fair enough
I thought that Sam chose to give the media and various advocacy organizations an opportunity to "celebrate" this important step in sports history, and yes that sexual preference should no longer be relevant in choosing football players for the NFL. Over the years, many people in various professions have chosen to do the same. Ellen Degeneris stands out in my memory. As was the case in various civil rights situations that I have followed in the past 50 years, individuals sometimes choose when to come out to the media as a strategy to spotlight the issue of discrimination.
I cannot speak for your thinking that my choice of words was "ignorant, archaic and insulting". Your perceptions are your own. I don't find civil right advocacy and strategies used to be any of these things. You seem to think that Sam did not choose to have the media focus on this very important step in NFL history. I think that you are incorrect. However, there is no way for us to resolve this issue.
My issue is with people thinking they have a right to judge how he expresses himself, because he is gay.
Straight players are seen all the time with wives or girlfriends. They discuss their wives and girlfriends publicly at times.
The fact that the media or the twitterverse wants to cling to Sam as a celebrity is not Sam's fault.
Comments such as 'celebrating his sexuality' imply that he is taking advantage of flaunting something he has no right to.
There was a time when interracial marriage was thought of as immoral. If an NFL player had an interracial girlfriend or wife, and kissed her when he was drafted, and then the media wanted to turn him into a celebrity as the first interracially married athlete, would you chastise him for 'celebrating his race'?
It is insensitive to treat gay people as they are nothing more than gay. Who really cares that he is on Dancing with Stars. Its the off-season, but he is gay, so that's a 'gay thing to do' so it gets criticism. Gay people are people. They do smart things and stupid things. some want attention, others do not.
To try to say that you can decide for the first openly gay football player how he should have handled the situation, including that he should have just not said anything is wrong. Many gay teens hide their orientation from their family out of fear that they will not be accepted. You simply cannot walk in the shoes of Michael Sam and have any idea what the issues he was facing are.
In the end he did nothing detrimental to his team. No more than Tom Brady did by drawing attention by who he dated.
I understand where you are coming from, but people need to realize they are talking about someone dealing with an issue that is probably more stressful than anything we have ever dealt with, and not belittle that with comments like 'celebrating his sexuality'.