By DAVID HAUGH
By DAVID HAUGH
Tribune News Service
As an Indiana native working in Chicago, I always laughed along with colleagues who mocked my Hoosier roots in fun, typically asking them to speak slower so I could follow.
It never bothered me because of my pride in being a small-town kid in the big city, a product of a place like so many others in a state known for its hospitality. It never embarrassed me among friends to be the guy who grew up working odd jobs on farms and in factories or someone who identified with everything about Indiana’s heritage.
Until now.
A week of celebration over the Final Four in Indianapolis has turned into a national discussion about what’s wrong with Hoosiers. Ugh. Ideologically speaking, an Indy car couldn’t distance me fast enough from association with the new law of my homeland creating all the fuss.
Legislation Gov. Mike Pence signed called the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, essentially institutionalizing intolerance allowing discrimination of gays and lesbians, nudged Indiana toward a historic tipping point. The state’s image, economy and overall well-being hangs in the balance. Pence called a news conference Tuesday to control the damage, but his vow to “make clear this law does not give businesses a right to deny services to anyone” failed to mute the state’s mutinous citizens.
To spare Indiana from ignominy, Senate Bill 101 intended to protect religious freedom needs to be repealed or the General Assembly must enact a companion law to counter it that prohibits such discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity. Not that anybody expects a governor who still sounded rattled to respond to mounting public pressure.
“Was I expecting this kind of backlash? Heavens, no,” Pence acknowledged Tuesday.
Days away from college basketball’s premier event, chances are Pence hasn’t seen anything yet. Sports traditionally offer platforms to increase awareness and push for social change, one recent example in Chicago coming from Joakim Noah’s anti-violence campaign. In Indianapolis, imagine how powerful a symbolic, anti-discrimination message from all four teams would be received. Student-athletes can unite for a cause beyond NCAA issues, especially one as serious as discrimination.
If it were logistically feasible before Saturday, the NCAA would face a mandate to move the Final Four. It isn’t but, barring political intervention, this could be Indy’s last one. If nothing changes, the NCAA also should consider moving its headquarters out of Indianapolis rather than stay in a state that overreached legally protecting businesses that choose to discriminate against gays and lesbians.
In Illinois, for instance, the RFRA law protects religious freedom but also provides gay and lesbian residents protected legal status. The federal government and 19 states have adopted RFRA laws that similarly safeguard religious freedom, but Indiana goes one step further with open-ended legislation White House press secretary Josh Earnest worried “could justify discriminating against somebody because of who they love.”
Sports at every level help promote the kind of inclusion Indiana’s landmark law discourages.
The NFL should take Indianapolis out of the running for future Super Bowls until the law changes. The NBA and the Pacers issued statements but the NBA Players Association should advise free agents to avoid signing in Indianapolis to spur change. The Colts should threaten to move back to Baltimore just out of principle. A sports town like Indy needs to keep its sports teams happy partners.
The Big Ten should relocate its league title game, scheduled at Lucas Oil Stadium through 2021, to someplace like Soldier Field. The list of championships suddenly up in the air because of the local change in climate is long, as NCAA President Mark Emmert hinted.
“It strikes at the core values of inclusion and diversity,” Emmert said.
You know something’s out of whack when a politician makes Emmert, a pinata for sportswriters, look noble by comparison. But Emmert speaks for his constituency, as one major-college athletic director explained.
“Our student-athletes, coaches and staff deserve to be fully supported and embraced regardless of race, religion, sexual orientation and gender,” the athletic director told the Tribune.
USC athletic director Pat Haden, whose son is gay, tweeted that he will skip the College Football Playoff meeting in Indianapolis this weekend in protest. Even NASCAR, a sport built around turning left with fans who often veer right politically, released a statement vowing not to “embrace nor participate in exclusion or intolerance.”
Understandably, the law’s symbolism scares every sport. One Division I football coach wondered if Indiana can legally allow businesses in 2015 to discriminate based on sexual orientation could similar habits form based on race, religion or ethnicity?
In sports and beyond, too much is at stake for any state to open the door even a crack to government-sponsored discrimination. It’s a dangerous precedent. The roads aren’t the only things that can be narrow in some rural parts of Indiana. As a native Hoosier, I can only hope the philosophical landscape changes — and soon.