By now, even if you aren’t a sports fan, you’ve probably heard that Missouri’s All-American defensive end Michael Sam, a candidate for this year’s NFL draft, has announced that he is gay. A gutsy move for a young man with professional football aspirations. It’s a sport that takes great pride in its toughness, its manliness. Negative comments have already come from various NFL personnel. It will hurt his draft chances, they say. He’d be a “distraction” in the locker room, they say; he’d make people “uncomfortable.”
Well, “they” may be proven wrong. In Sam’s home state of Texas, a bastion of conservatism like no other, Dallas sportscaster Dale Hansen spoke up powerfully and unforgettably in Sam’s defense. If that can happen, anything is possible.
Wow good that someone with so many people listening to him making this statement.
Yep. Someone popular, respected, with a large audience, in a state where ultraconservatives can be really mean. Two minutes of truth.
As one who grew up thinking of Texas as being a source of bigger than life heroic figures, it’s nice to see that there are at least two of them living today!
Well said!
You know, here’s the thing I don’t get. Why do people feel compelled to share such personal details of their lives? Frankly, I don’t care if somebody is gay. My brother was gay. I have no read on it. But I also feel a little icky when people make it part of their career bio. Just like I wouldn’t really want to know if my favorite singer was into that whole 50 shades of gray thing. It makes me feel like I’m privy to things I shouldn’t be.
And while I don’t believe people should be persecuted for their sexuality, I also don’t believe it is anyone’s business but that particular person’s. It seems as a society we have absolutely no restraint about what we say or do. Call me old fashioned but if you’re a football player the only thing I’m interested in is whether or not you can play the game and how well you can play the game. I don’t really want to know about your social life, what you eat for breakfast or who you sleep with. TMI.
But then I’m probably in the minority on that.
Annie
Then we are a minority of at least two. While I recognize now that being gay is about more than just what goes on in one’s bedroom, I still don’t fully understand announcing it as though it’s something new and different. Like brown hair, or short stature, or nearsightedness, it just is. And has been since the day you were born. I sort of understand, but sort of don’t. Kind of like Hansen, I guess.