Gay sports host who was allegedly called a f*g by his radio station has been fired
Seth Dunlap wrote about the shame he has experienced as a gay man. (Facebook)
Gay radio host Seth Dunlap, who was called a “fag” in a since deleted tweet from the radio station he worked for, has been fired.
A public row between Dunlap and WWL Radio broke out in September when a tweet from the official radio account referred to him as a “fag”. Dunlap later filed a $1.85 million lawsuit against the station over its “anti-LGBT culture” – however, the station later claimed Dunlap had sent the homophobic tweet himself.
Now, a month and a half after the public row first broke out, Dunlap’s attorney Megan Kiefer has revealed that he was fired from the New Orleans station at the end of October.
“The action of Entercom wrongfully terminating Mr Dunlap has compounded his damages,” Kiefer said in a statement released on Saturday.
“It is truly reprehensible [the station] would be attempting to blame the victim of its own anti-LGBT culture, and they are only compounding the severe damage that Mr Dunlap has experienced at the hands of Entercom,” she continued.
The radio station alleged that Seth Dunlap sent the anti-gay tweet himself.
In September, the station’s owners revealed that they had passed the issue on to police after a digital forensic expert said he had “posted the tweet himself from his personal cellphone”.
WWL host Seth Dunlap denies sending the tweet about himself
The police investigation into the since deleted tweet is ongoing. Last month, detectives obtained a warrant to investigate the phone the tweet was allegedly sent from.
The action of Entercom wrongfully terminating Mr Dunlap has compounded his damages,” Kiefer said in a statement released on Saturday.
Kiefer has previously denied that Dunlap had anything to do with the tweet, saying that he was not one of the 14 staff members who had access to the Twitter account.
The station deleted the original tweet and apologised 12 hours later – but had already been widely condemned.
The controversy kicked off when Dunlap wrote an open letter to NFL quarterback Drew Brees, who has been criticised for appearing in a promotional video for anti-LGBT+ group Focus on the Family.
In the essay, Dunlap delved into the challenges he had faced as a gay sports presenter. It was then that the official WWL Radio station’s Twitter account quoted one of his tweets and referred to him using the homophobic slur.
Almost 12 hours later, the station tweeted: “We are aware of a tweet that went out today from the WWL account. The content of the tweet is categorically offensive and abhorrent to the station. We are actively investigating this incident and will take swift and appropriate action once we determine how this occurred.”
