NBA Center Jason Collins publicly comes out as gay

[joeybee12]

I'm a 34-year-old NBA center. I'm black. And I'm gay.

I didn't set out to be the first openly gay athlete playing in a major American team sport. But since I am, I'm happy to start the conversation. I wish I wasn't the kid in the classroom raising his hand and saying, "I'm different." If I had my way, someone else would have already done this. Nobody has, which is why I'm raising my hand.

via NBA player Jason Collins says he is gay - The Magazine - SI.com.

And with that, the first active NBA player to come out has revealed his sexuality in an interview with Sports Illustrated. In 2007, retired journeyman John Amaechi revealed he was gay and has since become an advocate for sexual equality in sports.

Collins, a free agent, appeared in 32 games this season for the Celtics before being traded at the deadline along with Leandro Barbosa for guard Jordan Crawford. He averaged one point and one rebound this season.


http://www.cbssports.com/nba/blog/eye-on-basketball/22166934/jason-collins-publicly-comes-out-as-gay

[Botany]

1. "He averaged one point and one rebound this season."

Well he might not be the best baller in the league but I wish him well.

Edit: He seems like a really good guy smart and thoughtful.

"The recent Boston Marathon bombing reinforced the notion that I shouldn't
wait for the circumstances of my coming out to be perfect. Things can change
in an instant, so why not live truthfully?"

Read More: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/magazine/news/20130429/jason-collins-gay-nba-player/#ixzz2RrsVVGMp

[Smarmie Doofus]

2. Two points! K and R

This is interesting:

>>>>I realized I needed to go public when Joe Kennedy, my old roommate at Stanford and now a Massachusetts congressman, told me he had just marched in Boston's 2012 Gay Pride Parade. I'm seldom jealous of others, but hearing what Joe had done filled me with envy. I was proud of him for participating but angry that as a closeted gay man I couldn't even cheer my straight friend on as a spectator. If I'd been questioned, I would have concocted half truths. What a shame to have to lie at a celebration of pride. I want to do the right thing and not hide anymore. I want to march for tolerance, acceptance and understanding. I want to take a stand and say, "Me, too.">>>>

Read More: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/magazine/news/20130429/jason-collins-gay-nba-player/#ixzz2RrtN38rw>>>

[TDale313]

3. This is a BFD.

Good for him. Guessing we'll see quite a few current and former athletes deciding it's safe to open up about being gay. Kinda shocking it took until 2013 for a current player in one of the major American sports leagues to come out. Been rumors that several nfl players were preparing to do so.

My best to Jason Collins. Thank you for your courage.

[pinto]

4. Kudos Mr. Collins.

[Redfairen]

5. Why Jason Collins's Coming Out Is Such a Big Deal (but women coming out is not)

http://www.theatlantic.com/sexes/archive/2013/04/why-jason-collinss-coming-out-is-such-a-big-deal/275383/

Female professional athletes are already gender non-conforming. Male ones are still worshiped as exemplars of traditional masculinity. Extremely sporty women have to fight stereotyping that they are lesbians and ignore all manner of unkind commentary about how they are mannish, while sporty men are seen as participating in a form of the masculine ideal.

This is the backdrop to why N.B.A. center Jason Collins' revelations in a Sport Illustrated piece today that he is gay are such a big deal -- and why it is that similar recent revelations from the this year's W.N.B.A. Number 1 draft pick Brittney Griner were greeted in mid-April with a collective yawn.

Women who play professional sports are grown-up versions of what we still to this day call "tomboys," a linguistic relic of our cognitive inability to see outdoorsy, competitive, rough-and-tumble behavior as inherently and naturally female, as well as male. Remember when people were speculating that then Supreme Court-nominee Elena Kagan was a lesbian just because she played on a softball team? "Sorry, softball=lesbian," wrote Brian Moylan in Gawker. (Yeah, that still happens.) Team sports have about them something martial or manly, which means that female team sports are often seen as butch activities. Meanwhile, men who participate in activities like gymnastics or ice skating are often stereotyped as gay; even though they are athletes, they are taking part in something more feminine. As King Kaufman observed in Salon in 2002: "The average American sports fan, watching the Olympic men's figure skating competition, probably figured that most of the contestants were gay." He then went on to debunk this assumption in a conversation with U.S. Olympic medalist Rudy Galindo, "the first actively competing figure skater who was out as being gay."

There have been many female athletes who have come out of the closet and been pioneers. Tennis great Billie Jean King. Tennis player Martina Navratilova. WNBA player Sheryl Swoopes, the "female Michael Jordan." Soccer midfielder Megan Rapinoe. Most recently, we had the example of college basketball phenom Griner. Her casual mention earlier this year that she's gay was greeted with a New York Times story headlined, "Female Star Comes Out as Gay, and Sports World Shrugs." Why was her declaration seen as not such a big deal? Because she was female, according to the paper of record.