Tim Hardaway Now Works To Save Young Gay Lives

MIAMI, FLORIDA - Former Miami Heat guard Tim Hardaway, who in 2007 wrecked his post-basketball career by declaring on radio "I hate gay people,'' will co-sponsor a South Beach fundraiser Sunday for The Trevor Project -- a national suicide prevention group for gay youth.
"Gays and lesbians, we don't have to accept the act, but we have to accept them as people. Especially children, we don't want them to kill themselves. We want them to live their lives as they want to,'' said Hardaway, who took several training sessions at YES Institute, a local anti-suicide group for gay youth.
After the anti-gay rant, Hardaway lost his advertising endorsements and income.
"The endorsements will never come back. People have taken that and it's gone. I understand that. I'm trying to look for work and provide for my family,'' he said. "All that stuff has left me high and dry. I have to dig for work.''
Hardaway has repeatedly apologized for what he said, but still wants to know who's gay in the locker room:
"We have a right to know. We'd say, `How do you want to do this? Do you want to go into the shower first, or do you want me to go into the shower first?' ''
Back then, he wouldn't have showered with a gay teammate, but today he might.
"I've probably already done it and not even known it.''
from The Miami Herald

Related Post: Amaechi On Hardaway
Related Post: NBA Sends Hardaway Home
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Related Post: Tim Hardaway Loses His Car Wash

Tim Hardaway Loses His Car Wash

FLORIDA - Available for $16,000 a month: the building at 3501 S. Dixie Hwy. in Miami that once housed a car wash co-owned by former NBA star Tim Hardaway. Hardaway and partner Cory Mason got evicted for not paying rent, says landlord Antonio A. Fernandez of Bird Road Properties.
The Hardaway team was in arrears before Hardaway got his rear-end in a sling over his ''I hate gay people'' interview on 790 The Ticket last month. Says Fernandez: "It had nothing to do with the comments that he made.''
Hardaway apologized for his remarks.
from The Miami Herald

Gay Mayor Reaches Out To Hardaway

As the firestorm continued over Tim Hardaway's anti-gay remarks on radio, the mayor of North Miami, who is gay, invited the ex-Heat star to spend a day with him.
On Friday, Hardaway accepted, the mayor said.
''We're just trying to show him that there are living, breathing people that just happen to be gay,'' said North Miami Mayor Kevin Burns, who lives with his partner of 23 years and an adopted daughter.
He's still working out details of the visit with Hardaway's representatives and expects they will make a joint announcement on Monday, Burns said.
The plan is for Hardaway to join Burns and his family for a routine weekday at the mayor's office and home -- doing things like dropping off Burns' child at school, meeting with constituents and dinner with the family.
Hardaway has been hit hard since the broadcast on the local AM radio station 790 The Ticket, in which he said, ''I don't like to be around gay people'' and ``it shouldn't be in the U.S. or the world.''
Although he apologized within hours, the NBA canceled his remaining appearances at this weekend's All-Star festivities in Las Vegas, and he lost at least two major endorsement deals.
On Friday, Hardaway spent the day with his family, pleading for privacy as television cameras continued a vigil outside the gates of his Pinecrest home.
Terry Washington, a spokeswoman for Hardaway, said the former five-time All-Star had not yet spoken to Mayor Burns and that an announcement would be "premature.''
Hardaway played for the Heat from 1995 through 2001. On several occasions, he expressed interest in returning to the Heat's roster but was turned down.
He now has ownership in several South Florida businesses, including Tim Hardaway's U.S. 1 Car Wash in Miami and Tim Hardaway's House of Wings in Coconut Grove.
Burns has some experience building bridges outside the gay community, since he won the mayor's seat decisively in 2005 despite some hostility in a city without much of a gay constituency.
He has been open but low-key in public about his relationship with Rob Flint, his partner of 23 years, and their adopted daughter, Autumn. During the mayoral campaign, Burns said he understood the discrimination faced by the Haitian Americans and African Americans who predominate in the city.
''I don't expect [Hardaway] to be waving a peace flag anytime soon, even after this,'' Burns said Friday.
"But maybe he'll be less likely to say something bad about people if he knows them and understands a little more.
from The Miami Herald

NBA Sends Hardaway Home

The NBA banished Tim Hardaway from All-Star weekend in Las Vegas because of his anti-gay remarks.
Hardaway, who played in five All-Star games during the 1990s, was already in Las Vegas to make a series of public appearances this week on behalf of the league. But after Hardaway said, "I hate gay people" during a radio interview, commissioner David Stern stepped in.
"We removed him from representing us because we didn't think his comments were consistent with having anything to do with us," Stern told reporters Thursday at the opening of a fan festival at a Las Vegas casino, part of the NBA's All-Star weekend.
Stern said he had not spoken with Hardaway, who left Las Vegas on Thursday, but he planned to do so.
While Stern said a discussion about openly gay players could be part of future rookie orientation programs, he doesn't see a need to address the league.
"This is an issue overall that has fascinated America. It's not an NBA issue," Stern said, pointing to the ongoing debate over gay marriage at the state and federal levels.
"This is a country that needs to talk about this issue," he said. "And, not surprisingly, they use sports as a catalyst to begin the dialogue."
Hardaway apologized for his comments, which came a week after John Amaechi became the first former NBA player to say he was gay.
"As an African-American, I know all too well the negative thoughts and feelings hatred and bigotry cause," Hardaway said Thursday in a statement issued by his agent. "I regret and apologize for the statements that I made that have certainly caused the same kinds of feelings and reactions.
"I especially apologize to my fans, friends and family in Miami and Chicago. I am committed to examining my feelings and will recognize, appreciate and respect the differences among people in our society," he said. "I regret any embarrassment I have caused the league on the eve of one of their greatest annual events."
The NBA brings in many former players to take part in various All-Star events. Hardaway had already represented the league in Las Vegas earlier this week at a Habitat for Humanity event and a fitness promotion. The former U.S. Olympian was also scheduled to be an assistant coach at a wheelchair game Thursday night and later appear at the fan-oriented Jam Session until Stern told him he was no longer welcome.
"His views are not consistent with ours," Stern said.
Amaechi, who spent five seasons with four teams, came out last week in advance of the release of his autobiography, "Man in the Middle." He is the sixth professional male athlete from one of the four major U.S. sports - basketball, baseball, football, hockey - to openly discuss his homosexuality.
"David Stern has sent a clear message," Amaechi said on Good Morning America on Friday. I'm very pleased that the NBA put their money where their mouth is."
Though Stern said last week a player's sexuality wasn't important, Hardaway disagreed Wednesday on a Miami radio show.
"First of all, I wouldn't want him on my team," the former Miami Heat star said. "And second of all, if he was on my team, I would, you know, really distance myself from him because, uh, I don't think that is right. I don't think he should be in the locker room while we are in the locker room."
When show host Dan Le Batard told Hardaway those comments were "flatly homophobic" and "bigotry," the player continued.
"You know, I hate gay people, so I let it be known. I don't like gay people and I don't like to be around gay people," he said. "I'm homophobic. I don't like it. It shouldn't be in the world or in the United States."
Hardaway also said if he did find out that a teammate was gay, he would ask for the player to be removed from the team.
Hardaway apologized later Wednesday night in a telephone interview with WSVN-TV in Miami, but the furor over his remarks continued Thursday.
"I don't need Tim's comments to realize there's a problem," Amaechi told The Associated Press in a phone interview Thursday. "People said that I should just shut up and go away - now they have to rethink that."
Two major gay and lesbian groups denounced Hardaway's remarks.
"Hardaway's comments are vile, repulsive, and indicative of the climate of ignorance, hostility and prejudice that continues to pervade sports culture," said Neil Giuliano, president of the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation. "And by apologizing not for his bigotry, but rather for giving voice to it, he's reminding us that this ugly display is only the tip of a very large iceberg."
Said Matt Foreman, president of the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force: "Hardaway is a hero to thousands of young people. And that's what makes his comments so troubling. Sadly, his words simply put the pervasive homophobia in the NBA on the table."
Amaechi, who detailed his life in "Man in the Middle," hoped his coming out would be a catalyst for intelligent discourse.
"His words pollute the atmosphere," Amaechi said. "It creates an atmosphere that allows young gays and lesbians to be harassed in school, creates an atmosphere where in 33 states you can lose your job, and where anti-gay and lesbian issues are used for political gain. It's an atmosphere that hurts all of us, not just gay people."
Amaechi taped a spot Thursday for PBS' gay and lesbian program "In the Life." He said the anti-gay sentiment remains despite Hardaway's apology.
"It's vitriolic, and may be exactly what he feels," he said. "Whether he's honest or not doesn't inoculate us from his words. It's not progress to hear hateful words."
from The Associated Press

Audio From The Tim Hardaway Interview

Click Image For Audio

Hardaway later apologized for the remarks during a telephone interview with Fox affiliate WSVN in Miami.
"Yes, I regret it. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said I hate gay people or anything like that," he said. "That was my mistake."

Hardaway issued a statement to Local 10 News saying:
"There are more important things to worry about than my comments. We should be more concerned about President (George) Bush and all the people dying in Iraq."

Amaechi On Hardaway

How do you deal with a gay teammate?
''First of all, I wouldn't want him on my team,'' former Miami Heat star Tim Hardaway said Wednesday. "Second of all, if he was on my team, I'd really distance myself from him. I don't think he should be in the locker room when we are in the locker room. I wouldn't even be a part of that. . . . I'd ask for him to get traded. Something has to give. The majority of the players would ask for him to be traded, or they would want to get traded. Or just buy him out of his contract and let him go.''
But, Tim, you realize that's bigotry and homophobia?
''I hate gay people,'' Hardaway said in an interview on 790 The Ticket. "I let it be known. I don't like gay people. I don't like to be around gay people. I'm homophobic. I don't like it. There shouldn't be a world for that or [a place] in the United States for it. I don't like it.''
There it is, ignorance and hatred without a filter, coming from one of the most popular players in Heat history. And Hardaway is hardly alone, even though he is the first to voice it so plainly since former player John Amaechi last week became the first former NBA player to come out of the closet.
Amaechi's response?
''I'm actually tempted to laugh,'' Amaechi said Wednesday. "Finally, someone who is honest. It is ridiculous, absurd, petty, bigoted and shows a lack of empathy that is gargantuan and unfathomable. But it is honest. And it illustrates the problem better than any of the fuzzy language other people have used so far.''
SHOCKING WORDS
You've heard the fuzzy language. LeBron James said he'd have trouble trusting a gay teammate. Wide receiver Andre Johnson said he wouldn't want to share a shower with a gay teammate. Philadelphia 76er Shavlik Randolph said he'd be fine as long as said player ''didn't bring your gayness on me.'' Hardaway, always blunt, turned mere discomfort into transparent hate, talking in a way that was shocking to hear. And now you know why Amaechi is the first in the history of his sport -- that's a lot of players, folks -- ever to announce he is gay.
Amaechi is grateful for Hardaway's words, believe it or not. It gets the conversation going, and gets ugly things out in the light. Publicists have been pushing their athletes away from this uncomfortable question, trying to avoid the kind of trouble Hardaway's words cause. The Heat franchise is going to have to apologize for him today, and that's just the start. If he were still on television, he'd be fired.
Amaechi is the smartest athlete I've ever met in two decades in this business. He is uniquely qualified to be an eloquent spokesman for his cause. But he is terrified and exhausted while fighting it during his book tour at least in part because hatred is scary, heavy and awfully unpredictable.
And although Hardaway doesn't speak for everybody, neither does Charles Barkley when he says this is simply a media issue.
''Hey, nobody cares John Amaechi is gay,'' Barkley says. ``I just find it humorous and amazing people think we care if someone is gay or not. It is always fun to hear these reporters say how we'd treat them in the locker room. Trust me, we'd treat reporters a lot worse than we treat a gay guy.''
WHAT IF?
But what would it be like? There's a reason no active player in a male team sport has ever come out. There's a reason that the one who does while active would cross the last uncrossed barrier in sports and become a modern-day Jackie Robinson. Barkley sounds naive.
''You don't think we've all played with gay guys?'' Barkley said. "Of course we have. It has never been an issue. America, the more I live in it, the more I realize how full of it we are. If we're not bombing the wrong country, we're not fixing hurricane-relief areas. America is homophobic. It's so easy for [reporters] to say the other jocks won't like it. America discriminates against gay people, but we've all played with gay people.''
There's no way to know how an entire macho league populated by different personalities would react to an outed gay athlete. There have been Internet rumors for months now that a current NBA player has already come out privately to his family. The reaction if he is outed? It will be somewhere between Hardaway's hate, Barkley's indifference and Mavs owner Mark Cuban's contention that the first gay NBA player will be a rich, pioneering hero. But Hardaway's words give voice to at least one person's truth:
The league isn't quite ready for this.
from The Miami Herald