Mets on June 5 in Washington.

If Twitter has its way, "That's a clown question, bro" will join "Don't tase me, bro" in the annals of popular rhetorical comebacks.

"That's a clown question, bro" comes from 19-year-old baseball phenom Bryce Harper. That's what he told a Canadian journalist yesterday, following his second three-hit game in a row.

The journalist asked the Nationals' Harper if he was going to celebrate by drinking a beer, being that the legal drinking age in Canada is 19.

Harper, who is Mormon, rolled his eyes and said, "I'm not going to answer that. That's a clown question, bro."

In truth, the phrase is much funnier in print and removed from the context, as you'll see in this video:

But that hasn't stopped Twitter. The phrase has ignited debate. There is a T-shirt now. And many have noted that in a confrontational interview today, NBA Commissioner David Stern should have resorted to the Harperism.

Instead, when Jim Rome asked Stern, "Was the fix in for the [NBA] lottery?" He replied, "Have you stopped beating your wife yet?" an answer that called into question the trickery of the phrasing.

Chris Moody, a political reporter for Yahoo!, tweets:

"Jay Carney didn't say "that's a clown question, bro" during today's WH presser. This is how I feel about that: http://bit.ly/NfSdKU"

We'll note that unlike "Don't tase me, bro." the Harperism has not gotten an entry on Urbandictionary.com.

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Eyder Peralta is NPR's East Africa correspondent based in Nairobi, Kenya.

You make NHPR possible.

NHPR is nonprofit and independent. We rely on readers like you to support the local, national, and international coverage on this website. Your support makes this news available to everyone.

Give today. A monthly donation of $5 makes a real difference.