by Jamilah Lemieux
Clutch Magazine

Late last night, the Marriage Equality Act passed the New York Assembly, bringing the Empire State one step closer to extending full marriage rights to gay couples. However, the battle is not quite done, as the bill faces an uncertain future in the Senate.

Earlier that same day, a former New York Giants player released a video warning of the potential “consequences” of legalizing same-sex marriage. David Tyree worked with the anti-equality National Organization for Marriage on the clip, on which he claims that the passage of the Marriage Equality Act would be “be the beginning of our country sliding toward…anarchy.”

Unlike most same-sex marriage opponents, Tyree invoked both religious and secular reasons for his views: “You can’t teach something that you don’t have. So two men will never be able to teach a woman how to be a woman.” The former Super Bowl champion did not offer comment on the many straight persons who have also failed to teach children how to be women or men, including those who have abandoned their marital and parental responsibilities by choice.

WATCH MICHAEL STAHAN’S PRO-MARRIAGE EQUALITY AD:

Tyree also failed to see the parallels between the marriage battle and civil rights struggles of the past involving people of color, claiming that it is not okay to change a long-standing institution simply “because a minority — an influential minority — has … an agenda,” he said. Disregarding the separation between church and state, Tyree expressed that he is “disappointed when … not enough guys … lift up something as honorable and near to God’s heart as marriage…We’re doing God an injustice by not making his heart known to our country.”

Another ex-Giant has taken a very different stance in the same-sex marriage debate. Tyree’s former teammate Michael Strahan recorded an ad in support of the Human Rights Campaign’s “New Yorkers for Marriage Equality” campaign alongside fiancee Nicole Murphy. In the clip, the happy couple states “We believe that everyone should have the right to get married, just as we do.”

Strahan and Murphy were among the notable New Yorkers to participate in the campaign, which also featured Whoopi Goldberg and Russell Simmons.