Misquoted Manny

When I read the LA Weekly blog post about Manny Pacquiao saying that “gays should be put to death,” I felt utterly shocked at the seeming intolerance, narrow-mindedness and fundamentalist implications. According to the author, Dennis Romero, Manny quoted Leviticus 20:13 in a National Conservative Examiner interview.

Since then, the seven-division world champion has been hit by an internet firestorm. In the wake of President Obama’s groundbreaking personal shift on same-sex marriage, the many voices of the internet lambasted Pacquiao.

It turns out that Pacquiao did not actually utter the words of the aforesaid bible passage. Granville Ampong, the Examiner journalist who originally interviewed Manny published an article to set things straight: “Pacquiao never said nor recited, nor invoked and nor did he ever refer to such context [gays should be put to death].”