Tony Dungy, Bigot

This is something I’ve been thinking about for a while now.

Tony Dungy is a bigot. He has been for years. The target of his bigotry is the LGBTQIA community. He has a problem with them. As do many of the organizations he gives his money and time too.

I don’t like bigots, even if their intolerance is biblical based. But you know what I really don’t like? People who ignore bigotry. The ones who hear it and then carry on as if it doesn’t exist. This is the case with Tony Dungy and his many admirers across the NFL, sports media, and public landscape.

They all know where he stands on this issue. He’s not shy about it, he’s been open with his bigotry against the community for years, and yet, you would be hard pressed to find a sports commentator or reporter who wouldn’t call him anything other than a great and honorable man. A paragon who is above reproach. The one they call upon when “wisdom” is needed on subjects like race relations in sports and America. Called upon–even though he’s a proud bigot.

It doesn’t seem to bother the people who call on him. Nor does it seem to bother the people who listen to him. Not any kind of consequential mass of them anyway. Howard Bryant said something interesting in reference to Dungy on Bomani Jones podcast-

Isn’t it fascinating how people think that if you don’t raise your voice you can’t be a bad person?

It is fascinating isn’t it?

I don’t know if Tony Dungy is a good person or bad. I do know that he believes horrible things about gay people. He believes them and backs people who have proposed policies that would be disastrous, and in some cases deadly, for them.

And they do it all in the name of their Lord and Savior. 

It’s not against the law to be a bigot. Nor is it against the law to be filled with hateful intolerance. But no right-minded person should be accepting of it. And no right-minded person should be looking to bigots for wisdom. Not even when it comes in a soft voice.  That softness, that earnestness, has proven to be an illusion. A porcelain veneer hiding a blackness of spirit. A facade that people are all too eager and willing to accept. The question for me is what will it take for it to become unacceptable? I believe someone when they show me who they are. 

Tony Dungy is a bigot.