Perhaps one day a top flight professional footballer will have the balls to come out and declare he's gay. Ideally a whole group of them would do it at the same time. From the Pink News report, it looks as though that might happen in Italy before it happens here!
political commentator * author * publisher * bookseller * radio presenter * blogger * Conservative candidate * former lobbyist * Jack Russell owner * West Ham United fanatic * Email iain AT iaindale DOT com
Thursday, January 08, 2009
Marcello Lippi to Coach Iranian Football Team?
Marcello Lippi and Channel 4's favourite world leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad should get on like a house on fire. The Iranian President is famous for declaring that there no homosexuals in Iran. Now Marcello Lippi, coach to the Italian national football team, has said that there are no homosexuals in Italian football. No, of course there aren't, LOL. Reading THIS report in Pink News would be funny if it weren't so tragic. One day people will acknowledge that just because a naked footballer stands under a shower, it doesn't mean a gay teammate will automatically want to have sex with him. If gay people can work as teams in the armed forces, you have to question the antideluvian attitudes displayed in sport.
Perhaps one day a top flight professional footballer will have the balls to come out and declare he's gay. Ideally a whole group of them would do it at the same time. From the Pink News report, it looks as though that might happen in Italy before it happens here!
Perhaps one day a top flight professional footballer will have the balls to come out and declare he's gay. Ideally a whole group of them would do it at the same time. From the Pink News report, it looks as though that might happen in Italy before it happens here!
The problem is that while there are morons willing to make people like Sol Campbell's life hell by shouting horrible abuse at him, why would the players risk it?
ReplyDeleteWhat is the view from the West Ham faithful on this?
ReplyDeleteDo you believe the rumours about a West Ham player being gay?
Ps Blue Eyes, Sol is a heterosexual male and any abuse he gets is for his Judas behaviour.
We had a footballer come out 20 years or so ago - he also had a brother who was not, also a footballer. I think one of them was Justin or similar - they were black.
ReplyDeleteAlan Douglas
I don't know or care what Sol does when he's off the pitch, but the fans certainly abuse him for more than his "judas behaviour".
ReplyDeleteRe: Alan Douglas, I presume you're referring to Justin Fashanu who had a brother John. John publicity disowned his brother at the time.
ReplyDeleteJustin committed suicide in 1998, many years after he had retired from the game, he was being investigated by US police at the time for alleged sexual assault
RE: Blue Eyes, Sol Campbell gets abuse from Spurs fans for one reason, and one reason only; for being an out-of-touch overpaid footballer who lied, treated Spurs fans with contempt and left for their arch rivals despite saying he would never play for them. The word Judas in their chants kinda of gives that away.
ReplyDeleteIf you want to make a point about homophobic abuse in football, you're better off using either the experiences of Graeme le Saux or Ashley Cole (I'm not suggesting either of them is gay)
Though of course football is not the only sport that experiences homophobia as the gay NBA basketball player John Amaechi makes clear.
Iain:
ReplyDeleteWomen are excused from taking showers with men because of the possibility of sexual tension. If you agree with that, why would you insist that men should have to allow homosexuals to shower with them?
Similarly for the Armed Forces in barracks. You wouldn't force women to cohabit with men, so why insist that men should be forced to cohabit with homosexuals who might be viewing (ogling?) them as sexual objects.
Oh FFS. Bangs head against wall.
ReplyDeleteI tried to make a serious point about a problem I have wondered about for some time. I should have known better. Sorry to have bothered you.
ReplyDeleteIf you regard that as a serious point then I think you have some issues to deal with. Either that or you have a very warped view of what it is to be gay.
ReplyDeleteJesus H Christ. I'm fortunate in knowing a young team sportsman who is enough of a world class athlete to have accepted ... but no. I can't say.
ReplyDeleteHe's gay. His sexuality and his athletic life are completely separate. He has to pretend to be straight. He describes it as a mental partition. A partition of such determination that his team mates are at less risk of sexual advances from him than from Jeremy Clarkson.
FFS, do some of you understand nothing about the way in which all of us, straight or gay, manage our sexuality?
"One day people will acknowledge that just because a naked footballer stands under a shower, it doesn't mean a gay teammate will automatically want to have sex with him."
ReplyDeleteYou've hit the nail on the head there, Iain. I hope and pray that day comes soon, but I'm afraid I'm not holding my breath.
The warped logic and vanity of many people's attitudes, that just because someone is gay they'll want to have sex with anyone of the same gender they meet, constantly astounds and depresses me.
I'm a bisexual woman and, by that thinking, should be lusting after everyone I meet, and stopped from sharing a shower block or changing room with anyone. Fortunately, I'm not.
Yes,why do heterosexual men always think gay men fancy them and that we are only after one thing.I wouldnt touch most with a barge pole.
ReplyDeleteThey get quite upset and ask whats wrong with them if you point this out.
Dont even mention the huge numbers of closet married gay men.
Gordon your wasting your time mate.
ReplyDeletePersonally I have no Idea what it is to be gay but then again...
Iain ,Bad bunny, DMC etc what the hell do you REALLY know about straight men apart from sweeping generalistions that reveal nothing but your own "issuses".
Anybody who thinks a straight man is going to view a gay man as just "another one of the lads"
simpy doesn't live on this planet.
It's not homophobia or a inflated idea of our attractiveness it's in our DNA.
Now let me be clear
Do I care if a footballer is gay
No
Do I care if a footballer is paid more in a week than most of us earn in a year and then seems to treat a match as an incovenience
in between shopping for a new ferrari (insert a long list of candidates here) - you bet the hell I do.
@ Half The Story
ReplyDeletehttp://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/7839316.stm
Nice people, eh?