Guest Post by Terence Bates
Two weeks back the tabloids ran front page news that two gay premiership players were going to out themselves as gay. The net result was nobody did come out other than Luke Shaw to strongly deny it was him.
Ok so none of this should matter… But it clearly does as Luke Shaw has shown in having to come out to deny it is him. No one from football is coming out to play.
In the last week Elton John, the musician and life long Watford football fan was sent a message from Vladimir Putin apologising for a recent prank/hoax call from somebody purporting to be the Russian President. If reports are to be considered true, then Putin is a fan of Elton Johns music and considering Elton is due to play a concert in Moscow he may be wanting to meet the performer. Paradoxical/ironic as that may seem, Elton John is hoping to meet with Putin to discuss the situation over gay rights in Russia, where Russia has taken giant steps backwards.
Now forgive my anecdotal time travel tangent, but I am going to recall an element of my youth, which was not only last century, but a long time ago when disco was booming and the cost of a pint of beer was about 20p and every one could afford to go and watch West Ham play and more importantly we actually won something called the FA Cup.
I had a mate at school called Mark, we shared common interest’s including soul music and indeed football. As we evolved into teenagers we hung out at clubs and somewhere along the way we inexplicably went different ways and directions. Mark from my distant memories was a really cool good looking guy, a snappy dresser who loved music, loved life, loved football… we often kicked a football together, he also had a passion for motocross.
A couple of years after leaving school Mark had an accident on his motor bike when competing, but true to form he simply dusted himself off after he had flew over the handlebars. He eventually went home laughing about his somersault off the bike. It wasn’t that he was macho, but he was quite stoic, unfussy and saw through life with a smile and a joke.
That night Mark collapsed and died from internal bleeding, he was 19.
I can remember the disbelief at this, despite not having seen him for almost a year. And then it came out that he was gay and the talk was all about the nightclubs that he frequented in London’s West End and his lifestyle. More people seemed shocked at this than his untimely and sad death. I know I was, but partly because I had no idea of his sexuality. I still now often think about him he was truly a great guy. I don’t/didn’t care about his sexuality… I wish I could have told him that.
Like many gay men at that time, he probably kept his sexuality and feelings secret for fear of prejudice and violent assault. It was after all the 1970s and despite new legislation that had been brought in, growing up in the East End was difficult enough without having to think about one’s sexuality and walking in fear of the ‘Queer bashers’.
This was of course nearly 40 years ago. You would like to think that things have moved on. Well of course they have in most walks of life. But in football we are still in some ways stuck in the dark ages. At a game at Upton Park a few seasons back I can remember the Brighton fans being barracked about which part of their anatomy they were taking it in, this with an obvious stereotypical reference to the large gay community that lives in Brighton. I cringed, it wasn’t funny, yet so many people thought it was a laugh. And there lies the problem within football, anything gay is there as game to poke fun at or even throw abuse.
Should a footballer playing in the premier league admit to being gay, then he would get all manner of jibes and abuse aimed at him, it’s the same mould in the way black players in the 70’s would have monkey chants or bananas chucked at them. There is no difference in my view.
Of course there are gay players in the premier league, why on earth should it make the front pages of the tabloids? Why should we care? But many do care, including notably the press.
Justin Fashanu is the only top flight player to have been outed, but not through his choice but through the tabloids pressure and this was 30 years ago. At the time his footballing Brother John initially disowned him. The tragedy of Justin Fashanu ultimately ended in his hanging himself in a deserted warehouse in Shoreditch, this after an accusation made against him in America. Justin Fashanu actually played two games for West Ham, such was the chaos of his life he registered with no fewer than 22 clubs. Brian Clough cast him aside at Nottingham forest, because of his sexuality calling him a ‘poof’. It is also worth mentioning that Justin Fashanu was considered a very talented footballer way more than his brother John.
Leaving aside the salacious side to his story, you are left with a guy deeply troubled and almost ashamed by his sexuality. It is and was truly tragic.
Now supposedly the only openly gay footballer in England is Liam Davis of wait for it …. The mighty Gainsborough Trinity. Such is the medias obsession on finding a gay footballer in the UK they have had to prise out one from a team that sounds like a Sunday Church team. And in doing so they have managed to get Davis to admit that two Premier League players will come out before the start of the 2016/2017 season… hmm perhaps he was paid well for his story. Needless to say everyone is waiting for our ‘Robbie Rogers’ to reveal himself.
And so to the current West Ham, who could be gay? I’ve mentioned Justin Fashanu but he can hardly be called a West ham player after just two games. Who do have we hiding in the pathetically proverbial closet? Well we have already had one player come out, but he waited until his career was over and that of course was Thomas Hitzlsperger who played briefly for the Hammers in the relegation season of 2011/2012. He was a useful player with a wicked ‘hammer’ shot, but in later seasons suffered injury wise.
So what would the reaction amongst West Ham fans be if say Dimitri Payet announced he was gay or indeed the latest crowd favourite Manuel Lanzini? It so obviously should not matter, but to many it clearly does.
One of the other factors we do not consider is how the gay community are put off of sports like football because of the largely ignorant attitude of male heterosexual footballer fans. Of course I am not saying all fans are like this, but from where I stand I would say many are. And yet the gay community are full of ingenuity, economic savviness and industriousness something we crave to see in football. It’s our loss.
In the same way that Black and Asian people originally did not attend football games or were put off from them in the 1960’s/70’s (and yes even 1980s) because of racism and the presence of groups like the National Front, the gay community, are I figure turned off participating and watching of sports like football because of the homophobic attitudes of just about everything to do with the game. If we change this then there is a potential to increase the interest in the game, in the same way more of the Black/Asian community are now involved and more women are interested in football. This can only be good for the sport. We need to get over all our prejudices.
The view of those fans with these attitudes and who may cite that gay people aren’t into football because it’s too macho blah blah blah is shot to pieces by the likes of Sir Elton John and indeed Thomas Hitzlsperger, but more fittingly for me, by the like of the friend I lost all those years back and of whom I can still remember placing the jumpers down for the goal posts and punching the air after he flicked the ball up and volleyed and scored an unstoppable shot… I so wish he could come out to play.