I am taking a class that focuses on Race, Gender, Sexuality, etc. in sports in American Society. The other day I was asked to answer this question. I would like to see what everyone's answer will be.

When will the first gay male American athlete in a prominent professional team sport step forward and declare his sexuality?

This post was edited by BigDChet on Oct 10 2012 04:30pm

Tim Tebow--by end of season.

No good athletes are gay

This is the debate we have in class. You don't know that. Many athletes that retire have announced that they are gay. When will someone announce it during their play time? WILL someone announce it during their play time?

during their careers* i hope you mean

because if you expect chris bosh to openly declare his sexuality at a 1/2 time interview, you're retarded...

and even during their careers, it wouldnt be wise to come out of the closet; you're just giving opposing teams fans fuel to the fire

when everyone is gay

oh lawd

please no gay men touching each other during games

this is exactly the point. i think most western societies (at least here in europe - i'm not sure about america though, i think homophobia is still quite common in some mostly republican states, isn't it?) are ready for that, the sports associations are no doubt and the majority of players as well.
the problem is indeed the fan. we all know the average sports fan is not the brightest and most tolerant bloke in the world - and history has shown that in sports rivalries almost nothing is sacred (liverpool fans singing songs about man united players who died in a plane crash).

so it's fair to assume there would be a lot of mockery and so i don't see that happen any time soon in team sports... although there is one case of a rather successful welsh rugby player (gareth thomas) who publicly announced he's gay during his active carreer but well, that's "just rugby" and "just europe" (not being elitist here, i don't see that happen in football / soccer here either) and "just one case"...

Probably when society completely accepts homosexuality as something normal (just to clarify, normal doesn't necesarily mean natural).

You go into the wikipedia article or whatever of a homosexual public figure and there is stuff about him being homosexual. You don't see information of other people being heterosexual, why should homosexuality be note worthy? Well, because society has still failed to accept it as something normal, there is still discrimination towards gays, although it is slowly becoming smaller.