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Changing the Game: John Amaechi Speaks
By Clay Cane
March 13 , 2007
http://www.vibe.com/news/news_headlines/2007/03/john_amaechi_interview/
The newly out ex-baller talks with VIBE.com about his new book and being closeted, gay and in the NBA
When news broke that former NBA basketball player John Amaechi came out as gay, many of us asked, "Who is John Amaechi?" The name didn't have a familiar celebrity ring like Charles Barkley, Michael Jordan or Dennis Rodman. (Yes, we all thought Rodman would be the first chosen gay one!) Nonetheless, Amaechi was a force on the basketball court and made history as the first Brit to join the NBA in 1995. Amaechi played as a center for the Cleveland Cavaliers, Orlando Magic, Utah Jazz and the Houston Rockets.
In 2003 Amaechi bowed out of the NBA, returned to his native England, focused on his charity work and seemed to disappear from the spotlight. Now, with the release of his critically acclaimed autobiography and New York Times bestseller Man in the Middle, Amaechi is more recognizable than he ever was on the basketball court.
Amaechi debunks the so-called myth that there are no gays in the turbo-masculine sport of the NBA. In one of the most powerful lines from the Man in the Middle, Amaechi states, "The pro locker room was the most flamboyant place I'd ever been. The guys flaunted their perfect bodies. They bragged of their sexual exploits. They primped in front of the mirror, applying cologne and hair gel by the bucketful. It was an intense kind of camaraderie that to them felt completely natural, but was a little too close for my comfort. As I surveyed the room, I couldn't help chuckling to myself: And I'm the gay one."
While only 30 out of 300 pages discuss being a gay man, the autobiography has sparked a media firestorm. LeBron James called closeted gay NBA players "not trustworthy." Tim Hardaway babbled unforgettable antigay sentiments: "It shouldn't be in the world or the United States." And the NBA has begun having unprecedented discussions of masculinity and diversity. NBA legend Charles Barkley recently said, "I played with gay guys. I got gay friends. Only God can judge other people. I don't care if a person is gay or not. Any jock who thinks he's never played with a gay guy is sadly mistaken. Any team you've been on at some point in your life you have played with a gay guy."
The man at the center of all this drama is a lone 6'9" Brit. John Amaechi dished to Vibe.com about his controversial book, reactions from the media, advice to other closeted players and more.
When your story first broke one of the first things I heard was, "There was a DL guy in the NBA." How did you feel about being labeled "DL" when you were far from that label and just in the closet?
John: It's one of those things. I can't control what people say about me in that respect, but I was never DL. I had a family with my kids, sister and a couple friends of my sister's friends living in my house. But I never had the actress paid to be on my arm. I certainly never had a wife or a real girlfriend so I don't think I fit that description. But again, I can't stop people from saying that.
I know people in the entertainment industry who are not heterosexual and they have this constant paranoia. When you were in the NBA were you afraid of being outed?
John: It certainly did occupy a percentage of my time, but at the same time it wasn't a massive worry. I think the "don't ask, don't tell policy" applies on a number of levels in basketball. In terms of the people that I met when I went out to bars or clubs—naively, I just kind of felt that they wouldn't say anything. Certainly that seemed to be the case. I would walk past doormen into bars and they would tell me about the game - whether I played well or badly. So it wasn't massively a secret.
I interviewed you previously for CLIK Magazine, which is a gay magazine. How different is your interview experience when you are interviewed for a gay publication versus more urban or mainstream publications?
John: Surprisingly, it isn't really that different. I think the one thing that's different is some mainstream publications tend to think it's okay to ask questions that are more inappropriate. Going into detail about sex lives - things they certainly wouldn't ask a straight author, celebrity or whatever the term. So that seems to be the big difference, I tend to get a few more inappropriate questions from the mainstream press. Usually well meaning. I might add. It usually isn't meant as an insult, though sometimes it is.
Do you think Hardaway's career will ever rebound from his now-legendary "I hate gays" rant?
John: I think that it's a real shame that his legacy will be forever tarnished with this. There may be a way of revamping his career and changing his track. I believe everybody deserves a chance at redemption and that opportunity will come.
Do you think his apology was sincere?
John: No, it wasn't sincere - his apology was empty. It was almost as if he was saying, "Sorry for the words I said because they really got me in trouble." It didn't reflect to me the kind of thing that gay and lesbian people wanted to hear, which is, "I will think about the level of bigotry that I have inside my heart." That's what people needed to hear for recognition of the damage those words do when they ricochet around the world.
Your performance on the court has been scrutinized since you came out. People are saying you weren't really a good player - what's your reaction to all that?
John: I'm the only British player to have a career in the NBA - that's my reaction to that. I wasn't a bad NBA player, I wasn't a great NBA player, I was an average NBA player. Most of the people who are criticizing me weren't NBA players, even though they wanted to be.
In the book you go into detail about strife with your former coach, Jerry Sloan, when you played with the Utah Jazz. He has made some comments saying he doesn't really remember there being any strife—what's your take on that?
John: I'm just not going to spend time to try and back up what I said in the first place. People need to stop pretending that he is this benevolent old granddad - he just isn't. He's got a nasty, mean streak and is unbelievably a good coach, but he can also be unbelievably cruel.
You've traveled all over the country promoting your book and your face has gotten more known. Have you experienced any homophobia with the public?
John: A little bit…it's all in a very hands-off type of way. People yell out the "F" word as they drive by. One thing I've discovered is that bigots are usually less than brave. I am 6'9", 320 lbs and black - most people don't want to be a bigot to my face.
You write in the book that when you were with Orlando Magic, you called out one of your teammates for his homophobia. You said you felt like you were able to do that because you had some credibility and were at a high point in your career. What do you think would've happened if you had come out at that point - the high point in your career?
John: I was on a one-year contract when that happened - at the height of my career. Now you tell me… would I really have had 17 different teams offering me contracts the next year had I come out? I'm not trying to be overly pessimistic, but sometimes people want to put on rose-tinted glasses with this. I'm just saying, logically, knowing America as we do - is that really what would've happened? I would've had the same number of offers? People would've looked at me versus the guy that has almost the same skills as me and I would've had the same opportunity? I don't think that would've been the case.
I loved how you described the relationship with your mother in your book. What would her reaction have been to the media attention and the success of your book?
John: She would've been more interested on how I handled myself. Did I handle myself with grace and composure? Did I treat people with compassion? She always used to tell me that a noble knight is judged by his deeds… and that's what she would've been interested in.
Do you ever regret not getting a chance to tell your mom about your sexuality?
Yes, I do regret not having a chance to, but the issue with me while she was alive was - I wasn't willing to use the word "gay" and my name in the same sentence. It wasn't that I didn't trust her or anything like that. It wasn't me at the time - I was refusing it.
Your mother is white and your father is black. In America, the whole "biracial-mixed" topic tends to be a big issue, but in your book, you didn't go into detail about your racial identity. Was there any type of strife with your racial identity or was it just not an issue for you in Britain?
My mother had a lot of Nigerian friends and I still have a lot of photographs of myself with my family in both normal Nigerian Ebo dress and also in full ceremonial stuff so I was involved a lot in these other families. For me, it didn't seem incongruent at all, it's like - this is me. Part of me is my mom and this English culture, and part of me is this Nigerian culture within England. It never even was a conflict. When I was growing up in England, people were designated by the color of their skin. So I was always called brown when I was growing up because my skin is brown. The people who were darker than me were called black because their skin was darker than mine. The racial identity and the cultural identity are different and complex, and sometimes the nuances of that seem to get lost. I've been to Africa, which I think puts me a step ahead of many African-Americans. I recognize the fact that my friends from Egypt -they're not wealthy people, they're just your average Egyptians - they have more in common with somebody from Hollywood then they do with somebody from Ghana. My friends from Ghana have less in common with my family from Nigeria than they do with a Jewish person from New York. I think sometimes these nuances are lost in America. It really upsets me when I see people comparing who is "black enough." When you hear Al Sharpton talking about Barack Obama that you can be our "color" without being our "kind" - I think that's the worst kind of internal fighting we can have.
Tell me about your children's charity, the ABC Foundation.
We build community centers where you come play different sports, you can go to a library, you can use a computer, see a counselor - talk about anything from what you plan on doing in the future for a job to some problems you are having at home. It's this holistic center, this hub for the community in Manchester. It's a pretty massive project; we plan on building four more centers in England before 2012.
You have two adopted children. How are they reacting to you, their father, at this new point in your life?
Frankly, they're worried about my well-being, my happiness, which is a beautiful thing. Mostly, the issues between us are the fact that the time when they really needed somebody to show them unconditional love - I did that. The beauty is that it's a modeling behavior. It allows them to know how to give that back not just to me but to other people. Our relationship is - and all the best relationships between mentors and their children - based on this unconditional love so it's not really been a factor.
Right now it is March Madness - do you still follow basketball?
To be honest, I haven't seen a game since I retired. People often think it's because I have this thing against the NBA or against basketball, but there's no bitterness there. It's just I'm trying to do such big things with the book, with my charity work and with my business. I'm trying to occupationally redesign myself. That's just taking all my time.
I find it interesting people have criticized you for not coming out while you were in the NBA, but if you would've come out you wouldn't have been supported. How you deal with that criticism?
It's understandable - it's the simplest, easiest criticism to make if you don't have anything else to criticize. It just shows a monumental lack of empathy. In America alone, where many gay people aren't out at work - even people who work jobs that are considered to be very gay friendly - why is it so amazingly hard to understand that it would be difficult to come out within professional sports? There are a thousand professional sports in America, give or take. If you extrapolate the number of players—we must be talking hundreds of thousands over the last three or four decades—six of those people have come out. Unless it's some unholy paranoia on the part of gay people, there's a pretty good reason to not do it while you work.
For the men who are in the NBA right now and in the closet, what advice would you give to them?
I would give the same advice to them as I would give to a 16-year-old in high school - I would say they need to find a connection for themselves. The coming out process is a personal one, and it can't be dictated by society, by the media orby cool bloggers on the Internet. It's for them to find a connection with somebody - it might be a teammate, it might be a coach, it might be a staff member, it might be a sibling, parent - to find the connection to share their life and then move forward at their own pace.
John Amaechi's Man in the Middle is in stores now.
To learn more about John Amaechi and the ABC Foundation, visit http://www.meech.org/ |
