UFC president Dana White has spoken out in support of gay fighters. “I’ll tell you right now, if there’s a gay fighter in the UFC, I wish he would come out,” White said during an interview. “I could care less if there is a gay fighter in the UFC. There probably is, and there is probably more than one.”
White was responding to complaints by the Las Vegas Culinary Union and other organizations that have filed reports and created online positions against the UFC for what they consider homophobic conduct. The complaints often cite Antônio Rodrigo Nogueira as an example of homophobia in the UFC. Nogueira has made statements saying that he would allow a gay fighter to train at his academy, but he personally would not want to train with him. White has also been accused of homophobia in the past and was caught on film directing anti-gay slurs at a reporter in 2009. Shortly after, he released an apology.
“If you guys look at the stuff I’ve said over the past 10 years — some of it stupid, some of it whatever — that [the video in which he makes the slurs] is the one thing that bothers me,” White said about accusations that he’s homophobic. “That’s the one thing that bothers me — the fact that these culinary losers can go out and say I’m a homophobe and things like that, because it’s the furthest from the truth.”
Obviously, it’s not the furthest thing from the truth if you were caught on camera using words that are derogatory to homosexuals, but we all make mistakes. Since the UFC appeals primarily to straight boys butch lesbians, I think it’s cool that White is evolved enough to not only apologize for his faults, but to encourage his fighters to be themselves.
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