Homosexuality In Same Sex Sports

In, “Homophobia Is Rampant in Professional Sports,” Ford speaks about how in male dominated sports coaches or other team players have tendencies to shame athletes by calling them names such as “sissies” or “girls” (paragraph 1). Ford later talks the causes of homophobia being hyper masculinity and the humiliation that players were put though as children and teenagers in school teams to get short term gains (paragraph 14). The author also states that someone in a professional team could come out on a major team and survive, if they have the team support (paragraph 16).

This paper explores the documentary Training Rules directed by Dee Mosbacher and Fawn Yacker, who released the film in March 2009. This film is about how women’s collegiate sports dealt with homophobia in the league, and it focuses primarily on Pennsylvania State University’s Rene Portland, who was the women’s basketball coach. Under her coaching, she had a “No Lesbians” policy that all the girls had to accept or else they risk being kicked off the team and losing their scholarship. This documentary recounts the instances where some of her players felt discriminated against when they just wanted to play basketball, and their testimonies tell how the university’s basketball program came under fire because of sexual orientation discrimination.

One of the main ways that guys bond and prove their manhood is through the institution of sports. “Guys like sports because it is the easiest way to choose ‘guy’ over ‘gay’—and make sure everyone gets the right idea about them.” (128) Sports play a very important role in solidifying male camaraderie because it allows men to talk to each other without having to disclose anything personal

Up until recently a person could not be gay in the military. Homosexuals were honorably discharged from the military. In 1993 President Clinton attempted to change this tradition. He received much opposition from politicians, citizens and the military. The result was a compromise, a don't ask, don't tell rule. This meant that the military personal was not to inquire about sexual preference, and that service members were not to be blatant about their sexual orientation. Another macho activity is sports. Gay men in sport have not been accepted. " There is much at stake in maintaining the silence about gay men in sports and in discouraging gay male athletes from revealing their identities"(Coakley 234). To even talk about homosexuals in sports would threaten the system of gender classification. The fact is though there are homosexuals in sports and they are discriminated against. In the locker room athletes use anti- gay banter as part of daily life. Homosexuals in sports live in fear of the truth about their sexuality coming out. Although recently studies have shown that organized sports are becoming less homophobic. People in sports are becoming more tolerant of homosexuals. But the value of a homosexual athlete is of core importance. " Gay athletes with high human capital are much more likely to come out of the closet to their teams than are gay athletes with medium or low human capital"(Anderson 12). As homosexuals are slowly accepted

Ward touches on the social context for interpreting public responses to male and female athletes coming out, and this example of Michael Sam details the harsh and cruel reality that society will never be fully accepting to gay and lesbian athletes. Invisibility is the best defense when it comes to athletes being gay and lesbian, but it doesn’t signify approval or disapproval when people have paid lots of money to see a match and they’re more bothered about what type of person is playing. I don’t’ care about Michal Sam’s sexual preference, and the only thing that we should view him as is a phenomenal athlete who could bring a lot to any NFL team. He had an extremely good final year playing college football, rated the best in the country at his position; but because of how super-sized NFL players have become, he's smaller than anyone else at his position in the NFL. While playing with the Baltimore ravens, he gave it a good 12 months, mostly on the practice squad and the whole time he was on this team he was constantly ridiculed and humiliated, which lead him to retire soon after due to mental illness. It takes a lot of will power and strength to continue to try and be the person you’ve longed to be, and do the job you’ve always wanted to do with the majority of people in American hating you for what you are outside of the field. I wish him the best. It isn't just latent homophobia that's costing him; it's also losing himself as a

This paper will continue on, researching the societal change/acceptance in the gay and lesbian community as no longer being unorthodox and with the stigma coming from the gay community itself.

A singular and limited view of masculinity has hijacked professional sports, the NFL especially, and has led to a culture where many players cannot tell

Football is probably the most hyper masculine sports someone can be involved in. However, just Michael Sam’s being out is so helpful in taking apart the ignorance around homophobic stereotypes. It goes to show, a broader aspect

Just a few years ago Jason Collins who identifies himself as a man was the first professional basketball player to come out as Homosexual. Of course he faced some backlash and was called numerous degrading names similar to Ricky as River High, but was he less of a man because of this? No. The skills and athleticism he displayed every night on the court never changed following his admission, nor did the aggressive nature in which he played. Skeptics couldn’t fathom how a homosexual could play such an aggressive sport, even though he had an extremely long professional career. Jason Collins makes it apparent that the backbone of what defines a man according to the institutions throughout society does not posses any merit. Collins doesn’t appear to be a “sissy” or “untough” rather the opposite, yet the fact remains he is a homosexual.

Homosexuality has nothing to do with whether or not one is a proficient athlete. However, due to predisposed perceptions of what it is to be an athlete and what it is to be homosexual, the words homosexual athlete and the athlete himself are not always met with the warmest of regards. The reason for this dissonance can be somewhat explained through the Role Congruity Theory. Role congruity is the social phenomenon that an individual is perceived more positively when their actions and behaviors are consistent with their gender (Lanter 2008). When action and gender are perceived to be inconsistent the perceptive party feels dissonance, which is can be displayed in a variety of ways ranging from avoidance to disgust or even anger. Athletes are big and strong, they are the men that the women swoon over and the men wish to be. Athletes are considered to be the ideal picture of what it means to society to be a man. When an athlete comes out as gay, especially a male athlete, it skews the entire picture for some; leaving them lost and questioning what exactly it means to be a man based on their learned societal constructs.

Strong support with the black community might have been affected by the connotation between African American women athletes and “mannish” lesbianism. Factually, European American ethnic thought categorized African American women as violent, rough, zealous, and physical which are the same qualities assigned to masculinity and sport. The image of the manly lesbian athlete had an unswerving effect on women competitors, strategies of athletic organizations, and the overall fame of women’s sport.

Shame Shame, Know Your Name In “What I Learned In The Locker Room,” by Steve Almond, it is clearly stated that he believes that the athletic world is a place for men to appear hyper-masculine and to also hide what most would consider to be feminine characteristics. The author interestingly uses a personal story about meeting a transgender sports reporter while working as an intern for a local newspaper, and how this was such an anomaly in both the era and industry. Almond admits that throughout his life he has felt that being a fan of sports has protected him from his underlying fear that he wasn’t masculine enough to measure up to his preconceived ideas of what a man should be. In the article, Almond does successfully understand and explain how sports represent one way of seeing the world.

Pascoe explains that what is considered masculine and feminine essentially gender roles is accomplished through day to day interactions. perpetuated in our society and it is why cheerleading is seen as feminine while football is masculine. Pascoe states that “Through imitating a fag, boys assure others that they are not a fag by immediately becoming masculine again after the performance. In other words, calling another boy a Fag makes you a non-fag and hence reassert one’s masculinity. The use of the word fag is essentially about a gendered homophobia not a sexual homophobia because a male can still be considered masculine while also being queer.

A weakness to Skyes’ article would be the fact that our society is very judgemental. Sports organizations fear the classification process of transsexual and transgender athletes into mainstream sporting events. Although most people will say they are for the equality of others, in reality many people in our society do not approve of transsexual and transgender people. These non-binary athletes may never be fully accepted into mainstream sports if sporting organizations continue to fret about anxieties these

There is a decent amount of homosexual athletes in the NFL alone. Michael Sam has already spoken regarding this openly saying that “I am not the only gay person in the NFL,” Sam said Thursday.“I’m just saying there is a lot of us.."(Williams 3). Imagine how many homosexuals are in every sport across the nation. There is problems that come with being a homosexual athlete in the society nowadays. One of those struggles being the non acceptance into anything in the society is despondent. This is only one of the conflicts for some homosexual athletes. The other struggle is not being able to do what they love on the biggest stage. The problem doesn 't only relate to homosexual athletes, It can relate to anybody that hits a “brick wall” in life. Homosexual athletes have the potential just like everyone else and the owners and players are too judgmental sometimes. Players are going to disagree by making negative comments and accusations about and towards the athletes. If the opportunity is just given It could make an explosion. Even though the owners of sport’s organizations are the final deciders of every decision the organization makes. However, If the owner does not approve of openly gay athletes. There is then a less chance of approval of openly gay athletes being accepted in the sports world. Should sport’s organizations be more open to openly gay athletes because gay athletes could then be held from reaching their fullest potential. Even though gay athletes are just like