D.L. Hughley thinks Caitlyn Jenner “looks like every P.E. teacher I ever had,” and says she wouldn’t have been his choice to receive the ESPYs’ Arthur Ashe Courage Award simply because she “put on a dress.”

But he doesn’t consider that bashing.

“I think that it’s named after Arthur Ashe,” the comic said of the award, speaking to a TMZ videographer Thursday on a New York Street. “Arthur Ashe from Richmond, Virginia, a symbol of courage. He fought [a] segregated South, a very segregated profession, he fought AIDS with dignity and honor, and Caitlyn Jenner put on a dress. I don’t think it’s the same thing.”

The 1976 Olympic gold medalist, of course, made her post-transition debut on national TV during the ESPY Awards on Wednesday night, accepting the Ashe trophy with a speech about gender transition being “harder ... than anything I could have imagined, and that’s the case for so many others besides me.”


In New York on Thursday -- around when Jenner was thanking her ESPYs glam squad via Instagram -- Hughley continued to riff on a comparison he’d drawn Monday on Facebook between the 65-year-old Jenner and tennis champion Serena Williams.

“In the last month, we had the media telling us that Caitlyn Jenner was beautiful and that Serena Williams looks like a man,” he said. “That was a little weird to me. The man looks like a woman, but the woman looks like a man. That’s ridiculous. Serena Williams is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen on a tennis court, and Bruce Jenner looks like every P.E. teacher I ever had.”

(Yeah, the “media” take on the Wimbledon champ was about more than that one dude on Twitter who got “Harry Potter” author J.K. Rowling riled up over his criticism of Williams’ physique. There was also the blowback to a New York Times article about female tennis players and body image.)

On Facebook, Hughley had said to a commenter Monday, “explain to me how pointing out obvious hypocrisy is bashing.”


Meanwhile, after the comic called Caitlyn Jenner beautiful “in a, like, ‘Mrs. Doubtfire’ way,” Kris Jenner was being kinder to her ex.

Caitlyn’s speech “was amazing and very brave,” the reality star told Us Weekly at an event Thursday night in Los Angeles. “I think she looked beautiful.”

Follow Christie D’Zurilla on Twitter @theCDZ and Google+. Follow the Ministry of Gossip on Twitter @LATcelebs.

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