Make no mistake—it’s mainstream to be pro-life

Beloved former NFL coach and current NBC sports analyst Tony Dungy recently made the apparent mistake of publicly endorsing an extremely mainstream opinion while speaking at the March for Life this year: Namely, that unborn children don’t deserve to die.

The predictable hysteria from some corners of the internet followed. Erstwhile sports commentator Keith Olbermann said Dungy ought to be fired. Op-eds in prominent papers all over the country accused Dungy of being “regressive,” among other things. A social media mob formed in short order to smear him over past and present expressions of belief.

Setting the justice or injustice of the smear campaign aside for a moment, let’s establish one thing very firmly: Dungy is with many Americans on this issue. Polling shows that 69% of Americans support limiting abortion to the first three months of pregnancy, at the most. Americans don’t want other Americans forced to perform abortions to which they object morally. They don’t want taxpayer funds used to subsidize the abortion machine at home or abroad.

Consider, too, the vast numbers of Americans who actively work to support vulnerable women who are either seeking an abortion or considering one. At Human Coalition, we are part of a blessedly broad and complex movement invested in making these abortions unthinkable and unnecessary. Pregnancy resource centers deliver hundreds of millions of dollars in support to women and their children every year. Thousands of centers operate using the time and talent of untold men and women invested in saving preborn life. I’ve devoted my life to the cause, and I’m far from unique.

So why is it that an individual man—one who has, notably, fostered more than 100 children in need—expresses a mainstream and sincerely held belief, only to be met with blind outrage? Why is it that Dungy faces threats to his career when he speaks freely and humbly of his pro-life convictions, all while a vast and blithely pro-abortion network of talking heads use their professional platforms to proclaim daily how important it is that Americans endorse the unrestricted killing of preborn children—and go unchallenged?

The simple fact is that Dungy is exactly the sort of man we ought to be holding up in the public sphere. He is honest and earnest, living a private and public life consistent with the moral commitments he professes. He knows the value of life well, and he knows the challenges of supporting it.

By condemning Dungy in such extreme terms, his critics condemn and implicitly stifle millions of Americans who cherish the same beliefs on life.

They inhabit a homogeneous ideological space, far away from the majority of Americans. They sincerely believe that Dungy’s utterly mainstream beliefs are fringe and extreme, and they are close enough to the levers of power to make sure the prevailing political and media narratives frame him as a dangerous figure prowling at the fringes of civil discourse.

We can’t let them succeed in doing so. We need men like Tony Dungy, and not just because they serve as moral examples we can follow and trust. We need men like Dungy because they represent an important truth of American political liberty, and of the respect and civility which undergirds it.

Dungy, like any American, should be able to articulate a sincere belief that preborn children deserve to live, without fearing for the end of his career. Dungy, like any American, should be able to engage charitably in one of the most important political and moral issues of our time—and he should be able to do so freely, fully and in good faith.