What We Choose to Be
Is all-star college football player Michael Sam gay by choice, or by birth? Slate writer Will Saletan makes the convincing argument that, considering all the difficult choices Sam had to make to become the athlete he is, being gay is hardly something he would've picked; and by extension, coming out is certainly something he could have elected not to do. This point has been in my arsenal since at least 1992, when my opinions about gay rights were first confronted by a well-meaning homophobe. The impetus for this conversation was the 1992 General Conference of the United Methodist Church, which was making national headlines for its quadrennial struggle over whether to relax its rules against ordaining gay pastors. In that conference, as at every time the battle has been joined, the church came down conservative, tightening rather than relaxing restrictions. Even so, the very fact that Methodists were having this debate, that it wasn't a simple given that homosexuality alw...