Gay Ball - The Stranger

Contents:

• GAY BALL
• IS SOFTBALL GAY?
• GAY UNSELOR'S FIRG BY INDIANAPOLIS CATHOLIC SCHOOL PERMTED BY FERAL APPEALS URT
• THREE STRAIGHTS AND YOU’RE OUT GAY SOFTBALL LEAGUE
• GAY SOFTBALL SETTL LAWSU. COURT UPHOLDS STRAIGHT LIM, DISMISS DISCRIMATN CLAIMS.
• COLUMB HOSTS 2021 GAY SOFTBALL WORLD SERI, BIGGT EVENT SCE START OF PANMIC
• GAY MOSW MOSW CY GUI
• HOW GAY DO YOU HAVE TO BE TO PLAY SOFTBALL?
• THE VOICE OF CHICAGO'S GAY, LESBIAN, BI, TRANS AND QUEER COMMUNITY SINCE 1985
• PARTI SETTLE CASE CHALLENGG DISQUALIFITN OF BISEXUAL PLAYERS’ TEAM AT 2008 GAY SOFTBALL WORLD SERI

GAY BALL

Currently, more than 17, 000 players om 52 ci across Canada and the Uned Stat participate member leagu, and the bt of the teams nverge once a year for head-to-head petn at the annual Gay Softball World Seri. Currently, more than 17, 000 players om 52 ci across Canada and the Uned Stat participate NAGAAA member leagu, and the bt of the teams nverge once a year for head-to-head petn at the annual Gay Softball World Seri (GSWS). The 2008 Gay Softball World Seri was unr way, an alternate universe of petive sports that mov each year to a different cy, brgg wh nearly 200 gay softball teams om across the Uned Stat and Canada, as well as thoands of spectators.

IS SOFTBALL GAY?

For the Seattle world seri, the San Francis Gay Softball Associatn, one of the olst gay softball clubs the Uned Stat, sent a team that lled self D2.

On Augt 30, 2008, havg sailed through the early rounds of petn at the Seattle Gay Softball World Seri, D2 found self the semifals. The accatn, which end up spawng a feral lawsu that uld change the way gay sports are played around the untry, was simple and yet very hard to prove: D2 was fieldg too many heterosexual players. The North Amerin Gay Amatr Athletic Alliance, which puts on the Gay Softball World Seri, was found the 1970s by gay players San Francis and New York seekg to promote a safe and separate space for gay softball.

GAY UNSELOR'S FIRG BY INDIANAPOLIS CATHOLIC SCHOOL PERMTED BY FERAL APPEALS URT

It wasn't until 1993, as harned cultural animosi toward gays were begng to crack, that the flat-out ban on straight people loosened. He pch for a gay team known as the Portland Brewers, and he apologized advance for the way he speaks—explosive emotn, choppg hand gtur—sayg 's a batn of his passn for gay sports and his Italian herage.

THREE STRAIGHTS AND YOU’RE OUT GAY SOFTBALL LEAGUE

He went on: "There was one time, a few years ago, where we spl a double hear wh a straight team—they were ready to take baseball bats and e to blows bee we were gay. This is one of the many hard-to-duplite experienc that e wh playg on a gay sports team, this opportuny to humble—and enrage—straight people who aren't ed to gays beg good at sports. Even our quickly shiftg culture, gay people still face discrimatn and hostily, still spend a certa amount of time crisscrossg the divi between explicly queer spac and domantly heterosexual spac.

Partly bee of this, for many the gay muny there's still a powerful pull toward moments, like the Gay Softball World Seri, which that kd of divi-crossg gets put on extend pse. The problem —as NAGAAA is now fdg out feral urt—when a group of people tri to fend queer space by enforcg a lim on exactly how many non-gay people n be clud.

) The NCLR is mandg unspecified moary damag for the "emotnal distrs" suffered by s clients—scribed urt documents as "vivid flashbacks, " "loss of sleep, " and feelgs of "huiatn, embarrassment, and anger"—pl a natnwi junctn agast enforcement of the two-straight-players-per-team lim at the Gay Softball World Seri. It's taken the unual step, part, bee has a profoundly different sense of the current culture—and what's required to fend gay space—than Melani's anizatn do. Today, a le that lims participatn based on sexual orientatn jt isn't necsary to have a gay sports league, or any kd of gay-iendly space.

GAY SOFTBALL SETTL LAWSU. COURT UPHOLDS STRAIGHT LIM, DISMISS DISCRIMATN CLAIMS.

This summer, Vanuver, BC, will play host to the North Ameri Outgam, an Olympics-style petn volvg gay teams petg agast each other soccer, swimmg, hockey, volleyball, nng, mounta bikg, badmton, golf, poker, and, y, softball.

COLUMB HOSTS 2021 GAY SOFTBALL WORLD SERI, BIGGT EVENT SCE START OF PANMIC

That's a very different policy than at the Gay Softball World Seri or the Natnal Gay Flag Football League, which also lims the number of straight players allowed on a team to 20 percent.

GAY MOSW MOSW CY GUI

" All the D2 players waed outsi as, one by one, their teammat were brought before a panel posed of lears the natnal gay softball associatn. Charl, who is Ain Amerin, said that when he, too, profsed bisexualy, one of the NAGAAA board members the room told him, "This is the Gay World Seri, not the Bisexual World Seri. Wh three of D2's players now led "non-gay, " the team was retroactively disqualified om the Seattle Gay Softball World Seri and forced to forfe s send-place trophy.

At the time, the polici of NAGAAA allowed bisexual players to play the Gay Softball World Seri and not be unted as straight, said Leishman, admtg, "Some people seem to have been nfed. But he ntends that no one wh a vote on the tribunal was nfed, nor did any of the votg members make any statement about beg "the Gay World Seri, not the Bisexual World Seri. Still, Melani feels there's a place for that kd of majory-gay vers majory-straight petn, and a place for majory-gay vers majory-gay petn—and the Gay Softball World Seri is the latter.

HOW GAY DO YOU HAVE TO BE TO PLAY SOFTBALL?

"I felt, and still feel, offend that someone would thk that havg players who were voted by a group of strangers to be 'non-gay' would make the difference whether we w or lose, " he said.

One of the more tertg legal qutns that lawyers are preparg to bate is whether the Gay Softball World Seri, as manifted self Seattle, nstuted a "public acmodatn. In urt filgs, the NCLR has argued that the Seattle Gay Softball World Seri was a public acmodatn ( was played on public fields and advertised wily) and that by nyg "non-gay" people the abily to participate, NAGAAA vlated the state's nondiscrimatn law.

THE VOICE OF CHICAGO'S GAY, LESBIAN, BI, TRANS AND QUEER COMMUNITY SINCE 1985

Leishman, returng to his example, explaed that sentially what the NCLR is mandg here is not jt the right for anyone to enter a gay bar regardls of race or sexual orientatn, but also the right for anyone to leap over the bar and start pourg beer for ctomers.

PARTI SETTLE CASE CHALLENGG DISQUALIFITN OF BISEXUAL PLAYERS’ TEAM AT 2008 GAY SOFTBALL WORLD SERI

At the 2008 Gay Softball World Seri, anyone uld buy a ticket regardls of race or sexual orientatn, but not everyone was allowed on the field. Addnally, Leishman argu, the group that puts on the Gay Softball World Seri is a private anizatn—like, say, the Boy Suts of Ameri, which explicly exclus homosexuals and 2000 succsfully fought all the way to the US Supreme Court to fend s right, as a private anizatn, to do so.

Talk to Melani about his path to the world of gay softball, and quickly be clear why a safe space for gay players is so important to him. It begs wh a flashback to high school, which is mon: Adult gay athlet are petg not jt agast their on-field opponents, but also agast the memori of what happened to them back then.

I asked whether a kd of survivor's guilt—a guilt at beg able to pass as straight and thrive the world of high school sports—was behd Melani's later volvement the world of gay softball. But there's another money issue that Melani now worri about: If, as a rult of this legal fight, the pury of the gay mographic at the Gay Softball World Seri is diluted by urt orr, will NAGAAA still be able to receive lucrative sponsorships om gay-targetg beer pani and the like, the kd of sponsorships that make the event possible? Intertgly, all the parti volved seem to thk that someday there will no longer be a need to fight feral urt over how to fend this untry's gay sports space.