The Art of Coming Out Traditional and Social Media Frames Surrounding the Nbas Jason Collins

Jason Collins of the Brooklyn Nets earlier a game against the Washington Wizards at the Verizon Center on March 15, 2014, in Washington, D.C. (Photo: Keith Allison/Flickr)

For five consecutive days in December 1975, the Washington Star ran a series, authored by Lynn Rosellini, datedly titled "Homosexuals in Sports." In it, she wrote that "some of the biggest names in football are homosexual or bisexual."

The reaction was mostly bullheaded indignation. Outraged by the outrage, David Kopay, a recently retired NFL actor, responded by becoming the first major professional person squad sport athlete to come out. Naturally, he hoped others would follow. In an interview with the Washington Mail 38 years later, he expressed disappointment that so few have.

It's not entirely surprising. Sport is a central site for hegemonic masculinity, and a bastion for homophobia. Coming out means navigating that politically charged terrain. Further, in the media discourse of sport, rarely are issues of institutional homophobia investigated and addressed. Referring to sports every bit an "equal playing field," even with good intention, negates the need for serious discussion about how sport reinforces not only homophobia but too racism and gender issues.

"[B]y positioning themselves as supportive of gay players, journalists and Twitter followers alike can engage in cocky-congratulation for progressiveness and tolerance while systemic homophobia in sports remains prevalent."

On April 29, 2013, at SI.com, Jason Collins, a male person athlete still agile in sport, came out. In the first four weeks the story was online, it garnered more than five meg pageviews—more double the normal Web traffic for Sports Illustrated'southward site.

"I'yard a 34-yr-former NBA centre. I'm black. And I'm gay," Collins writes in his opening paragraph. In the resulting wave of media interviews Collins said he hoped his declaration would encourage other athletes to come out, both echoing the words of Kopay and illustrating how incremental the progress has been for gay athletes.

This month, in the Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, a new study looks at the media framing of Collins' declaration by examining 364 newspaper articles and vii,556 tweets that ran in the week post-obit his announcement. The results showed largely positive just widely divergent responses. The study, led by Andrew Billings, also offers insight in how both legacy media and social media present a historic first—an deed that reverberates in the world of sport simply also stretches far beyond it.

Collins doesn't fit in the box stereotypically assigned to gay male athletes. In many ways he fits the normative definition of masculinity. Every bit a role player, standing seven feet tall and weighing in at 255 pounds, he was on the courtroom considering of his size, force, and immovability. He was a defensive stopper, grinding it out in the low post and clamoring for rebounds amongst the other giants of the game. Past studying the reaction to Collins' coming out, researchers were able to glean not simply how modern society understands gay and lesbian identity, only "the ancillary issues related to identity politics."

The study tabled the nigh prevalent themes used in the media framing surrounding the publication of Collins' story. The researchers found considerable departure between legacy media and social media. For newspapers, the three nearly prevalent themes were referring to the declaration every bit a watershed moment, highlighting celebrity support, and comparison this case with others. On Twitter, the pinnacle three themes were categorized as "other," links to ceremonious rights, and general support.

"The newspapers tended to employ Twitter, for the first few days, to enter the story and see how people were responding to information technology," says Billings, the report'south atomic number 82 author. "Newspapers were far more than probable to cross promote the Twitter universe than Twitter was to cantankerous promote from newspapers."

Past twenty-four hours 3, newspapers were offer varying perspectives and deeper assay. In contrast, by day vi, on Twitter, there was inappreciably anything that could be categorized. While newspapers were able to investigate the touch on of Collins' coming out, Twitter was focused more on the stories that could exist fastened to him.

"Twitter was very popular, very big on the story to begin with but then it got the point where there was no mutual theme within information technology," Billings says.

Surprisingly the vast majority of the tweets captured by the written report contained none of the predominant frames circulated past the mainstream media. In other words, "public commentary did non repeat, reinforce, or disseminate the major framing devices employed past legacy media," co-ordinate to Billings.

Twitter besides tugged at other strings that newspapers largely ignored, mainly an emphasis on the connections to ceremonious rights and discussion based around faith.

Despite the multitude of responses on Twitter, the superlative five themes remained abiding over the studied timeline, albeit in different orders. Newspapers, on the other mitt, had various themes motion in and out of the height 5, and some themes, while relevant for ane platform, were nearly non-real on the other.

News reports turned to other athletes who tweeted their support, such every bit Kobe Bryant, and presented them as opinion leaders. The celebrity "reactions" to Collins' announcement were a way to frame the coverage of the story.

Lost in that exercise though, was the fact that the story was written in Collins' vox, in his own words, and less than half of all the stories written afterwards quoted him directly. Effectively, Collins became someone who was talked most, rather than someone who was in command of the narrative. In fact, Billings' study shows most as many newspaper articles (123) direct referenced responses on Twitter every bit cited Collins in his own words (148). "The story become less about Collins' and more near their interpretation" Billings says.

And while the overall tone was supportive and congratulatory, information technology's of import to articulate any false assumption that Collins' coming out represents full equality for gays and lesbians in sport, or lodge at large. The written report explains this further: "[B]y positioning themselves as supportive of gay players, journalists and Twitter followers alike can engage in self-congratulation for progressiveness and tolerance while systemic homophobia in sports remains prevalent."

As the days passed, newspaper coverage began to focus less on celebrity support of Collins and instead shifted to the ramifications for race, organized religion, and ceremonious rights. Commentary on social media expanded to the point that, a calendar week after the story broke, no overarching theme could be discerned.

Billings says a takeaway here is that traditional media allows for something that social media seemingly has in short supply: reflection. That'southward important non only in framing celebrated events, just also for the nuance and complication of coming out.

Collins' announcement is significant, that much is obvious, but it doesn't mark the end of homophobia in sports. It doesn't account for the pressures to remain closeted and the challenges gay and lesbian players continue to face.

Sport, and the world of celebrity, is congenital on status and there's hope that the side by side athlete to come out volition be one who already toils in the spotlight. That'south non to minimize the touch on of Collins' coming out, but the reality of what it will have to bring the story to the largest audition possible.

"We're waiting for a prominent athlete in a squad sport to actually move this conversation forward," Billings says. "The all-pro who is playing at the all-pro level and indispensable to their team. That's when information technology's going to be another layer."

The Sports Lens is a running serial exploring the intersection of sports and civilisation.

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Source: https://psmag.com/social-justice/how-newspapers-and-social-media-framed-jason-collins-coming-out-in-sports-illustrated

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