Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova, and Vivian Stringer on Oprah

As I was studying for a test late on Tuesday night Oprah Winfrey's late night show came on television. I was not really paying attention until I heard them talk about two of the greatest tennis players Chris Evert and Martina Navartilova. This caught my attention and I put aside studying to listen to their story. I'm not much of a follower of tennis, but I do appreciate the sport. Therefore, I did not know that these two athletes had a huge rivalry for years. It seems as if attitudes back then were very different from that of athlete's today. When they were playing tennis they were able to respect good competition and really pushed each other to excel and strive to be the best. However, in todays sporting realm it is hard to find athlete's who appreciate good competition and take away something beneficial from it rather than just disgust and the idea that they cannot be friends with their greatest rivals. These two ladies went back and forth in competition, one never really winning more than the other. Although they had a great rivalry, after the matches they always hugged in the locker room and showed each other a great deal of respect. Oprah asked Navratiolva how being one of the first openly gay professional female athletes affected her. Martina explained that at times it was hard because everyone would cheer for people like Chris Evert, but when she walked out there would either be silence, whispers, or booing from the crowd. It did not matter much that she was just as good as the other tennis stars, she was gay and thus seen as an outcast. Oprah made a comment that she was sort of the first female to pave the way for celebrities and other professional athletes to come out such as Ellen, and Rosie O'Donnell. I was just curious to see how many people in our class watched this episode and their reaction to it. How do you think you would react if someone close to you told you that they were gay? Would it change your overall opinion of who they are as a person? Would it matter that they are successful in many areas of their lives? I am glad that Oprah has episodes like this where we can take people who impacted women in sport in general. It was great to see that these two ladies are still really close friends and still have the amount of respect for each other as they did on the court. I only wish we could see more women able to step out of the closet in a respectable way so that awareness and acceptance will reach a greater audience. I know we live in California so for most people this is not really much of an issue, but on a larger scale other states still think of homosexuality as a controllable mental defect that is somehow correctable by simply abstaining from homosexual relations. 

Nicole G 338I