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RE: Jason Collins: "I'm Gay" - 5/1/2013 5:08:14 PM

dcnovice

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quote:

I just don't really see the need for him to write an article for Sports Illustrated telling the world that he likes men and not women.

I'm sure you don't. That may say more about you, though, than about Collins or closeted athletes.

quote:

I see liberals applauding him for this and the conservatives are just like "yeah, so what? You want to bang a guy, go do it. No need to tell me about it because I really don't care."

"I really don't care" could be a conservative credo, not just for this but any number of issues.

quote:

I see it as grandstanding and attention seeking because he sucks as a ball player and can't get attention any other way except by people applauding him for where he wants to stick his dick.

I believe you. But, again, that may say more about you than Collins.

quote:

In today's society, there really isn't anything courageous about coming out as gay. Homosexuality is applauded in this country.

We've certainly made progress, but "applauded" seems like a stretch.

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RE: Jason Collins: "I'm Gay" - 5/1/2013 5:16:56 PM

MAINEiacMISTRESS

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quote:

ORIGINAL: LadyPact

quote:

ORIGINAL: searching4mysir
Lauren, I'm not upset by it. I just don't really see the need for him to write an article for Sports Illustrated telling the world that he likes men and not women. I see liberals applauding him for this and the conservatives are just like "yeah, so what? You want to bang a guy, go do it. No need to tell me about it because I really don't care."

I see it as grandstanding and attention seeking because he sucks as a ball player and can't get attention any other way except by people applauding him for where he wants to stick his dick. In today's society, there really isn't anything courageous about coming out as gay. Homosexuality is applauded in this country.

I don't know if I agree with this entirely. I agree with your concept that it *shouldn't* matter and we should be past who people are sexually attracted to making any difference to whether they will be accepted or not. I'm just not sure if we are really there or not.

I think most people have seen the struggle that some go through with coming out. Hopefully, it's getter easier. Maybe articles like this can help with that when it comes to those facing the decision to be out or not.

If nothing else, it's never been done before. There have been those who came out when they were officially retired. I can't say I recall any other Sports Illustrated articles of the same type.

Even if the guy was the worst player in the NBA, he's good enough to be a professional. That's got to mean he's at least semi decent at what he does on the court.

I mentally uttered a big "WELL, WHOOOOOOPTEY FRIGGING DOOOO!" when he came out with the news, since it doesn't matter to Me what consenting partner(s) people are sexually attracted to. However I DO see it as a valuable ENCOURAGEMENT to people who are still afraid and in the closet, and especially to further "NORMALIZE" it to the general public who still haven't learned to accept that not everyone fits into the same cookie cutter mold they have in their minds as what's "normal" sexual attraction; there is still growth needed in that area. A friend of Mine recently lost his gay cousin to suicide because the man couldn't be himself around his Catholic family. It's a damn shame, he never realized how many others around him ACCEPTED him exactly as he was without so much as a blink. Loss of a loved one is a heavy price for that family and others to pay for their lack of acceptance. If more celebrities come out, hopefully it will help.

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RE: Jason Collins: "I'm Gay" - 5/1/2013 5:17:51 PM

PeonForHer

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ORIGINAL: Level

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ORIGINAL: PeonForHer

What isn't true?

Peon, that America "applauds" being gay; I should have quoted you, so it'd have been clearer, sorry.

No worries, old boy. I thought you meant the issue of Turing's death - that's still very much a big question here.

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RE: Jason Collins: "I'm Gay" - 5/1/2013 5:24:34 PM

PeonForHer

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It could be argued that Turing won WWII when his team broke the enigma code. Whether he killed himself or was killed it was a tragedy of the sort it is hard to imagine

Yes, it could be - seriously. I could be writing in German right now, were it not for him.

It's staggering to think of it that way - but, yes, he could have been 'found out' as a gay during the war and before he'd done his crucial work and slammed into jail. I honestly don't like to think about this kind of thing too much, Ken. It's really quite unsettling.

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RE: Jason Collins: "I'm Gay" - 5/1/2013 6:06:46 PM

dcnovice

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FR

Interesting perspective from another out athlete:

Martina Navratilova: Jason Collins a 'game-changer'

The penultimate paragraph particularly spoke to me:

Collins has led the way to freedom. Yes, freedom -- because that closet is completely and utterly suffocating. It's only when you come out that you can breathe properly. It's only when you come out that you can be exactly who you are. Collins' action will save lives. This is no exaggeration: Fully one third of suicides among teenagers occur because of their sexuality. Collins will truly affect lives, too. Millions of kids will see that it is OK to be gay. No need for shame, no need for embarrassment, no need for hiding.

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RE: Jason Collins: "I'm Gay" - 5/1/2013 6:25:38 PM

njlauren

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quote:

ORIGINAL: searching4mysir

quote:

ORIGINAL: njlauren

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ORIGINAL: Level

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ORIGINAL: njlauren

One of the biggest reasons for coming out is probably why the OP is upset about it

Why do you think I'm upset about it?

I screwed up and I owe you an apology, my comments were not aim at you, it was at searching4mysir and everyone else who complains about why did he have to come out about what he does in the bedroom, reducing being gay to like being into foot worship *sigh*..I sincerely apologize to you, all I can plead is senility.

Lauren, I'm not upset by it. I just don't really see the need for him to write an article for Sports Illustrated telling the world that he likes men and not women. I see liberals applauding him for this and the conservatives are just like "yeah, so what? You want to bang a guy, go do it. No need to tell me about it because I really don't care."

I see it as grandstanding and attention seeking because he sucks as a ball player and can't get attention any other way except by people applauding him for where he wants to stick his dick. In today's society, there really isn't anything courageous about coming out as gay. Homosexuality is applauded in this country.

Really? It is applauded? It is true that the media is generally friendly and attitudes have changed but you frankly are way, way out of line about that. What you see on tv and what happens in reality is very, very different. Did you know that in 35 states you can be fired for being gay? Did you know that in many parts of this country, if a divorce happens and one of the people is gay, the child if they were granted custody could be removed simply because they are gay? Do you realize that gay kids in school routinely face bullying and worse? The fact that in 2012 not one major athlete has come out as gay until now (when active) tells the story. And how about the scumbag who was the coach at Rutgers, you think yelling homophobic slurs was a compliment to gays?

I have an even better idea, go talk to your friends and neighbors up where you live, in your own little corner of cowpatch and redneck hell , take a look at what Scott Garret thinks about gays before saying that, and ask if there is any LGBT group at the local high school, I strongly doubt it, farm country isn't exactly so liberal.

Frankly, you don't know, which means you probably don't know any gay people, if you did, they would tell you that while things have gotten better, it isn't easy. I belonged to a pretty liberal church more then a few years ago not all that far from where you live, and there were a lot of gays and lesbians in the congregation, and even in relatively liberal northern NJ many of them were too scared to be out, that they would lose their jobs and the like. In the financial industry, being out and gay in trading environments and the like would be suicide, they would find a way to get rid of you as soon as possible. As far as conservatives thinking gays were no big deal, really? Then why do they fight legislation like ENDA designed to protect LGBT people from being fired, why do conservatives say things like 'we don't want the government encouraging sin'. The GOP as a party was trying, until it became a political liability, to amend the constitution to ban same sex marriage, and the GOP has filibustered any attempt to amend federal anti discrimination language to include LGBT people. In many states if a teacher is found out to be gay, they can be fired for cause, you think it is just 'oh, okay' with conservatives? We don't have same sex marriage here in NJ, and the only reason we have benefits at all is the Supreme Court ordered it, which all the GOP types grumbled about. Our dear 1/7th of a ton governor has said he won't allow same sex marriage to pass, that not only would he veto it, but he would find ways to punish the districts of those who voted for it..sound like it is no big deal?

When the day comes when a gay person can have a picture of their spouse on their desk, or can go to the company christmas party with their SO, or can go to the local PTA meeting and not cause a fuss, then yeah, you would be right. The fact that this is a big deal, someone coming out as gay in a sport, says the whole story, if being gay was no big deal, others would have done it a long time ago, since more then a few have come out after they retired.

BTW, until the supreme court invalidated them, more then a few states had laws on the books making homosexual sex a felony crime, including texas (that wrote a law in the 1990's that made private homosexual conduct a crime, subject to jail time in a penitentiary, that interestingly decriminalized sex with farm animals, as long as they were their own). And needless to say, they were all conservative states.

< Message edited by njlauren -- 5/1/2013 6:31:29 PM >

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RE: Jason Collins: "I'm Gay" - 5/1/2013 6:31:43 PM

LadyPact

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ORIGINAL: dcnovice

FR

Interesting perspective from another out athlete:

Martina Navratilova: Jason Collins a 'game-changer'

The penultimate paragraph particularly spoke to me:

Collins has led the way to freedom. Yes, freedom -- because that closet is completely and utterly suffocating. It's only when you come out that you can breathe properly. It's only when you come out that you can be exactly who you are. Collins' action will save lives. This is no exaggeration: Fully one third of suicides among teenagers occur because of their sexuality. Collins will truly affect lives, too. Millions of kids will see that it is OK to be gay. No need for shame, no need for embarrassment, no need for hiding.

I wanted to take a moment to say thank you for sharing this article.

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RE: Jason Collins: "I'm Gay" - 5/1/2013 6:33:06 PM

dcnovice

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quote:

I see it as grandstanding and attention seeking because he sucks as a ball player and can't get attention any other way except by people applauding him for where he wants to stick his dick.

Looking over the thread again, I was struck by this sentence. It's interesting that you reduce Collins's coming out to crude mechanics: "where he wants to stick his dick." Never mind that he might also cherish a partner for companionship, laughter, travel, support, and all the other things that go into building a life together.

Even more interesting, the tone shifts when one gets to your signature line: "No longer searching -- found my one and only right here on CM." When it comes to a heterosexual--to you--pairing up is suddenly romantic and ennobling. It's about finding "the one and only." If you were to describe yourself in the same diction you used for Collins, your sig might say "found someone to stuff my twat." Yet you treat your own romantic status--which you appear to feel the need to share with strangers, given your sig--with far more respect than you accorded to Collins. Interesting.

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RE: Jason Collins: "I'm Gay" - 5/1/2013 6:42:25 PM

dcnovice

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quote:

I wanted to take a moment to say thank you for sharing this article.

You're welcome.

I really liked it and thought others might too.

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RE: Jason Collins: "I'm Gay" - 5/1/2013 6:43:37 PM

DomKen

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ORIGINAL: PeonForHer

quote:

ORIGINAL: DomKen
It could be argued that Turing won WWII when his team broke the enigma code. Whether he killed himself or was killed it was a tragedy of the sort it is hard to imagine

Yes, it could be - seriously. I could be writing in German right now, were it not for him.

It's staggering to think of it that way - but, yes, he could have been 'found out' as a gay during the war and before he'd done his crucial work and slammed into jail. I honestly don't like to think about this kind of thing too much, Ken. It's really quite unsettling.

It's my understanding his homosexuality was known during the war. He was too valuable to mess with. It was only later that he could be destroyed.

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RE: Jason Collins: "I'm Gay" - 5/1/2013 6:44:11 PM

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Thankyou Lauren and DC, :) most excellent:)

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RE: Jason Collins: "I'm Gay" - 5/1/2013 6:46:37 PM

njlauren

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quote:

ORIGINAL: dcnovice

quote:

I see it as grandstanding and attention seeking because he sucks as a ball player and can't get attention any other way except by people applauding him for where he wants to stick his dick.

Looking over the thread again, I was struck by this sentence. It's interesting that you reduce Collins's coming out to crude mechanics: "where he wants to stick his dick." Never mind that he might also cherish a partner for companionship, laughter, travel, support, and all the other things that go into building a life together.

Even more interesting, the tone shifts when one gets to your signature line: "No longer searching -- found my one and only right here on CM." When it comes to a heterosexual--to you--pairing up is suddenly romantic and ennobling. It's about finding "the one and only." If you were to describe yourself in the same diction you used for Collins, your sig might say "found someone to stuff my twat." Yet you treat your own romantic status--which you appear to feel the need to share with strangers, given your sig--with far more respect than you accorded to Collins. Interesting.

What LL is saying is what a lot of the homophobes see, which is that being gay is all about sex, like it is a variation in sex kind of like having anal or oral sex, that it is a 'preference' you play out in the bedroom. I posted earlier on this, and I pointed out that this is about who someone loves, that reducing gays to the sex they have is like reducing straight marriage to sex, it would be like telling a bride showing off her wedding rings you don't want to know that she likes a dick stuck in her vagina......it leaves out the companionship, caring, bonding and love that make up a relationship. It shouldn't be so surprising, this is how the conservatives have framed gay people, they have demonized them, called them the same as bestiophiles and pedophiles, obsessed about the sex, because then they can refuse to see them as human beings with feelings and love. It is in many ways no different than the way that anyone dehumanizes others, in the case of gays, that they are all nothing more then sexual hedonists and so forth.

It also doesn't surprise me given where LL lives, at one time it was a hotbed of the KKK, and in the next town over there is a town park that at one point was a Nazi Bund camp, that to this day you cannot see the records of the camp, because many of the members were local families who still live in the area. The area has a rep in the US House of Reps who would fit in very well in Georgia or Alabama with his views, so seeing this kind of bilge from someone from that area doesn't surprise me.

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RE: Jason Collins: "I'm Gay" - 5/1/2013 6:50:44 PM

njlauren

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ORIGINAL: DomKen

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ORIGINAL: PeonForHer

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ORIGINAL: DomKen
It could be argued that Turing won WWII when his team broke the enigma code. Whether he killed himself or was killed it was a tragedy of the sort it is hard to imagine

Yes, it could be - seriously. I could be writing in German right now, were it not for him.

It's staggering to think of it that way - but, yes, he could have been 'found out' as a gay during the war and before he'd done his crucial work and slammed into jail. I honestly don't like to think about this kind of thing too much, Ken. It's really quite unsettling.

It's my understanding his homosexuality was known during the war. He was too valuable to mess with. It was only later that he could be destroyed.

I think it was suspected but it was a kind of weird time from what I know, among other things, there almost was an assumption that more then a few men from the all male boarding school/elite colleges were gay and it was kind of don't ask/don't tell. Turing getting arrested and then forced to take depo provera (which basically dumps the male sex drive into the toilet and also has other side effects, including breast tissue forming and can cause depression) was made into a very public scandal, and the prime reason they were doing it was the cold war, where being gay was considered a security risk and in the heightened fascist response to the red menace (it wasn't just the US), he was treated harshly. I think he killed himself, but it wouldn't surprise me if some douchebag in MI5 had him killed, either.

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RE: Jason Collins: "I'm Gay" - 5/1/2013 7:07:47 PM

SeekingTrinity

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Lauren, I'm not upset by it. I just don't really see the need for him to write an article for Sports Illustrated telling the world that he likes men and not women. I see liberals applauding him for this and the conservatives are just like "yeah, so what? You want to bang a guy, go do it. No need to tell me about it because I really don't care."

I see it as grandstanding and attention seeking because he sucks as a ball player and can't get attention any other way except by people applauding him for where he wants to stick his dick. In today's society, there really isn't anything courageous about coming out as gay. Homosexuality is applauded in this country.

I too disagree with this. If homosexuality was so applauded in this country as you seem to think it is, the tragedy of LGBTQ children committing suicide because of the persecution they suffered for being LGBTQ wouldn't be happening. We just had a poor 15 year old child hang himself from playground equipment not too long ago because he was tormented for being gay, so it happens! We wouldn't have children being kicked out of their homes because they came out. We wouldn't have people beaten to death because they were gay. And we wouldn't have morons talking about returning to the good old days when gays were stoned (not the high kind either) for being gay. So while we have come far as a country, we as a society still have a long way to go.

Should it matter how Gray or anyone else for that matter loves? No, it shouldn't. But sadly it still does until the day comes when people drop the intolerance. So if someone has the guts to stand up and hopefully provide a positive role model especially for LGBTQ kids trying to make it in an intolerant world, Im all for it. I don't give a rat's ass if he is a marquee player or the shittiest dude on the team, it takes a huge set of cajones to know you are going to face what you are going to face by coming out, yet still doing it anyway.

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RE: Jason Collins: "I'm Gay" - 5/4/2013 11:39:17 AM

njlauren

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ORIGINAL: SeekingTrinity

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ORIGINAL: searching4mysir

Lauren, I'm not upset by it. I just don't really see the need for him to write an article for Sports Illustrated telling the world that he likes men and not women. I see liberals applauding him for this and the conservatives are just like "yeah, so what? You want to bang a guy, go do it. No need to tell me about it because I really don't care."

I see it as grandstanding and attention seeking because he sucks as a ball player and can't get attention any other way except by people applauding him for where he wants to stick his dick. In today's society, there really isn't anything courageous about coming out as gay. Homosexuality is applauded in this country.

I too disagree with this. If homosexuality was so applauded in this country as you seem to think it is, the tragedy of LGBTQ children committing suicide because of the persecution they suffered for being LGBTQ wouldn't be happening. We just had a poor 15 year old child hang himself from playground equipment not too long ago because he was tormented for being gay, so it happens! We wouldn't have children being kicked out of their homes because they came out. We wouldn't have people beaten to death because they were gay. And we wouldn't have morons talking about returning to the good old days when gays were stoned (not the high kind either) for being gay. So while we have come far as a country, we as a society still have a long way to go.

Should it matter how Gray or anyone else for that matter loves? No, it shouldn't. But sadly it still does until the day comes when people drop the intolerance. So if someone has the guts to stand up and hopefully provide a positive role model especially for LGBTQ kids trying to make it in an intolerant world, Im all for it. I don't give a rat's ass if he is a marquee player or the shittiest dude on the team, it takes a huge set of cajones to know you are going to face what you are going to face by coming out, yet still doing it anyway.

Thanks, ST, that is incredibly well said. If we lived in a world where being gay was simply a fact of life, Jason Collins wouldn't have to come out as being gay, he would simply have lived his life openly, had boyfriends/spouses that were publicly acknowledged and move on from there. As I pointed out in an earlier post, in most places in this country you can be fired simply for being gay, in many school districts if a teacher has been outed, they can be fired. We also have the Christian rights, the Christian dominionists, who think US law should be based on the bible, and that includes stoning gay people to death (there is one of the infamous "free evangelical churches" near where LL lives that advocates stuff like that), and it isn't that small, estimates re there are 25-30 million people who believe like this. If same sex marriage were legal, if two men or two women going down the street holding hands didn't raise eyebrows, she would be right, or worse, if it wouldn't get them attacked. Two gay friends of mine a couple of years ago were attached on 8th avenue in Chelsea, which is about as gay a place as you could want (this is NYC), I faced my own problems in NYC with the young twits from the midwest and elsewhere who have flocked to NYC, ostensibly because it is so hip and cool, who unfortunately are just as bigoted and stupid as their parents, and in NYC there is a big problem with gays being targeted by black and hispanics......in an ideal world, to quote a friend like mine, gays would be able to be part of the boring, normal fabric of life, but they aren't, not yet.

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