Tyson Fury has the world’s attention right now as he prepares for a major face-off with Oleksander Usyk – but the heavyweight champion has never been too far from the limelight, be it for sporting achievements or for something altogether less savoury.
Fury will have the bulk of the country’s support on Saturday night when he faces his Ukrainian opponent in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, however he has been known to alienate certain communities in the past with a series of ill-judged comments. Fury has never been one to shy away from controversy and his happy-go-lucky persona has managed to charm an army of fight fans into his corner, however, the boxer does have a history of making prejudicial comments.
It was in 2013 that Fury was even fined a staggering amount of £3,000 by the Boxing Board of Control for comments he had made on Twitter, now known as X, about fellow fighters David Price and Tony Bellew. Fury branded the pair ‘gay lovers’ and proceeded to make other disparaging remarks about the two Liverpudlian boxers, which led to the board stepping in.
In response to Fury’s comments, the secretary of the Boxing Board of Control, Robert Smith, told Telegraph Sport at the time that he did not recognise the Fury he saw on social media versus the man he knew in reality. “What he did was wrong,” Smith said. “He is a licence holder with us and he was abusing other licence holders. It is unacceptable and he has told us he has put a stop to it.
“Tyson was not doing himself any favours. The person posting on Twitter is not the mature individual who myself and other members of the Board have come across and know. It had to end.”
In response to the £3,000 hit, Fury conceded claimed that the public enjoyed his ‘outspoken’ views – although maybe the time had come to say less. Speaking after the fine, he said: “People like outspoken people and I am outspoken, but when you are getting hit for three grand, it’s time to maybe quieten down a bit. The board has been more than lenient with me and it was a hefty fine that I will take on the chin.”
However, Fury’s vow of silence did not last long as in October of that year, he once again got into a social-media stand-off with former British heavyweight Lennox Lewis and Ukrainian fighter Wladimir Klitschko. A series of homophobic tweets ultimately lead to another investigation by the British Boxing Board of Control, as reported at the time by PinkNews.
It was in 2015 that Fury made headlines once again for offensive and inflammatory comments in which he compared homosexuality and abortion to paedophilia. The then 27 year-old boxer told the Mail on Sunday: “There are only three things that need to be accomplished before the devil comes home. One of them is homosexuality being legal in countries; one of them is abortion; and the other is paedophilia.”
However the comments didn’t stop there. Following his victory over Wladimir Klitschko, a video clip then resurfaced which saw Fury’s response to a question about women in sports with Fury appeared to reference ring girls as opposed to female boxers in a misogynistic flurry.
Fury said in the video: “I think they are very nice when they’re walking around that ring holding them cards. I like them actually; they give me inspiration when I’m tired and I see them wiggling around with their Round 2, Round 8. I think women in boxing is very good.”
However, arguably the worst was yet to come when speaking on women with the fighter elaborating on his position on women in the workplace. He added: “It’s up to everybody what they want to do. I’m all for it; I’m not a sexist. I believe if a man can to go work all his life a woman can.
