Former NFL kicker Jay Feely has the internet up in arms.
The 41-year-old sports analyst tweeted a photo on Saturday, April 21, that shows him carrying a pistol next to his daughter and her date. “Wishing my beautiful daughter and her date a great time at prom,” Feely captioned the picture. He then used the hashtag #BadBoys referencing a scene from the 2003 film, where he apparently got the idea.
Wishing my beautiful daughter and her date a great time at prom #BadBoys pic.twitter.com/T5JRZQYq9e
— Jay Feely (@jayfeely) April 22, 2018
In a follow-up message posted on Sunday, Feely clarified that he was “joking.”
Shannon Watts, who founded Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, wasn’t laughing. “Oh yay — American dads have kicked off the season of ‘its pretend I’m going to shoot my daughter’s date for impugning her chastity’ pics,” Watts responded. (Her reply received nearly 60,000 likes.)
Other users were quick to point out that the massacre at Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, occurred just two months ago.
“He is also apparently sending a message that he owns his daughter, and this kid better not trespass on his ‘property,’” tweeted one woman. Another noted that they understood the #BadBoys movie reference “but this was terribly out of touch with gun safety. And out of touch with no making that picture and night about you.”
In Feely’s Sunday apology, he explained that his daughter and her boyfriend of more than a year knew he was joking. “I take gun safety seriously,” wrote Feely, who had a 14-year NFL career with teams including the Chicago Bears. “(the gun was not loaded and had no clip in) and I did not intend to be insensitive to that important issue.”
