"The Truth About Gay Men Of Color In Professional Sports..."

This is Glenn Burke, he was professional baseball's first openly gay player and he was posthumously honored by MLB on Tuesday as part of the league's efforts to create an atmosphere of tolerance and acceptance.

Burke got his start with the Los Angeles Dodgers in 1976 before being traded to the Oakland A's.  He became the first professional baseball player to come out by discussing his sexuality in an interview with Inside Sports in 1982. At the time, Burke was not playing professionally; he had quit the majors at 27, primarily because of animosity in the locker room.

In 1994, a year before his death due to AIDS-related causes Burke said, "Prejudice drove me out of baseball sooner than I should have,"

Many people have speculated on why so many of the first out professional sports players have been men of color.  My thoughts on this are that for gay men of color, it's probably a little easier since as men of color they tend to start at a disadvantage due to institutionalized racism.  I suspect that when they do the mental math in their heads, they find that they've got less to loose than many of the white counterparts because they routinely start with less to begin with.  It's just a thought...

BTW:  Glenn Burke is also famous for another reason, he is credited with being the inventor of the "High Five" a celebratory mannerism he often engaged in while on the playing field.

I'm proud that Glenn is finally getting the recognition he deserves.  It was a very different world in 1982. Proudly proclaiming the truth of one's heart at the dawn of the HIV/AIDS crisis was perhaps one of the bravest acts imaginable.

Read more about this story here: The Huffington Post

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