Former Cowboys wide receiver and Pro Football Hall of Famer Michael Irvin has become somewhat of a preacher as he’s grown older. He’s no longer the drug using, womanizing, flamboyant party animal he was during his playing days and in the early parts of his retirement. Now, he’s making an effort to support gays.
As we learned via Deadspin, Irvin is on the cover of Out Magazine and talked about homosexuality in a feature article.
“If anyone comes out in those top four major sports, I will absolutely support him,” says Irvin. “That’s why I do my radio show every day. When these issues come out, I want to have a voice to speak about them. I think growth comes when we share. Until we do that, we’re going to be stuck in the Dark Ages about a lot of things. When a guy steps up and says, ‘This is who I am,’ I guarantee you I’ll give him 100% support.”
“The last thing I want is to go to God and have him ask, ‘What did you do?’ And I talk about winning Super Bowls and national titles,” Irvin says. “I didn’t do anything to make it a better world before I left? That would be scary.”
Irvin says he thinks he would have supported a gay player on his team as long as the player helped them win. He also thinks the player would have been supported rather than chastised as long as he were accepted by some of the other team leaders.
You can also call him the anti-David Tyree for his views on the issue. Tyree, the former Giants receiver, infamously said gay marriage would lead to anarchy. Irvin feels differently about the way homosexuality should be viewed.
“I don’t see how any African-American with any inkling of history can say that you don’t have the right to live your life how you want to live your life. No one should be telling you who you should love, no one should be telling you who you should be spending the rest of your life with. When we start talking about equality and everybody being treated equally, I don’t want to know an African-American who will say everybody doesn’t deserve equality.”
In case you’re wondering why Irvin has come out in support of gays, a good amount of it has to do with his late brother Vaughn, who was gay. Irvin speculates that he acted like a macho ladies-man throughout his career because he was in fear of being gay himself.
Between this and the story of his Hall of Fame jacket, it’s clear Irvin has changed over the past several years. And we like what we see.
