There was lots of controversy on Twitter (but when isn’t there?) a couple days ago when Leafs defenseman, Morgan Rielly, was accused of yelling a homophobic slur on the ice.
There were conflicting opinions with some people thinking the on-ice mics caught him yelling “Fucking faggot” (which wouldn’t be the first time this has happened in the NHL) while others thought it was a combination of someone yelling “Fuck!” while Rielly (whose team was on the penalty kill at the time) was yelling “Rag it!” (which is hockey slang for “hold on to the puck and try to waste time” – usually said when you’re killing a penalty or protecting a lead near the end of the game – though apparently even some NHL players claim to have never heard the term.)
The NHL did an investigation and exonerated Rielly (which naturally led to conspiracy theories that the NHL was covering things up to protect their image) but no matter the finding in this situation, it’s unfortunate that slurs – homophobic and otherwise – are still heard in arenas big and small to this day.
At the same time, the Rielly case is an interesting one in that it’s also an indictment of the immediacy of the Internet which mixes with outrage culture so that people and organizations are regularly found guilty of all manner of crimes they didn’t commit, usually without any opportunity for all evidence to be considered or the accused to be fairly judged – whether that’s a kid in a MAGA hat in Washington DC or a hockey player in Toronto.
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