Pete Thamel: Sexuality In Professional Football

Sexuality in Sports Sexual identity is a growing concern in professional and collegiate sports as the issue continues to gain interest and attention with each athlete that announces they are homosexual. More explicitly, the significance of this issue is that it involves people being able or not being able to remain true to their self. Most people only know there are a few openly gay players in high profile sports, but do not recognize the effects such players can have on the many stakeholders involved. Players, universities, coaches, and fans are all affected by the issue. Some believe that the sexual orientation of players detracts from the mentality of the team coming first while the opposition believes players should be able to disclose
The article, “How will news that Michael Sam is gay affect his NFL draft stock?” was published on February 9th of 2014 and written by Pete Thamel. The general idea behind Thamel’s work was that Sam’s decision to come out will affect where he is selected in the draft because NFL teams are not prepared to take on the negative publicity associated with signing an openly gay player (22). Thamel quoted an analyst explaining such thought, "I don 't think football is ready for [an openly gay player] just yet. In the coming decade or two, it 's going to be acceptable, but at this point in time it 's still a man 's-man game. To call somebody a [gay slur] is still so commonplace. It 'd chemically imbalance an NFL locker room and meeting room" (23). This NFL insider is saying that even though homosexuality is gaining more support, issues would arise for an NFL team in the locker room setting and with the media due to the lack of full support for homosexuality from the players and the fans. Whereas this insider may be correct in that fans could cause issues, I don’t believe he is correct with the locker room issues. At the end of the day, the team just wants to win. Players can learn to accept differences between each other if it means winning rather than losing. This newly formed opinion of
Although my thoughts and opinions were essentially maintained throughout this process, I did gain more knowledge to fully support my opinion for unit three. Players, teammates, coaches, universities, and fans are concerned with winning, but some may say their real concern is to avoid a negative image to ensure positive consequences for their program. Due to the fact that these consequences are caused by the norms and expectations of society, and the role of media, I will attempt to use a media source to shed some positive light on homosexuality. To be more specific, I will show that perhaps the real issue to consider is that of acceptance compared to that of equality; that all men are created equal and that society should consider accepting each person for who they are as long as their beliefs do not interfere or are imposed on them. If the American society really wants to be true to the statement that all men are created equal than taking an all-embracing approach would have a positive impact on the differences of opinions that generate conflict in the sports