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Retired British soccer pro Thomas Beattie shares with the world that he is gay: “It’s time live my truth”
This is absolutely wonderful – what a great story for Pride month!
Thomas Beattie, who played professional soccer from 2008 to 2015, has come out publicly as a gay man in an interview with ESPN and on his own Instagram page.
Here’s an excerpt of what he told ESPN: Of all the things I’ve achieved or accomplished, the pursuit of mastering myself has been the most liberating. So I’m able to say it out loud now for everyone to hear: My name is Thomas Beattie. I’m a brother, son, friend, former professional footballer, entrepreneur and annoyingly competitive lad.
I’m a lot of things, and one of them is gay.
Being gay and having a career in football never felt like an option. Society told me my masculinity was linked to my sexuality — something we of course know is a false assumption — but I felt as if I couldn’t be a footballer and accept who I was. Everything around me suggested these two worlds were pure enemies, and I had to sacrifice one in order to survive. It doesn’t feel that way in other industries. In music, we love Freddie Mercury and Elton John. It’s accepted in film. Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple, is gay, and these things are all OK.
But in football, there’s still fear a gay teammate might disrupt the team environment. Sometimes it’s brushed away, like homophobia isn’t an issue in football anymore. Obviously that’s not true if there are so few examples young kids can look to as role models.
Now he is one of them!
Comments
(All comments are reviewed before being published, and I review submissions several times per day.)
Richard V says:
Lovely man… body is rocking.