ESPN Sports Analyst's Major Gaffe Shows How Backwards America Still Is on Gay Rights

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http://www.alternet.org/civil-liberties/straight-americas-gay-baggage

About four years before I came out as queer, a high school teacher asked our class how many of us would be comfortable changing in front of a gay person. I don’t think anyone raised their hand. I’m sure I didn’t.

That squirmy high school moment came to mind when I saw ESPN analyst and ex-NFL player and coach Herm Edwards, in response to Michael Sam’s coming out, compare him to “a player that has some issues, off the field issues” who’s “bringing baggage into your locker room.”

I’m sure Edwards would insist he’s no bigot, just as everybody in America insists they’re no bigot. But Edwards’ warning, if inartfully composed, offers an unintentionally elegant reminder of how heterosexism asserts and sustains itself. Not just through the bald fear and disgust we most often call homophobia (well-captured in the fear of predatory homosexuals invading the shower, as if straight bros’ locker room interactions were free of sexual surveillance, anxiety or bullying). But also through the insistence that anything other than normative heterosexuality is an issue, an event (maybe even an aggression), while straightness is unremarkable and un-remarked-upon. It’s called “straight” for a reason.

The epic time and energy devoted to performing, asserting and enforcing heterosexuality (just watch a Super Bowl ad) goes hand-in-hand with the assumption that any individual’s heterosexuality is a non-event. When projected first round NFL pick Manti Te’o told reporters about his ( apparently mythical) girlfriend, Herm Edwards didn’t accuse him of dragging his heterosexual baggage into the locker room. That’s the asymmetry at hand: Sam’s sexuality is noteworthy and suspect, while Te’o’s relationship only became baggage when it was revealed as a hoax. Similarly, Proposition 8 Judge Vaughn Walker was accused of being unable, as a gay man, to rule fairly on gay marriage, whereas heterosexuality (or whiteness, or U.S. citizenship) doesn’t get called out as a conflict of interest.

Sitting in that classroom back in high school, not yet having acknowledged to myself or intimated to anyone that I was anything other than straight, I took the lesson that being gay could make people afraid to share a locker room with you. But thinking back on it, I’m mostly struck by the teacher’s comfort speaking as if everyone in the room was presumptively straight. Despite swift progress, heterosexuality remains largely omnipresent, assumed and therefore invisible. Deviation (be it claiming queerness or just actively questioning one’s sexuality) comes at a cost – like getting accused of dividing your team, or undermining your sport, by introducing your “off the field issues.” (Note that the NBA’s Jason Collins, in coming out last year, wrote that he’d held off during the season so as to “not let my personal life become a distraction.”)

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1. I sent a complaint about Edwards to ESPN:

Herm Edwards is using UNACCEPTABLE language about Michael Sam. He refers to Sam's 'baggage' and 'issues.' Being gay isn't baggage or an issue for Sam. He is who he is.

Using terms like this is creating a very negative image. Dealing with Sam is on the league, the teams, the players and all others associated with the NFL. It should not be treated as baggage by anyone. Treat him like other players.

I like Herm Edwards. However, it's clear he is having trouble dealing with this. He needs to talk to Sam or others and find out what gay people are really like. They are not diseased.

ESPN already has given Chris Broussard a pass. He is openly hostile to gays off the air. That cannot be separated from him. Every time he appears his anti-LGBT stance gets a pass. People know his views. His website lumps gays and pedophiles into a category of people who are not acceptable. That is a dangerous and false meme.

And can you not find supportive statements of Sam other than those by gays?

To be fair, I'll bet other people who work or them would have probably made a lot of mistakes too if they were first up. He was a lot better later on.
ESPN scrambled to give out guidelines about phrases to use and other points.

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2. +1