At the urging of New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, the NFL has written a new game plan to fight discrimination against gays. The league said it will hang posters in the locker rooms of all 32 teams detailing the by-laws of its anti-discriminatory policies.
The groundbreaking blitz to step up awareness against discrimination will be reinforced by special training sessions with rookies and with team staffers involved with recruiting and signing players.
Schneiderman got involved in March after at least three college football players said they had reportedly been asked about their sexual orientation during recruitment interviews at the NFL Scouting Combines earlier in the year.
The questions came after Notre Dame star linebacker Manti Te’o was revealed to have had an online relationship with a man pretending to be a woman. Te'o claims he was not questioned about his own sexual orientation.
The attorney general warned NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell in a letter that New York State laws make it illegal for an employer to base a hiring decision on sexual orientation. And as a business based on New York, the NFL must comply with the law, he said.
This led to the two parties getting together and coming to a resolution.
Goodell said he believes the NFL proved to Schneiderman that it has had a longstanding anti-discrimination policy and is taking the issue seriously.
“I think they felt that we were doing the right things,” he said.
The NFL said it soon will “reiterate and reinforce” its policy in writing to the players, teams and staff.
“This is something that is very important to us and we have the right policies in place to support it,” Goodell said.
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