U.S. Senator Tommy Tuberville took the National Football League’s ownership to task on Tuesday during an interview with Outkick’s Hot Mic podcast for allowing men to perform in female cheerleading roles.
The controversy surrounding the issue gained notoriety after the Minnesota Vikings reported having two such cheerleaders, Blaize Shiek and Louie Conn, ahead of the preseason’s kickoff.
The former Auburn University football coach was blunt in his assessment of the issue.
“I would like to ask the ownership of the NFL and the commissioner: ‘What the hell are you doing?’”
“You’ve got the number one sport on planet Earth in terms of people watching it,” Tuberville said.
“Your business is growing. It’s getting better and better. If you’re going to be woke and you’re going to try to take the men out of men’s sports and say, ‘Okay, we’re gonna make it more about gender than we are about masculinity.’ Then you’re gonna have a huge problem.”
While the male cheerleaders may have support in places like Minnesota and California, Tuberville is certain the reaction will not be the same in more conservative markets.
“Minnesota is doing it. You know, they’re one of the blue states. We’ve lost them. They’re more about socialism and all of the things that go on with that,” he said. “And it’s about, you know, 150 genders. At the end of the day, I hope to God it doesn’t come south to Atlanta or to Texas or to Dallas, because you’ll lose it. People will actually quit buying tickets and going because of the narrative they’re trying to push.”
“This is not just about a couple of people being men cheerleaders. It is about pushing a narrative that you want to put gender into sports and let everybody know that we’re trying to take the masculinity out of it. That’s not going to happen in the South.”
In response to the outcry, the Vikings issued a statement to NBC, doubling down on the franchise’s decision to retain Shiek and Conn.
“Male cheerleaders have been part of previous Vikings teams and have long been associated with collegiate and professional cheerleading,” the team told NBC News. “We support all our cheerleaders and are proud of the role they play as ambassadors of the organization.”
Austen Shipley is the News Director for Yellowhammer News. You can follow him on X @ShipleyAusten
