Posted on 04/19/2005 1:27:46 PM PDT by real saxophonist
Gay football player talks about his life
Jesse Fanciulli
April 19, 2005
Esera Tuaolo isn't the man you might expect.
He weighs 310 pounds, and says he feels light as a feather.
He spent nine years as a defensive lineman in the manly-man world of the National Football League. And he's gay.
Tuaolo spent most of his life trying to be the man everyone expected: The man who laughed at fag jokes in the locker room and bedded women he met at bars.
"I made sure my teammates saw me kissing women and going home with them," Tuaolo told an audience of about 40 people who gathered to hear him speak Monday night at the University of Northern Colorado.
Tuaolo was apparently as good at acting as he was on the field.
None of his teammates with the Green Bay Packers, Minnesota Vikings, Jacksonville Jaguars, Carolina Panthers or Atlanta Falcons knew Tuaolo was gay until he came out of the closet in 2002 after retirement.
The revelation cost him friendships with many of his former teammates, but being honest about his sexuality lifted a huge burden from Tuaolo's broad shoulders.
Tuaolo learned early in life that being openly gay was dangerous. He remembers seeing one of his childhood acquaintances throwing rocks at another boy, calling him a fag, queer and homosexual.
That was the day Tuaolo decided to keep his sexuality a secret.
"That's when I started to be an actor," he said at UNC. The decision to hide who he is might have been a wise one from an educational and professional standpoint.
As the youngest child in a poor family of banana farmers in Hawaii, Tuaolo was the first in his family to attend college, thanks to a football scholarship. Later, he would find success as a professional football player.
Tuaolo is convinced that his NFL teammates would have shunned him if he revealed his sexual identity -- so he took great pains to live a secret life.
He said numbed the fear of being discovered as gay with alcohol and was deeply depressed. It was not until after he retired that Tuaolo made the decision to come out. He had adopted two children with his partner Mitchell and wanted his children to know that families came in many combinations, and that it's OK to have two daddies.
"My life now is just beautiful," he said.
Tuaolo is an inspiration for UNC Noah Slauson, 22, who saw the former NFL player on the cover of a gay magazine: "I grew up in an era when I never imagined I could look up to a professional athlete."
Tuaolo spoke at UNC on behalf of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender organization.
Psst...Ray Lewis is on da Down Low...pass it on.
There were actually big posters all over campus advertising his visit. I'd never heard of him. Then I saw this story. Funny only 40 people showed up.
So was a Packer when Reggie White was there?
You're right, Pappy.
He's a miserable excuse for a human being....he's a homosexual and certainly not gay.
Bedding is one thing (no doubt means he tucks them in at night) and having intercourse with them is quite another.
He's a butt-ranger through and through and a miserable excuse for a human being.
Never mind, I don't want to know.
Shalom.
It's kind of ironic that he was an Oregon State Beaver.
Soccer.
Sorry, someone had to say it...
""He's a butt-ranger through and through and a miserable excuse for a human being.""
And he and his partner have adopted 2 children also, that is the truly sick part I think.
*************
Hmmmm. I googled "laz" and found this:
Now I'm beginning to wonder..
poor guy
We're supposed to think he's all heroic for coming out of the closet instead of getting treatment.
We're also supposed to feel ashamed that this 300lb. wall of meat felt intimidated by the heterosexuals among us.
Shalom.
Nope ... CSU hosted Janet Reno a few weeks ago. It never ends.
I'll see your nightmare and rais you "after he's downed a pitcher of margaritas."
Shalom.
But why? Being gay is SO cool. We should all be gay.
/sarcasm
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