Results tagged ‘ Homophobia ’
Bad Ideas
Bad ideas are everywhere. All around us. Sometimes they’re blatantly awful. Sometimes they take a while to figure out. But whether it’s a delusional moron (who supposedly has the invisible ear of “gawd”) scheming to kill gay folks or a real life horror-show cutting up his friends and eating them, bad ideas are abundant.
Unfortunately, that doesn’t stop them from happening.
Even if one should know better.
That’s right. During a recent Red Sox game I became fixated with the primordial ugliness of our good flopsweatin’ friend, Vicenteticus Padillicarpeus (known to some as Vicente Padilla). Before I knew it, I was doing a Google image search of the man. Why?
I wish I knew.
All I know now is that a little big of ugly is a bad idea. A whole lot of ugly is a night without sleep.
Hate me ‘cuz I’m cruel, just don’t hate me ‘cuz I’m right.
Peace,
Jeff
Three Up, Three Down
Just like A.J. Burnett in a Pirates uni, this is going to be ugly, moan-inducing and might even warrant a trip straight to the DL.
New MLB Playoff Format
In short, I like it. It emphasizes winning the division, makes trade deadline trades more suspect and guarantees drama as we enter the postseason. The only thing I can think of that would make this arrangement better is to skip the one game playoff and force each wild card team’s manager to do a keg stand before engaging in a last-man-standing no-holds-barred boxing tournament. My money is on Ron Washington. Cocaine makes ya crrrrrrrrrrrrraaaaaaaazzzyyy!
Bigots Leading the Republican Party
Whether it’s the Pennsylvanian Taliban or the Ditto Führer of Ignorance himself , I’m getting quite tired of seeing Abe Lincoln’s party fall victim to mass idiocy. But I found something that will really cause ‘em to scratch their heads:
Yadier Molina: Five More Years
Halle-FRACKIN-lujah!!! Seriously, I cannot even begin to tell you how happy this makes me. To those outside of the St. Louis Cardinals family, such jubliation may not seem warranted, but let me assure you: this is a grand, grand deal for all involved. Say what you will about Albert’s tenure, Yadier Molina is the absolute heart and soul of the St. Louis Cardinals. And everyone’s happy now. Yadi’s happy. Front office is happy. The fans are happy.
Happy Saturday!
Jeff
The Filibuster
Tim Pawlenty is out of the race and Rick Perry is in. Bachmann wins the straw poll but is still bat-sh*t insane. If the Republican primary is a pennant race, who’s your horse?
Paul
Annandale, MI
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Oh boy.
Metaphors are my friends, metaphors are my friends, metaphors are my friends.
If the Republican primary is a pennant race, then it must be in the Arena Football League because I am finding it quite difficult taking any of them seriously.
Michele Bachmann? Um… no.
Rick Perry? Um… also no.
Please note my severe reluctance to support any candidate who harbors a deep relationship with imaginary friends who tend to be bipolar, judgmental, homophobe racists.
Rick Santorum? Noooo.
Mitt Romney? Double noooo. Though I am still waiting for his endorsement of the Mormon Underwear website.
Newt Gingrich? Yikes! Now we’re really gettin’ into the thick of crazy!
Jimmy McMillan? Okay, now we’ve reached the bottom.
Thad McCotter? Cool name. Boring everything else.
Sorry, Paul… ya see, unlike picking an MLB winner, crawling through this web of same-ole-same-ole GOP crazies is a bit difficult. There is no Philadelphia Phillies lights-out candidate. There is no Yankee flyer. There is no Red Sox contender.
No.
But, wait… there is… hmm… there is hope. And no, I’m not talking about the empty promise sounding “hope” dished out ad nauseum by the Obama campaign to dupe intellectual lefties like myself during the ’08 race. No. Staying here, within the “Republican” party, there is… there is another.
But before I can declare my allegiance, I need to think on it. I need to think on it very, very carefully. While I do so, remember not to hate me (because I’m right) and please enjoy this informational video thoughtfully prepared by the RSBS interns:
To be continued…
Jeff
**Have a topic you want to see us Filibuster? Interested to know why Mr. Krause still can’t believe it’s not butter? Send us your Filibuster questions by emailing kraulung@gmail.com or by commenting below.
Setting the Mahmud
Back and to the left, back and to the left…
Good afternoon gentleman, ladies and Allen.
Wanna get turned on whilst young children (maybe your own) are in the room?? Someone does!!
If you just woke up from a coma and realized that some Navy Seals in Pakistan just found Jimmy Hoffa’s body, you may have missed some of the greatest video ever known to man (until we get to see some grainy footage of a lunatic gettin shot in the eye).
Braves pitching coach Roger McDowell made some absurd homophobic slurs at some Giants fans in the presence of children the other day… because that would never happen at a mostly white male sporting event.
Usually these types of remarks come from someone who’s probably closeted in his own way… and from what I’VE heard, Roger McDowell could really smoke the fastball back in the day!!! Right????
THE HORROR!!! But wait!!!
The world has now benefited from some wonderful video conferencing, herein such…
But what I really want to talk about is the legendary Gloria Allred.
Someone who’s completely crackers. She should be hawking carpet… or eating it… SORRRY!!!!!
I have a feeling about how her meeting with her new client went down involving said bat:
“Look, here’s how this is gonna go: if you allow me to take this case pro bono, the press conference will go something like this… I’ll cradle the ****… stroke the *****… work the ****… and swallow the *****… Get it over here buddy let’s do this…”
What is in my head right now as I watch this? The hornswaggling bamboozelment of this sap (client) will be legendary. In fact, someday these kids will grow up and realize how much of a ridiculous piece of crap their father is.
I wish I had that weird District 9 prawn alien laser gun bazooka to blow her up into a million lawyer parts.
– Johanna Mahmud
The Filibuster
of an out gay/bi ballplayer in today’s game. Your thoughts?
Randy S.
Robbinsdale,
MN
http://heirloom.mlblogs.com
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That’s a great question, Randy, especially in today’s climate of suspense surrounding “Don’t ask, don’t tell” and the California ballot initiative. In the past few years we’ve seen a couple football players come out of the closet along with a basketball player or two. Baseball, of course, has Billy Bean. But the one thing that all of these guys have in common is that they didn’t come out until after their careers were over. I think that says a lot about the continued repressive climate in professional sports.
However, I don’t think this really comes as a surprise. Sports have the power to do good but that doesn’t mean it’s easy. When Jackie Robinson finally broke into the major leagues, the Civil War had been over for 80 years and the 13th Amendment had been around nearly as long. But that didn’t mean baseball felt any need to allow black players into the league and it definitely didn’t mean the fans immediately accepted it.
The difference here is that skin color is something immediately apparent, something you can’t necessarily hide. That made the conflict much more apparent as well. But sexuality you can hide and many gay athletes choose to take that route because it’s simpler. Why confront the issue and suffer the very real consequences when you can choose to step around it?
That’s one reason why baseball is still looking for its gay trailblazer, a guy who can step up and proudly say that he’s out before heading to the ballpark to do his job, ignoring the slurs and comments.
But there’s another aspect to this that we need to remember. Jackie wasn’t just any ballplayer. He was an All-Star, a guy who played on a winning team and who was one of the leaders of that team. If a Ryan Howard, an Albert Pujols or a Tim Lincecum were to come out and then continue to perform at the same level, it could have the same effect as Robinson. But some ordinary Joe, a roleplayer who has to grind it out, sadly, that just doesn’t mean the same thing.
This is an important distinction. The only reason that anyone still talks about Billy Bean is because of his coming out story. He was an adequate ballplayer but that’s it. Yes, Jackie was black but he also was the Rookie of the Year, won an MVP and was elected into the Hall of Fame. He didn’t let himself be defined as a black ballplayer; he was a great ballplayer who happened to be black.
In order to truly overcome the stigma of being gay, an out ballplayer would have to transcend his sexuality. That’s the point when he truly becomes accepted and that’s the point when it becomes easier for other ballplayers to come out and join him. But until that time, it’s going to be a difficult road.
Statistically, it’s nearly impossible that there are no gay or bi baseball players in the game today. And like you pointed out in your post, when respected guys like Ken Griffey, Jr. and Joe Torre say they would welcome out ballplayers on their team, you would like to think that a change is coming. But I’m afraid we still have a ways to go.
-A
Bruno Brings it Home
You don’t have to be gay or openly support gay rights to feel a little chill at the news coming out of Uganda right now. For a country that is supposed to be one of the brighter spots in sub-Saharan Africa (excepting the still turbulent north), the recent news and continuing coverage of a law that, if passed, would be one of the the most draconian and repressive anti-gay laws in the world is particularly troubling. It shouldn’t come as any surprise, though, considering that the “developed” world hasn’t really made that much more progress.
Don’t believe me? Here’s an example. Raise your hand if you saw Sacha Baron Cohen’s film Bruno this past summer. Ok, now keep your hand up if you enjoyed it. Yeah, a lot of hands went down there, didn’t they? And why is that? Was it any less funny than Borat? Were the stunts any less ridiculous? Did he take advantage of people to a greater degree than he did in Borat? I’ll admit that some of the scenes were over the top. But honestly, there was nothing there that was nearly as offensive as most of what happened in Borat.
So, why didn’t people like the movie? Well, I’m going to go out on a limb here and say it has a lot to do with being uncomfortable. It’s easy to laugh at xenophobia. It’s easy to laugh at a village simpleton who doesn’t understand the way things are done elsewhere. But the in-your-face sexuality of Bruno is discomfiting. The character doesn’t hide who he is and rather goes out of his way to flaunt it. Even those who consider themselves supportive of gay rights seemed to find themselves ejected from their comfort zones by Bruno’s portrayal of such extreme sexuality.
These same currents flow even deeper in the world of sports. Imagine for a second if Tiger Woods had admitted to having multiple affairs with men. At this point, despite his so-called indiscretions, he still has his marketing deals and no one is really considering cutting them, even if they probably will use the affairs to leverage the rates they pay. But if it had been 11 men? Or even 10 women and 1 man? He’d be out the door faster than a neo-Nazi at a Rufus Wainwright concert.
Within Major League Baseball, only two players have come out and both of them did it well after their careers had ended. They knew that there was just no way that who they were would be accepted. The article linked above notes one particular anecdote that gets right to the heart of the matter:
“In his recently published memoir, Going the Other Way, [Billy] Bean
(not the A’s GM) recounts how Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda constantly made homophobic
jokes, even as Lasorda’s gay son was dying from AIDS.”
The sad thing is, an openly gay baseball player, or even football or basketball player, could go a long way towards helping people become more comfortable with homosexuality. As support for gay marriage has grown in the US, the statistics show that much of that has to do with knowing someone who is gay. When that someone you know is the guy who plays second base for your team, well, that just might have an even bigger impact.
This isn’t going to change overnight. Intolerance is a deep-seated problem that takes generations to truly root out. But like it or not, in the same way that athletes are held up as examples and role-models all over the world, our country is also held up as an example all over the world. If we want to criticize Uganda for its inhumane law, we should probably take a look closer to home as well.
-A
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