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Coming out: It still takes courage
Jason Collins: Opportunist or hero? (a reply)
Alaina Johns
Poor Jason Collins. The pro basketball player told the world that he's gay in the May 6 issue of Sports Illustrated, and even Broad Street Review couldn't resist piling on.
Some gay rights activists hammered Collins for failing to come out sooner, in the prime of his (admittedly undistinguished) career instead of toward its end. At the other extreme, homophobic commentators like Chris Broussard, a pro basketball analyst for ESPN, took to the airwaves to excoriate Collins for his "sin." Homosexuals, like fornicators and adulterers, are "walking in open rebellion to God and to Jesus Christ," Broussard informed his listeners.
Yet last week in BSR, Robert Zaller complained about the lack of condemnation that Collins suffered upon coming out. All those congratulatory messages from President Obama on down to civil rights groups and even some of his fellow players, Zaller argued, suggest that coming out of the closet no longer requires great courage. On the contrary, Zaller contends, "Nowadays, being gay has been promoted into some kind of public virtue." (Click here.)
"'Ellen Degenerate'
Homosexuality a public virtue? That depends entirely on whom you listen to. As an academic, Zaller may lead a sheltered life. I, as the child of parents who referred to Ellen DeGeneres as "Ellen Degenerate" after she came out, have been exposed to a less tolerant America.
Zaller seems to believe that the National Basketball Association, where just two years ago Kobe Bryant denounced a referee as a "fucking faggot" on live TV, is now as gay-friendly as a casting call at Mauckingbird Theater Company.
Zaller also ignores the racial factor in Collins's revelation. "I'm a 34-year-old NBA center," Collins wrote in Sports Illustrated. "I'm black. And I'm gay."
Less than a year ago, during the presidential election campaign, the racial divide between black and white Americans on gender-preference issues was widely taken for granted. Blacks, it was assumed, may be liberal on most social issues, but they're opposed to gay rights. The Washington Post even cited that opposition as the real reason Obama took so long to declare his support for equality.
My many black gay friends and their supporters must not have gotten the memo. Still, coming out was no slam-dunk for any gay man, even a seven-foot-tall basketball player.
The Jackie Robinson test
Zaller objects to equating Collins with Jackie Robinson, who racially integrated Major League Baseball in 1947 to the widespread resistance of players and public alike. Zaller may be right on that point. Still, Collins's declaration qualified as an act of courage on three fronts:
It defied the hyper-masculine "no homo" culture of American sports, the pervasive fallacy that black people can't be gay or support gay rights, and an American culture at large that—Robert Zaller's rosy view notwithstanding— remains rife with fear and loathing for citizens who happen to be gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered.
On May 18, a black gay man named Mark Carson was walking in Greenwich Village with a friend. They were pursued and threatened by a man who allegedly said, "Look at these faggots," before he shot Carson point-blank in the head. Carson died on the way to the hospital. The website for The New Civil Rights Movement claims that incident is only one of 27 violent anti-gay assaults in New York City so far this year.
Let me put it this way: The good news is that Jason Collins received more public support than he expected, including this tweet from Kobe Bryant himself: "Don't suffocate who u r because of the ignorance of others."♦
To read a response, click here.
Some gay rights activists hammered Collins for failing to come out sooner, in the prime of his (admittedly undistinguished) career instead of toward its end. At the other extreme, homophobic commentators like Chris Broussard, a pro basketball analyst for ESPN, took to the airwaves to excoriate Collins for his "sin." Homosexuals, like fornicators and adulterers, are "walking in open rebellion to God and to Jesus Christ," Broussard informed his listeners.
Yet last week in BSR, Robert Zaller complained about the lack of condemnation that Collins suffered upon coming out. All those congratulatory messages from President Obama on down to civil rights groups and even some of his fellow players, Zaller argued, suggest that coming out of the closet no longer requires great courage. On the contrary, Zaller contends, "Nowadays, being gay has been promoted into some kind of public virtue." (Click here.)
"'Ellen Degenerate'
Homosexuality a public virtue? That depends entirely on whom you listen to. As an academic, Zaller may lead a sheltered life. I, as the child of parents who referred to Ellen DeGeneres as "Ellen Degenerate" after she came out, have been exposed to a less tolerant America.
Zaller seems to believe that the National Basketball Association, where just two years ago Kobe Bryant denounced a referee as a "fucking faggot" on live TV, is now as gay-friendly as a casting call at Mauckingbird Theater Company.
Zaller also ignores the racial factor in Collins's revelation. "I'm a 34-year-old NBA center," Collins wrote in Sports Illustrated. "I'm black. And I'm gay."
Less than a year ago, during the presidential election campaign, the racial divide between black and white Americans on gender-preference issues was widely taken for granted. Blacks, it was assumed, may be liberal on most social issues, but they're opposed to gay rights. The Washington Post even cited that opposition as the real reason Obama took so long to declare his support for equality.
My many black gay friends and their supporters must not have gotten the memo. Still, coming out was no slam-dunk for any gay man, even a seven-foot-tall basketball player.
The Jackie Robinson test
Zaller objects to equating Collins with Jackie Robinson, who racially integrated Major League Baseball in 1947 to the widespread resistance of players and public alike. Zaller may be right on that point. Still, Collins's declaration qualified as an act of courage on three fronts:
It defied the hyper-masculine "no homo" culture of American sports, the pervasive fallacy that black people can't be gay or support gay rights, and an American culture at large that—Robert Zaller's rosy view notwithstanding— remains rife with fear and loathing for citizens who happen to be gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered.
On May 18, a black gay man named Mark Carson was walking in Greenwich Village with a friend. They were pursued and threatened by a man who allegedly said, "Look at these faggots," before he shot Carson point-blank in the head. Carson died on the way to the hospital. The website for The New Civil Rights Movement claims that incident is only one of 27 violent anti-gay assaults in New York City so far this year.
Let me put it this way: The good news is that Jason Collins received more public support than he expected, including this tweet from Kobe Bryant himself: "Don't suffocate who u r because of the ignorance of others."♦
To read a response, click here.
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