REFEREE DAVID GOUGH says he felt obliged to speak out against the language used by Colm O’Rourke on an episode of Allianz League Sunday earlier this month, during which the RTÉ pundit used the phrase “pansy-boy” while relaying his fears that physicality will be phased out of the Gaelic football.
O’Rourke faced a public backlash for what many deemed to be the use of homophobic language, inadvertent or otherwise.
“If a person isn’t going to have the ability to go for a ball and take a chance on hitting somebody”, O’Rourke said, “then we’ll have nothing in the game. It will be a namby-pamby, pansy-boy game and I think none of us want that.”
All-Ireland football final referee Gough, who is openly gay, was among those who took umbrage with the remark. He tweeted shortly afterwards: “The pejorative use of homophobic language on national TV is abhorrent and unacceptable. I’m disgusted.”
The pejorative use of homophobic language on national TV is abhorrent and unacceptable. I'm disgusted. @RTEmcbennettd @RTEgaa https://t.co/PtuFHUz5Ur
— David Gough (@goughd4) February 2, 2020
O’Rourke subsequently contacted Gough, who he has known for 25 years, to discuss the matter.
Speaking on Tuesday’s Game On, Gough elaborated on his reasoning behind criticising the language used. He stressed that while he has no doubt O’Rourke neither meant any offence nor intended to use the expression in a homophobic context, the particular language used could still be offensive to members of the LGBTI community and had no place being broadcast on national television.
“If you look back at the tweet it was very specific and I took my time in composing it,” Gough said. “I called out what I said was pejorative use of homophobic language which was meant to be a throwaway remark.
I’ve know Colm since I was 12 years of age. I went to school where he was my manager at St Pat’s in Navan and he’s been a huge champion of my refereeing and my abilities on the football field over many years. I’d be the first to say that Colm meant no harm and he’s not homophobic, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that it did cause harm to people from the LGBT community and that needs to be recognised.
“I thought it was very unfortunate that it was broadcast on national TV.
“I have been lucky enough to survive a very private and a very public coming-out over the last nine years and there is almost an obligation on me to ensure that many other people in the LGBT community won’t face those challenges in the future.
I have been one of those people who [has] listened to that type of pejorative abuse in dressing rooms and in GAA grounds around Slane, Navan, and the country, and I thought it was the right thing to do to call it out.
“Colm may not have known that the language was a homophobic slur but we need to be big enough to say that it is, that we have learned from it and move on,” he said.
Equally, I would say that I might not know if someone is suffering from a racist slur or a sectarian slur because I’m not educated in what is offensive to them. But if someone said that to me, I would apologise immediately, learn from it and move on.
“I think that’s the greatest thing we can take out of this: that there is a learning process. People were educated around it and we can just move on from it.”
