OT: ASU OL Chip Sarafin comes out
Edward 'Chip' Sarafin has become the first active player in NCAA football to come out publically regarding his sexuality. I'm sure this will turn into a firestorm of opinions, positive and negative. Personally, I applaud this individual to have the courage in making this announcement. Its truly a historical event as I believe that Michael Sam and Chip are breaking new ground in college athletics' environment. Link: http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/11349933/edward-chip-sarafin-arizona-state-sun-devils-announces-gay
August 14th, 2014 at 5:06 PM ^
As a source. Same with Google. Those aren't scientific studies. Sexuality is something you are born with. Do you remember the day you decided to choose being straight?
August 14th, 2014 at 5:06 PM ^
As a former biochemist, I ask you to cite your empirical evidence that points to sexual preference as to being a choice, since you are so sure it is a choice.
Since I am not in the field of human sexuality, I have no clue of the top impact peer reviewed journals.
All i know is from my POV as a straight man, I did not choose to be straight. I was attracted to females since I started growing through puberty. I am willing to bet several of my friends who are homosexual would say the exact same thing. IT IS NOT A CHOICE. My other friend who is transitioning male to female would also say the same thing about her gender.
August 14th, 2014 at 5:13 PM ^
A: I don't "believe" that it's not a choice. That implies that I'm taking some leap of faith. I know it's not a choice. I've talked to people who've done everything they can to "be straight." But they weren't, no matter how much they wanted to be straight, they simply were not sexually attracted to the opposite sex.
B: FROM THE LINK YOU SUPPLIED, BY THE SCIENTIST CONDUCTING THE STUDY:
Dr Bailey said: “Sexual orientation has nothing to do with choice. Our findings suggest there may be genes at play – we found evidence for two sets that affect whether a man is gay or straight.
All that research says is that it's not strictly genetic. You are also operating on the assumption that it's a black & white issue: gay or straight. That's not how it works. It's more of a spectrum with many sexual orientations in between. When you accept that, the fact that your evidence cites 40% hereditary connection strengthens my position that it's not a choice.
Also from that article:
He said: 'The thing that’s consistent across all of them is that they all point to sexual orientation being something fundamental to a person rather than the lifestyle choice some opponents of equality repeatedly suggest.’
August 15th, 2014 at 8:22 AM ^
These fucking bigots can't even read.
August 15th, 2014 at 8:08 PM ^
Kapitan Howard, when you're open to real dialogue, I"m game. But when your post begins, These fucking bigots, well, it is a challenge to respond. Nonetheless, I'll go down this road a bit.
- In the statement "these fucking bigots," you seem to class all who hold a different position in the same group: "fucking bigots" May I suggest that there is more nuance? That not all who take a different position are fucking bigots? You just can't class all who you don't like together. There are many very offensive examples of this. To put all people into one class is overly simplistic and very rarely accurate.
- In the statement, "these fucking bigots," the use of the word "fucking" immediately insults and marginalizes those in the group you oppose. Put the shoe on the other foot. If someone put a post about a group you supported beginning "These fucking . . . (fill in the blank)," how would you feel? How would you respond? Would that be appropriate?
- In the statement "these fucking bigots," your assumption is that all who take a different position are bigots. Merriam-Webster defines bigot as a person who strongly and unfairly dislikes other people. Ummh, I've gone to pains in other posts to state that I don't dislike gay people at all. Let alone strongly or unfairly. I support gay marriage in society, support equal pay and equal opportunity regardless of sexual preference, made clear that I don't hate homosexuals, despise them, or feel the need to change them, and I've been clear that I have gay friends, and gays who attend my church. Some gays I like, some I don't. Some straight people I like, some I don't. Liking or disliking someone on the basis of their sexual preferences doesn't work very well. It is true that I believe that homosexuality is morally wrong. However, these are my own personal beliefs, which are irrelevant to you, and which I don't want to impose on homosexuals. I don't feel I am better or superior or more holy than someone who is gay. When you decide to label anyone who disagrees with you as a "fucking bigot," you are acting in a narrow-minded, closed minded, judgemental way. I can deal with that, Kapitan Howard. But is that really what you want to do?
As for my post regarding whether or not homosexuality is a choice, it was ill-advised on my part to open that can of worms. What I was trying to say is that it is pretty complicated, and that it isn't clearly the case that there is a gene determining whether or not someone is gay. Between environment, number of older brothers, dynamics in the home, genetics, there are tons of factors involved in why someone is gay, and someone else is not. I suspect that in some cases, choice is involved. In other cases, not so much. I'm not a scientist, nor have I studied homosexuality, so I'm not competent and my opinion doesn't matter much.
What's clear is that you're really passionate about this topic, and that I've deeply angered and offended you. I'm sorry that is the case, and really, I should have known better . . . this is a bad forum to address deep topics like this. I take a lot of the blame, because I know my beliefs are very offensive to some, and as such, I really should just keep my mouth shut.
August 17th, 2014 at 12:18 AM ^
Is going for a cheap one liner really the only option towards a guy who really adds value to the community in general? I get it, I really do, but it seems like the post above this one is the right way to go about replying.
100% just my personal opinion as a guy who really likes spending time around here.
August 14th, 2014 at 4:31 PM ^
As a "proclaimed Christian" it is actually incumbent on you to come to terms with the implications of your faith for the way you view and treat other people. Your labeling homosexuality a "decision" and a "life choice" that he has to come to terms with, not because it is part of who he is as a person, but because he is making supposedly difficult "choices", reflects a lack of understanding of homosexuality, and a need to insert unverifiable matters of faith into the resultant void. Chip Sarafin's being a homosexual is a threat to exactly nobody; your proclamation of a faith, or an interpretation of a faith, that redefines characteristics of others as "choices" that don't fit within your definition of morality is one step away from being a serious threat to Chip and people like him. You view this as a religious discussion; that's actually pretty scary.
August 14th, 2014 at 5:31 PM ^
August 14th, 2014 at 6:34 PM ^
we can all all laugh about it now.
Because it's fun to laugh about those things that advanced societies agree to finally throw upon the "scrap heap of bad ideas" like human sacrifice, vicarious redemption, lawn jarts, three-wheeled cars, the LP player in the glove compartment, and the notion that homsexuals should be somehow spared from the peerless, soul-crushing, wealth-destroying experience known as marriage, and it's best friend, divorce. Yep, we can laugh about all of that now.
August 14th, 2014 at 9:01 PM ^
Its pretty cool to see it from a Phoenix point of view. He's getting a lot of community support, but Phoenix is pretty liberal (minus our crazy sherrif and the old fashion snowbirds). Someday, it won't even be news worthy story - sexual orientation will be no big deal and then true progress will have been made.
August 15th, 2014 at 12:13 AM ^
My own take is so uncomplicated it's hardly worth repeating: don't hate. Having a take on an issue is cheap and easy. The point of discussing your take is to put your take on trial; if you're going in expecting to change others' opinions more than your own, you're doing it wrong.
The best way to really understand where you're coming from, where you sound like you're coming from, and where you shouldn't come from, is to understand a completely different way of thinking.
I've been supremely lucky to have discussed this particular issue--specifically, an out gay man on a major FBS roster--with a former college football player who profoundly disagrees with me.
He's a man who came from a terrible background, where 99% of the choices given him were bad and easy, and there was just one lifeline, one path from darkness to righteousness, one institution that was down there with him to offer a hand up, and the patience to keep offering it when he turned it down the first eight times. It's not an institution I would ever subscribe to but for that guy Christianity's rigid road was the difference between a life drowned in gangland, and a four-year starter at Michigan who's still in the NFL, and uses his fortune to put an extraordinary amount of good into the world that tried its best to throw him away.
He's learned not to discuss his views on teammate homosexuality in public, yes because any 140 characters extracted from his take will come off as narrow-minded at least and quite likely as bigoted, and that turns away fans. But it doesn't come from hatred, nor from an unwillingness to understand other people or accept other peoples' natures; it comes from seeing one code of morality, specifically a dogmatic Christian code, as absolute, and all deviation from it as temptation. This man faced temptations, and many times he chose the *only* other path. He remembers those who didn't take that path, and can't scorn them because so many are dead or good as. He mourns them and their choices. He sees everything a person is and does as this choice: the good, and the not.
Put aside who hates whom and who's trying to push whose definitions on each other and look at the players: many are profoundly, dogmatically religious Christian, because football and Christianity are two institutions in this country with such an appetite for talent that they'll scour the darkest places for human gems. But this sample grants them, as best we know, small if any immunity from the 4% of people who gay. There are 112 men coming down that tunnel. What are the odds?
Whatever arguments over a specific "gay gene" are semantic; it's practically undeniable at this point, given only the staggering number of people who identify as such, and homosexuality's incredible persistence through human history despite such ardent efforts against (they used to kill you for it!), that the gay trait is innate, and as far as innate human traits go, pretty normal.
So odds are an extremely close cross-section of men who play high-level college football are going to be more openly dogmatically religious than the norm, and at least someone on that field is, and can't help but be, gay. The odds are somebody is going to get trampled on.
We've been over this before in a hundred different skins: in this society, the will of the majority is less important than right of the individual to follow his nature, so long as that nature isn't harmful. It's not so hard to look at those two sides—the religious and the gay—and decide which should put his thing aside for the other.
It is hard to summon the requisite gratitude for him when he does. Being wrong for the right reasons doesn't make being wrong feel any better. Having it your way for centuries and then having to live with it going the other way is a hard thing to do, and those who do it with at least a measure of grace, however fumbled or misjustified, deserve gratitude for their forbearance, not scorn for their narrow-mindedness.
At this point in history the upset victory is so assured that pressing perfect agreement out of those who believe in a universal, religiously defined moral code, is merely running up the score. Either kneel the clock out (i.e. pump a fist at the passage of another inevitable yet still remarkable step forward, and move on), or else avail yourself of the generally intelligent, generally well-meaning people who disagree with you, and you may discover some incredible value in a different type of thinking.
August 15th, 2014 at 9:35 PM ^
This post is why I'm so glad the moderators let this thread go. It probably was a close call and I probably am one of the posters that made it a close call - I tried to be carefull in defending my stance but I know I was vocal.
This post has literally mellowed me out. As a young-ish straight guy who's become very passionate about gay rights as the modern day civil rights fight, it's often baffled me how anyone can still oppose equality for all. This post gave me a bit of perspective. I'm still very anti-religion in the sense that I don't feel I need a book or set of rules to live a moral life (especially when so many people who follow those rules seem to follow only those that are important to them - which is fine!). But, I kinda get it. I mean, I kinda don't since I subscribe to the religion of logic above all and just because a book some doods wrote millenia ago say owning slaves is cool doesn't mean it is. We've come a long way to see that The Book was wrong on that one.
And we've come a long way to recognize equality based on sexual orientation. In 10 years we can look back and probably say that same-sex marriage will be legal across the land. That will be great, but if people stop vocally supporting it then it continues to be delayed and some family out there suffers.
August 17th, 2014 at 12:10 AM ^
We all agreed to make a concerted effort to leave up threads on this topic (see this, this and this, only including the latter two for ease of viewing). I saw that some of the stuff that derailed the Michael Sam threads got deleted, that'll be the new normal going forward on [athlete/coach/university person] comes out topics instead of aiming to be all inclusive.
August 17th, 2014 at 8:30 AM ^
I think you each did an excellent job with that decision and deserve to have your paycheck doubled
August 17th, 2014 at 9:19 PM ^
Do you believe in God? I am curious because of the paragraph that you wrote basically stating that being gay is genetic/.
August 17th, 2014 at 8:58 PM ^
ASU's coach is a christian, for what it's worth. He goes to my church, albeit a different campus.