The True Face of Homophobia

[almaty 19]

Last week, Tim Hardaway declared his hatred of gay people. Gay people should be thankful.

Let me tell you a story. It's about a man named Bull Connor. In 1963, he was the police commissioner of Birmingham, Ala. Back then, Birmingham was pleased to be considered the most segregated city in the South. Then, civil-rights demonstrators under the leadership of Martin Luther King Jr. came to town. Connor directed the city's response.

When you see those famous images of dogs attacking unarmed marchers and firefighters directing high-pressure hoses at men and women singing freedom songs, you are seeing Connor's work. He was a hateful cuss, but there was a useful purity in his hate: The sheer violence of his response to the civil-rights movement brought international condemnation and irresistible pressure for change.

Segregation was, for many people, still socially respectable in that era. Politicians defended it with honeyed euphemisms like "state's rights," and preachers assured their flocks that it was God's will. So you could be a segregationist and still feel good about yourself, still feel moral.

Connor inadvertently made that impossible. How moral can you feel when a guy is loosing dogs on children in your name? Connor stripped segregation naked. He made people face it for what it was.

Hardaway, a retired jock who once started at guard for the Miami Heat, did the same thing for gay-bashing last week. No, he didn't turn dogs or hoses on anybody. But he surely stripped homophobia naked.

Asked during a radio interview by my Miami Herald colleague Dan LeBatard for a comment on John Amaechi, a former NBA benchwarmer who recently came out of the closet, Hardaway did not have the brains to lie or deflect the question. Nope, he was blunt as a brick.

"I hate gay people," he said, "so I let it be known. I don't like gay people and I don't like to be around gay people. I am homophobic. I don't like it. It shouldn't be in the world or in the United States."

Any questions? Me neither.

There is something bracing in the matter-of-fact clarity of Hardaway's declaration. He cut through the clutter of weasel words and half-truths that traditionally surrounds homophobia, showed us what lies behind honeyed euphemisms ("traditional values"), and claims to speak for God.

"I hate gays," he said. Period, end of sentence. The statement had to it the same flat clarity of Bull Connor, straw hat on his head, cigar clenched in his teeth, siccing dogs on children.

No, Hardaway isn't the first person to speak so stridently against gays. The lunatic Fred Phelps comes to mind. Still, you could always ignore Phelps precisely because he was a lunatic. Hardaway is not. He is, or always seemed, a decent guy. Which makes his words all the more hurtful.

He has apologized, of course, but that surely has more to do with universal approbation and the loss of lucrative endorsement deals than any true change of heart. Anyway, that's his business.

Ours is this: Like segregation before it, homophobia is, for many people, still socially respectable. So one hopes that one byproduct of Hardaway's outburst is that it will become less so. That we will be forced to face it for what it is. It would be a nice change.

So often, we use words to distance ourselves from what we feel, to hide our true meaning, even from ourselves. Hardaway used words to say exactly what he felt and it is possible to abhor what he felt and yet, appreciate that he does not make you guess or infer.

Think again of Connor, screaming obscenities under an Alabama sun. To hear him, to hear Hardaway, is to know that you have finally come down to it, finally met the beast that lives behind euphemism and weasel words.

It is ugly, but it is also, at long last, truth.

[pedroh 21]

good article hermano almaty

yea.. thing is.. if a gay person stares at ur children for 5 seconds, ur children turns gay.. also, if u share a locker room with a gay person, he/she's gonna try to fondle you every day you are there, and of course, if you drink from a gay person's cup, you become gay and get AIDS.. and of course, Baby Jesus kills a puppy everytime a gay couple kiss..

unfortunately, people think that's acceptable, to think such stupidities, and actually stand for those stupid things.. pff..

h8t3rs ftl

[Heracles 417]

Well the first amendment protects his opinion..

[pedroh 21]

Well the first amendment protects his opinion..

i thought u were against the 1st ammendment protecting hate speech and negative attitudes..

[Heracles 417]

Well the first amendment protects his opinion..

i thought u were against the 1st ammendment protecting hate speech and negative attitudes..

I am but I just wanted to show that the first amendment not only helps people have a voice but also protects scum bags like that, which is wrong..

[one...two...tree 2,762]

I believe Tim Hardaway (former NBA player) is now a sports commentator and the issue was brought because another former player came out and said he was gay. Some NBA players were asked to comment on the recent announcement by the former player and one said that, "he didn't care as long as the player didn't try to push his gayness on him."

I'm not trying to excuse the obvious prejudice in both of those player's comments, but these players do have a certain vernacular that tends to be blunt and in your face - probably a bit of false bravado. Trash talking is prominant on the court where players quickly learn to have ice in their veins or they fall apart.

I'm doubtful that Hardaway would be the kind of person that joins a group of people who protest gays - I think he's speaking the way he would if he were on the court.

[Robor007 0]

I believe Tim Hardaway (former NBA player) is now a sports commentator and the issue was brought because another former player came out and said he was gay. Some NBA players were asked to comment on the recent announcement by the former player and one said that, "he didn't care as long as the player didn't try to push his gayness on him."

I'm not trying to excuse the obvious prejudice in both of those player's comments, but these players do have a certain vernacular that tends to be blunt and in your face - probably a bit of false bravado. Trash talking is prominant on the court where players quickly learn to have ice in their veins or they fall apart.

I'm doubtful that Hardaway would be the kind of person that joins a group of people who protest gays - I think he's speaking the way he would if he were on the court.

I disagree to what's bolded above.

His response was he hates gay people and doesn't think they belong in the world or the US. That's not false bravado or game smack. He's a bigot and unfortunately for him his mouth acted before his brain engaged. He's entitled to his opinion just like everyone else - bigots, racists, etc inlcuded. However, if he's representing an organization or company where public opinion is a factor he's got to be smarter than that. He screwed up and his scripted apology can't close the can-o-worms his original statements opened up.

Edited February 21, 2007 by Robor007

[almaty 19]

i agree..also, he doth protest too much....hmmm..