A few months ago, Capital A CEO Tony Fernandes received a wave of criticism when he posted a photo on his LinkedIn profile of himself shirtless in a conference room while receiving a massage. The post was taken down shortly after but not before making numerous headlines.
It seems that the AirAsia chief might still be bitter about the incident as he posted a photo yesterday (Thursday, 28th December) of himself posing with a shirtless cosplayer at a recent anime/cosplay event. Here’s what he said:
As seen in the photo he posted on his LinkedIn profile, Tony stood next to a hunky Ryomen Sukuna (from “Jujutsu Kaisen”) cosplayer at Suria KLCC during the Comic Fiesta 2023 event. In the captions, the CEO said that it was unfair that the cosplayer gets to walk around shirtless in public when he can’t do the same in the comfort of his own conference room.
“Please tell me why this cosplayer can walk around Kuala Lumpur with no shirt on but when I take mine off for a sports massage with everyone’s consent, it’s global news? Thought it showed how we could multitask and what a great culture we had. Hahahahaha oh well,” he wrote. From the caption, it can be assumed that the 59-year-old was simply poking fun at the double standard.
Those on LinkedIn pointed out that the cosplayer was at an event which allowed him to portray the “Jujutsu Kaisen” character without the need to cover up whereas in Tony’s case, he was in a professional setting, hence why it was considered inappropriate for him to strip off. Those on Twitter were more ruthless with their comments.
As seen in the screenshots above, many said that he should not even compare himself to the young well-built cosplayer with six pack abs. Someone even added that while the hunky cosplayer was “blessing” onlookers with his abs, Tony showing off his bulging belly was a “disgrace”. Ouch!
