Lamar Jackson apologized for his tweet, but not to gay men or the homophobia behind it

Lamar Jackson has apologized for his vulgar tweet on Sunday after the team lost to the Jacksonville Jaguars that personally insulted a fan, using a slang term at the core of which is homophobia.

“I apologize if I hurt feelings out there,” he said, adding that he ultimately deleted the tweet because his girlfriend said he might be hurting someone with the language. The Baltimore Ravens — Jackson is their starting quarterback — clearly weren’t thrilled with his tweet.

He said he tweeted because he was bitter about the loss. But he had taken exception with the fan being bitter about Jackson’s performance and his contract with the team.

“I feel like you should be bitter after a loss,” he said. “No smiles. I feel like the fans should be mad we lost, too. But not mad as us. We tried.”

Jackson, it seems, did not apologize to the LGBT community or gay men for taking his “eat dick” language as rooted in homophobia. He also didn’t apologize to the reporter he said defamed his character for raising the question of whether his language was rooted in homophobia.

The term is rooted in homophobia — and you can see that full explanation here — even if Jackson didn’t intend it that way.

This probably ends this brief episode, again with the LGBT community being told to shut up and suck it up and their concerns about language are invalid. Neither the team, the NFL, coach John Harbaugh nor Jackson has addressed the root of homophobia here, other than to tell gay men they’re defaming him.

Jackson had so many opportunities to make this right. He’s clearly not interested in that, weak apology or not.