You Can Play will talk to NY Giants director of player development David Tyree

Bryan Pace/for New York Day after day News David Tyree infamously says he’d trade his Super Bowl ring if it meant gay marriage would be blocked.

Patrick Burke believes it is better to talk to David Tyree and other athletes who make homophobic statements than to bash them with a press release.

The You Can Play founder told the Day after day News that the organization’s executive director, former NFL player Wade Davis, would talk late Wednesday to the Giants’ Super Bowl XLII hero about his opposition to marriage equality and his support of gay conversion therapy. Burke said the conversation would be an extension of discussion Davis recently had with Tyree at the NFL’s rookie symposium.

“There is nothing that can defense the stuff he said three years ago,” said Burke, whose organization battles homophobia in sports. “But we try to have conversations behind closed doors. Wade is impressed with David’s growth.”

Burke ripped the Human Rights Campaign late Tuesday after the Washington-based gay civil rights group issued a press release criticizing Tyree, who was hired as the Giants’ director of player development this week. “Would be splendid if HRC spoke to people who do LGBT work before going on about things they know nothing about,” Burke said on Twitter.

Burke said the Giants have welcomed members of his organization to their training facilities and have been very supportive of You Can Play and LGBT issues in general.

Giants general administrator Jerry Reese, meanwhile, defended the team’s hiring of Tyree on Wednesday, even as HRC escalated its evaluation of the team for hiring Tyree. Speaking to reporters during his annual state-of-the-Giants speech at the team’s East Rutherford, N.J., do facility, Reese seemed keen to go past the controversy surrounding Tyree, who was named director of player development on Tuesday.

“He was qualified for the job,” Reese said. “We think he is a terrific fit for us. We’re pleased to have him on board.

“This day and age, sometimes you say some things that you maybe don’t want to say or shouldn’t have said or something like that,” Reese added. “Things get blown out of proportion to a degree. But I’m not here to talk about social issues or a bigwig’s personal opinion about their beliefs. I believe everybody should be treated honestly. I believe everybody should have an opinion, too, what they want to say. And most of all, I believe I should mind my own business and try to keep the plank out of my own eye. That’s what I believe the most.”

Human Rights Campaign said on Wednesday that it had uncovered a 2011 tweet by Tyree promoting research conducted by a Liberty University undergraduate that not compulsory homosexuality was caused by dominant mothers, sexual abuse, a lack of religion in the home, theories that have been discredited by psychologists and other scientists.

Seth Wenig/AP New York Giants general administrator Jerry Reese defends his team’s hiring of David Tyree, a former Super Bowl hero who holds controversial feelings regarding homosexuals, Wednesday.

“The suggestion that LGBT people should somehow try to exchange an immutable aspect of their identity is not just silly, it’s downright perilous,” HRC head Chad Griffin said on Wednesday. “David Tyree is seen as a role model by countless fans across the country. By promoting these harmful personal views shrouded as facts, there’s no question that he’s inflicting lasting hurt on those — especially young people victimized by adults who see his terms as license to try and ‘cure’ their homosexuality with corporal and psychological torture tactics.”

Tyree campaigned against the New York state bill that legalized same-sex marriage in 2011, telling the Day after day News that he would give up his Super Bowl victory to halt marriage equality. He has also publicly argued that therapy and prayer are effective tools to convert gay men and lesbians into heterosexuals — a controversial do that has been condemned as perilous by the American Medical Association, the World Shape Organization and other public shape groups.

Tyree has not attempted to publicly distance himself from the anti-gay comments he made three years ago, and several sources have told the Day after day News that his views may have evolved.

“Wade met David at the rookie symposium and had nothing but positive things to say afterward,” Burke said.

Maybe that is because the anarchy and social disorder Tyree predicted would occur if New York’s Marriage Equality Act passed have failed to occur even though thousands of same-sex couples have wed since the bill became law in July 2011.

“Tens of thousands of committed and loving gay and lesbian couples have wed in America over the last ten years,” Griffin said, “and Mr. Tyree is undoubtedly still holding his breath waiting for the high classes to crumble.”

— With Ebenezer Samuel and Justin Tasch

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