Sunday School 27th March 2022

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Davis wrote:

Enco…stop with the misrepresenting what people say. You failed to read what I said clearly (as you often did). I said out athletes in top tier European football leagues or in the North American leagues: NHL, NFL, NBA, MLB. Pay attention to what people say Enco. Yes, there are out Olympians and rugby players, gymnasts and figure skaters. I was referring to top tier league players of which there are none in Europe and one in North America. I didn’t reply because your reply was bogus. Read what people write Enco.

There are more than zero, but the underlying point stands. It’s rare, and up until recently, nearly every out athlete only came out after retirement (a point you may have already made), or ended up retiring shortly thereafter. Sustaining a career in a number of men’s sports—the most popular sports especially—as an openly gay man appears to be quite difficult.

[TheEncogitationer]

PopeBeanie,

Do you see as many generalizations coming from the left here on AZ as you often like to present?

The first time I actually noted these kinds of popularized slights was about 15 or 20 years ago when a co-worker used the word “Libtards”. Took me more time to realize it was used fairly often on Fox News shows, and then increasingly in other conservative talk shows.

Then I perceived name-calling against the left two or three more times as often as left against the right. I concluded it was a money-making, click-bait kind of strategy growing in media, as a logical extension of memed name-calling between hard conservatives and bleeding heart liberals–another type of smear–who, by that definition actually care more about individual human beings than those on the far right who see it as a weakness to be pounced on.

If I’m wrong, can you correct me in 200 words or less? I promise not to respond, at least not here.

I don’t keep figures or statistics on it quite frankly. I just call things as I see them, when and where I see them and I don’t call names, I name names.

If there is clickbait going on here, the links would surely show it. And I certainly have no checks or BitCoin to show for it or even affiliation with any outfit doing clickbait.

If something or somebody gets called something by me, they got it honest. And how others react to it is a product of their own thoughts and evaluations and is on them.

[TheEncogitationer]

Autumn,

To put it summarily, he said “none,” I said “some,” and he had a snit over it.

Yes, there’s always room for more improvement. But to say that, one must first acknowledge that improvement exists.

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TheEncogitationer wrote:

Yes, there’s always room for more improvement. But to say that, one must first acknowledge that improvement exists.

The thrust of the argument wasn’t the exact number of out players.

Your premise is off in the first place. First, I find it highly unlikely Davis is unaware that some progress has been made with regard to homophobia in sport. That doesn’t mean it’s germane to the point at hand.

Second, talking about improvement isn’t always valuable. Imagine you are a grade five student. Every day, an older kid much bigger and stronger pins you down and punches you hard five times. You complain to the teacher and the teacher says they’ll talk to the other student. After a week of this pattern, you are still getting hit. You’ve tried to resolve things the “right” way, but for all the administration’s talk of sympathy with your plight, for all their talks with the bully, nothing changes. You bring this complaint to the teacher explaining that the problem persists and that their resolution methods are ineffective.
The teacher says, “Well, how many times did they hit you today?”
You reply, “I dunno. Four, I think.”
The teacher responds, “Wasn’t it five earlier in the week?”
You concede, “I guess so.”
The teacher continues, “Four is fewer than five, so you must admit some progress has been made.”

Do you walk away from that conversation shouting, “Yippee! Progress. Isn’t that teacher swell? I can’t wait for the day it’s down to one punch a day!” No, probably not. The improvement doesn’t address the fundamental issue neither does it alleviate much in the way of suffering.

Naturally, it’s an imperfect analogy to the sports scenario. The point is, for those of us who have been around in the LGBTQ+ fight for equality, we often get these bizarre placating, trite, platitudinous pearls of wisdom that just drag the conversation backward. We can talk about what is wrong today without having to do some sort of gratitude prayer that some improvement has been made. And one of the major issues with acknowledging some improvement is it readily becomes an excuse to stop moving forward. “Well, it’s better than it was, so what more can we be excepted to do? We’ve adequately shown we cared, and now the time for caring is done (until someone can show us a profit in it)”.

 

[Strega]

Autumn, I remember the late 80s in the UK when it seemed all the manufacturers became aware of the huge buying power of the ‘pink pound’ – so commercials made sure to market to them as much as possible.

The pink pound was considered particularly powerful because “the gays can’t have children or marry so they have the most disposable income”.

This was, sadly, true. What appeared on the surface to be a new wave of celebrating gayness, was in fact based squarely on the fact that gays were unable to marry or adopt children – and that there was money to be made as a result.

ps I liked the school bully analogy.

[—]

Huh. I wasn’t aware that particular issue went that far back, although really, I shouldn’t be surprised. It’s amazing the sheer amount of effort we spend as societies creating the appearance of not being bigoted when it might take less energy to just stop being bigoted. But then I suppose there is a certain cynical belief that certain segment of the population is immobile and intractable.

Disney is a great example of wanting to play both sides. Publicly, they love the gays, but privately are absolutely terrified of alienating homophobic demographics or losing favour with politicians of any stripe including those actively opposed to LGBTQ+ rights.

[Reg the Fronkey Farmer]

Just an aside. The “Pink Pound”…In the late 80’s a gay bar\club opened very close to where I worked in Camden, London. It was always busy. About 20 years ago in Dublin there was a bar called “Inn on the Liffey” (after the river that flows through the city). Nearby a new one called “Out on the Liffey” was established. I always thought that was a great name.

Ironic thing about the “Don’t Say Gay Bill”………you can’t say that without saying “Gay” 🙂

[TheEncogitationer]

Autumn,

The presence, or even the absence, of an out LGBTQ+ athlete is not the same as a punch from a bully and you know this. That was and is and will ever be a terrible analogy.

And no one said anyone has to pray a “gratitude prayer” or any other prayer, to a God, a human, or anyone or anything else. Nice Straw-Person you built there.

All I call for is acknowledging that there are out and proud LGBTQ+ athletes and every other profession and that we as individuals make merit and ability the only criteria for admission and acceptance in sports, business, government, and every other area of human endeavor.

And, as a consequence of making merit and ability the only criterion, perhaps there will be more LGBTQ+ people and every other grouping in every human endeavor. Time, and individual choice, will tell.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve grown hoarse from sea lion calling and wore out from the sport of Sisyphean stone-rolling.

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TheEncogitationer wrote:

Autumn, The presence, or even the absence, of an out LGBTQ+ athlete is not the same as a punch from a bully and you know this.

No one said it was and my point is not contingent on that. “The improvement doesn’t address the fundamental issue neither does it alleviate much in the way of suffering.”

You ignored the thrust of Davis’s argument in favour of something pedantic, and then followed up with something useless and tangential at best. This is typically the pattern used in bad faith arguments.

And no one said anyone has to pray a “gratitude prayer” or any other prayer, to a God, a human, or anyone or anything else. Nice Straw-Person you built there.

It’s not a strawman. It’s very clearly rhetoric and not a reference to literal prayer. The whole point is that no one is obligated to make a show of acknowledgement of some arbitrary criterion just for an argument to be heard or deemed credible.

All I call for is acknowledging that there are out and proud LGBTQ+ athletes…

It wasn’t being denied.

… and that we as individuals make merit and ability the only criteria for admission and acceptance in sports, business, government, and every other area of human endeavor.

I don’t know if you are saying that is the case or should be the case.

[jakelafort]

Unseen these bleeding hearts playing the victim card makes me puke! We have laws that protect all of us. We have a nation that has equal opportunity for all citizens: black, white, yellow, purple, gay, straight, radical syndicalist, arch-conservative and every other conceivable stripe.

Imagine the gall of the legislators who have passed trick laws to address discriminatory animus and hate crime laws. We all understand that a crime is a crime is a crime. It makes no difference if a Black girl age 12 is dragged out of her bed at midnight and gang-raped by KKK members wearing those funny white suits and calling her a dirty Nigger as they take turns. It is rape either way.

On the other hand we should be ever-vigilant to prosecute to the full extent of the law those who would feign victimization of hate crimes. And it is usually Whites who are victimized in these common scams. Those activities are so prevalent that they are exhausting our overburdened legal system.

Anyhow all those transgender and LBGT athletes who have internalized the rejection and bigotry and felt unwelcome have to buck up and watch Loony Tunes to see how easily one navigates cartoon scenes. And why not have as a motto “sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me.” We know the free market place of ideas will weed out any ideas lacking merit. Yeah it is all about merit and ability.

[jakelafort]

Woops…meant to address that to Enco!

[—]

jakelafort wrote:

Woops…meant to address that to Enco!

With any luck, the error will remain unseen.

[jakelafort]

All quiet on the western front…

And that is remarquable…

[Reg the Fronkey Farmer]

Yes, atheists usually take Monday as their day of rest!

[Davis]

All I call for is acknowledging that there are out and proud LGBTQ+ athletes and every other profession and that we as individuals make merit and ability the only criteria for admission and acceptance in sports, business, government, and every other area of human endeavor.

Enco you’re talking to yourself. If you failed to read the last several times I, autumn and other people here clearly said, recognised and lauded the fact that there ARE out athletes, none of us have denied it…so I will repeat it: I DAVIS (and I assume Autumn once again) CLEARLY STATE, RECOGNISE AND LAUD THAT THERE ARE OUT ATHLETES (for what…the third time now?).

Merit isn’t an issue. There are ALREADY TONS of LGTBQ+ players playing in the main top tier leagues. They are almost all closeted for fear of their social life and career. We know this because confidential interviews with journalists directly say so and even if a small fraction of LGTBQ+ were interested in sports (not the case but let us assume), and even if we allow Unseen’s vile homophobic supposition that LGTBQ+ are potentially not capable of or want to be good athletes (let’s be absurd and say only 10% of them), then by numbers alone there should be dozens and dozens of them. Yet few (if any in top tier sports) are out. Thus they are closeted. The only reason they are is because of fear and homophobia. Virtually no one voluntarily stays in the closet without pressure to do so just as few left-handers would not admit so if they didn’t live in a society that insisted on right-handedness. This is basic logic. As an understatement: this is an awful situation.

I stand by the fact that there are too many athletes currently playing in top tier leagues, terrified to come out of the closet because of a culture of homophobia in general that has only somewhat improved, due also to some teammates, some fans and some within sporting institutions (including records of coaches and agents advising clients “not to come out”). This is bad. This should stop. This can only stop with a culture change and allies supporting change. This can only stop if people stop downplaying these problems, excusing it, blaming it on other nonsense and pretending this isn’t the case. I heavily thank allies who stop pointlessly arguing against these completely obvious facts which should be utterly non-controversial, and let me clearly and openly thank fellow users here who have done so. Thank you!

I simply don’t understand how it can be difficult to say, even lightly:

There is a problem, it sucks there is a problem, I support change and hope it happens.

Instead, we often get (and even from open minded progressive people): excuses, “victim card” bullshit, underplaying and understating and even bigoted comments, the kinds that keep grinding you down. We don’t ask for change and point out the problems because we enjoy it, we are weary and tired of being ground down and from what I remember in American narratives (like for instance overthrowing British tyranny and demanding your own rights), this should all be a good and admirable thing.

• This reply was modified 4 years, 2 months ago by Davis.
• This reply was modified 4 years, 2 months ago by Davis.
• This reply was modified 4 years, 2 months ago by Davis.
• This reply was modified 4 years, 2 months ago by Davis.

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