When we think about athletics in general, we often think about strength, toughness and machoism.
Since the beginning of time, athletes are often thought of as being a symbol of masculinity and endurance.
But what happens when athletes reveal that they are homosexuals? I think I speak for many when I say “who cares?”
As long as athletes do their jobs in their respected sports, I can care less what they do in their personal time as long as it does not involve me.
I believe that athletes should be persecuted or criticized by what they do in their respected sport, not by who they love away from it.
But in the previous weeks, the entire professional sports world has been talking about the coming out of former football player Esera Tuaolo. Now I will repeat what I’ve said earlier, “who cares?”
It is hard for me to understand why the media is making such a fuss about an athlete who has admitted that he is homosexual. There are millions of homosexuals on this planet, but Tuaolo gets all this fame and coverage because of his career.
Now Tuaolo, who was an offensive lineman for the Green Bay Packers, the Minnesota Vikings, the Jacksonville Jaguars, the Atlanta Falcons and the Carolina Panthers in the 90s, will now be remembered for his sexuality more than his accomplishments on the football field.
Most people think athletes are gods because of the high exposure they receive because of their careers. These same people are the ones who are making the most of this situation, but they fail to realize that Tuaolo and other professional athletes who are homosexuals are average people just like everyone else.
Most of the athletes in the athletic world are against homosexuality because of the uncomfortable situations that go on inside a locker room. Many heterosexual athletes often say they may feel uncomfortable dressing in front of an openly homosexual athlete.
“If I knew a gay guy on my college football team, I probably wouldn’t, you know, stand for it.” Jeremy Shockey, professional football player for the New York Giants as said on the Howard Stern Radio Show.
“I think you know that they’re going to be in the shower with us and stuff, so I don’t think that is going to work.”
Despite apologizing for his comments, Shockey’s comments represent what most heterosexual athletes feel about sharing a locker room with homosexual athletes.
This is why Tuaolo waited until after his career is over to break the news that he was a homosexual. Many teammates feel that Tuaolo would have been tremendously persecuted if he would have revealed his homosexuality while in the NFL.
“He would have been eaten alive and he would have been hated for it,” Sterling Sharpe, former teammate of Tuaolo during his tenure with the Green Bay Packers, said.
Now that everyone knows about his homosexuality, Tuaolo is know revealing heartbreaking situations that he had to go through while being in the NFL.
In his Real Sports interview with Bryant Gumbel on HBO, Tuaolo said that there were many times when he would drink himself to sleep, and hope that he would not wake up.
Tuaolo is not the only professional athlete to be faced with questions about his sexuality by his teammates. Although Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Kordell Stewart and New York Mets catcher Mike Piazza have all denounced being homosexuals, they have suffered through deep depression and separated themselves from their teammates because of the rumors spreading around the locker room about their sexuality.
Despite the persecution on the professional front, there is also persecution on the collegiate level.
According to an anonymous athlete here at Nicholls, he said “the Nicholls campus is not ready for an openly homosexual athlete.”
“I think if an openly homosexual athlete were to come out here at Nicholls, he wouldn’t be persecuted, but he would be on the lower end of the stick of respectability by his teammates.”
Either way you look at it, homosexual athletes have every right to participate in collegiate athletics without persecution. They have the right to help their teams in their sport anyway as possible.
And no matter how we feel about homosexuality, homosexuals are human beings and they deserve respect in every capacity.
As the late rapper Tupac Shakur said in “All Eyes On Me,” “Only God can judge me.”