The Deal; Formerly Titled Hello, Monroe!

Just a note to any Boltreaders who may be checking in from, say, southeast Michigan--I'm very glad you're spending so much time here, but I'm a little curious about why you have returned time and time again over the past week, pushing three hours total reading time and well into double digits in the visit count, when I apparently annoy you so badly. At least you finally figured out that by repeatedly getting here via "abby wambach dyke" on Teh Google, this blog was getting bumped higher and higher up on the link list, strengthening the algorithm in a direction you apparently don't agree with.

So hey, Monroe, save yourself some time and just bookmark and come in through the front door. Regardless of how you arrive, you're welcome here, and I'm hoping that the more you read (you must be approaching the 2006 archive, by my page count) the more it will become clear that my speculations about any public figure's sexuality aren't about that sexuality as an independent entity that is intrinsically good or bad, but, rather, about our society's fixation (for good or ill) on a single, morally neutral component of personality to the exclusion of acknowledging the full spectrum of traits that come together to define us as human beings. And sometimes it's about people being unable to deal with that one trait within themselves and taking it out on the rest of us, or about not giving a rat's ass about that trait but using it as a convenient whipping boy to advance their own political or religious power.

As far as the original post goes that got at least one person's shorts in a knot, if the word "dyke" is the problem, let me soften that for you. Instead of saying "she's also an obvious dyke," let me edit that to say "she is perceived as gay by many gay and straight soccer fans, most of whom still adore her regardless of her sexuality." The observation was made as part of a discussion about marketing, and offered as a hypothetical explanation for why the one of the top active scorers in the women's game is not being aggressively promoted by the national federation. It was not intended to be a value judgment about her as a human being.

The assertion that a 50-year-old assistant coach is the player's long-term boyfriend was beyond dignifying with a response; I thank commenter anonymous2 for pointing that out nonetheless. But as much as I appreciate the fact-checking, I gotta ask if your strong dislike of public discussions of anyone's sexuality extends to disliking mentions of Lils recently getting married (including a halftime feature about her husband and the cute story of how they met) or of Stephanie Lopez' recent engagement (including a photo of the engagement ring prominently featured in the photo galleries on the official US Soccer website). If I speculate that Wambach is being passed over in favor of Mitts because Wambach is widely perceived as being gay, that is a statement intended to be every bit as matter-of-fact and non-titillating as the statement that Kristine Lilly recently married a male firefighter (ergo, she's straight). If a player's sexuality gets bandied about in a negative way, or is used to denigrate and devalue her as a person, yeah, I'm right there with you. But speculating about it simply for speculation's sake is not inappropriate simply because the speculation leans in a non-straight direction. If the word choice offended, I apologize. I often forget I'm not purely preaching to the choir here.

Personally, I prefer my televised soccer coverage to focus on, well, soccer rather than the halftime warm 'n' fuzzy personal interest stories the media are convinced women adore above all else. Controversy on my little blog! Homer, I don't know how you do it. And with that, I do hope I'm done with this particular angle on a recurring theme.