WNBA legend Angel McCoughtry isn’t buying UFC CEO Dana White‘s hands-off approach to Pride Month, calling his stance hypocritical and asking that the LGBTQ+ community receive the same recognition as other groups in major sports.

Speaking with TMZ, the former top draft pick and defensive juggernaut criticized how the biggest MMA promotion in the world handles the topic of gay athletes, especially on the men’s side.

“Guys, why is it always like, ‘Oh, I know we have gay female fighters; maybe we have gay female fighters’? Like, why is it a maybe?” McCoughtry asked. “I’m sure you have gay male fighters. Why isn’t there a discourse there?

“That’s why we still have all these men on the DL (down-low), because it’s always this maybe and this masculinity thing.”

When the interviewer pointed out that Dana White simply considers an athlete’s sexuality to be a strictly personal decision rather than a workplace issue, the WNBA icon did not shy away from shooting back, claiming that a league executive absolutely has a responsibility to lead social initiatives.

“It is his job,” she insisted. “I know he doesn’t care what people do with their love life, which I agree on that. But we have different initiatives in that sport that we use to support people and groups.

“Like, we support the military. We support women in domestic violence. Why we could love that. So this will help. People will probably see a lot of DL men fighters come out because they’re supporting that initiative. So yes, they need to have it.”

The former Minnesota Lynx player pointed out that supporting Pride is more than just about individual orientation. In fact, she pointed out that professional leagues cross into non-sporting territory all the time irrespective of whether their core mission aligns with it or not.

“It’s for people in general, people who love Pride,” she said. “You don’t have to be gay to want to support Pride, to be a part of it, to go to the parties, to go to gay initiatives.

“And I think that’s the misinterpretation of it. You can just support it just because it’s something you want to support.”

Angel McCoughtry doubled down on her point by referencing rookie orientations in professional sports that cover everything from managing money to personal relationships.

“A lot of things don’t align, right?” she said. “That’s not our business, but it’s still required to do some of those things, right? But we do it anyway, to support people, to support our athletes, to show that we care, just like we did with Black Lives Matter.

“That has nothing to do with sports either, right? Politics stuff, but we do it anyway, because we show that that’s what athletes do. People will look up to us.”

For the unaware, the former basketball player’s criticism follows Dana White’s appearance on Tomi Lahren is Fearless, in which he explicitly said that the UFC will never organize “Pride Nights” or change its logo in June. However, it has nothing to do with him being in support of or against LGBTQ+, as for the UFC CEO, social causes and publicity don’t go hand in hand.

Inside the UFC and Dana White’s philosophy on social initiatives

If he wanted to, we’re pretty sure Dana White, too, could’ve held “Pride Nights,” but for the UFC boss, the issue boils down to avoiding corporate virtue signaling.

“I’m staring at my board, of my roster, of top 15 fighters,” the head honcho told Tomi Lahren in a recent interview. “I am assuming we have some gay fighters; I don’t know how many of them are openly. I know that we have gay female fighters. I don’t care what you are, who you are, or what you do.

“That’s just—we don’t talk about that or any of that stuff. We have a T-shirt that says, “We Are All Fighters,” and it’s got the gay flag colors on it. Everybody, do your own thing. I’m just not into it. We just let everybody be themselves, do their thing.”

And to be fair, when compared to Major League Baseball’s current administrative nightmare, Dana White’s decision to skip the themed-night game appears to be quite tactical. During a Pride Night game on June 12, several San Francisco Giants pitchers scribbled Bible verses on their caps in protest of the team’s rainbow logos.

And in a move that critics claim goes against every American’s freedom of speech, the MLB charged the players with uniform violations, resulting in widespread public outrage and a formal civil rights investigation by the Department of Justice.

But what has kept the UFC safe from such controversies is Dana White’s policy of always separating an athlete’s personal life from their performance in the cage.

Long before other sports leagues actively promoted LGBTQ+ athletes, the UFC included them in pay-per-view events. Liz Carmouche made history in 2013 by becoming the first openly gay fighter to compete in the Octagon as she went one-on-one against Ronda Rousey.

Rather than using her orientation as a marketing gimmick, the Dana White-led promotion just advertised her as just another up-and-coming fighter like they always do. And as for the issue raised by Angel McCoughtry about male gay fighters, currently, there are no openly gay male fighters on the active UFC roster.

The closest the promotion has come was when flyweight Jeff Molina publicly came out as bisexual in March 2023. However, it was against his will after an intimate video was leaked online without his consent. And true to his word and actions, Dana White kept the promotion completely out of the picture, providing no public commentary and keeping the focus strictly on the sport.