A cool thing about the poker "community" is it's an equal opportunity endeavor. It has its share from every culture and social archetype you can think of, and at the table it doesn't matter one little bit which one you fall into.

Agree. It shouldn't require such courage to be who you are, but in it does and I'm glad Jason has it. Can't express how proud I am of him.

Congrats again, buddy!

Protential tho

1. This is extremely common - most people who later identify as gay have had sex with a member of the opposite gender.

2. Arousal is physiological. Desire is psychological.

There's "different levels of gayness" in that some people fall somewhere outside the gay/straight boxes we tend to shove people into (bisexual, "mostly" gay/straight with some other gender attraction), but most people don't get that deeply into this outside of discussions with very close friends/partners.

So besides Selbst, who is in the closet as far as "super duper high profile cool neto" poker players go? Daniel is not gay so don't start with that.

Good on you Jason. You the man. PokerVT rules by the way.

You actually think people aren't prejudiced anymore in 2012? A bit over a year ago people spend millions of dollars to push through prop 8 in CALIFORNIA. I don't even want to think about the majority mindset of people in states like Utah or Alabama...

This IS news and it can only help to encourage others who feel like they have to stay closeted in our oh so tolerant poker world.

No speculation if you respond to this - unless it's fairly well known the player is out, don't bother responding. Unless you enjoy infraction points and temp bans.

neat

I really liked this part.

Coming out is important. People who might have felt apathetic towards gay rights can quickly become supporters when they learn that a friend or role model -- one they thought was straight -- is in fact gay.

Sounds like he's had a very rough time coming to terms with his sexuality. (Even the post itself sort of skirts around the issue.) I hope making it public helps make him be more comfortable.

I had some quick thoughts (not bad) but I can't rele word it lol. I'll be brief. Obv every1's thinking this but it's so odd how we live in a society where he was fearing being judged negatively. Btw I'm happy to see everyone being so nice in this forum. However, looks like people are almost applauding him... like he's done something well or achieved a high score or summin (bad anology). This just furthermore promotes how bad our society is. He hasn't done anything right... It's nature.. Ok he's gay.

On the flip side, I'm gona get this, yes it was 'brave' coming out and good for him and hope he's happy. I think the acknowledgements should be 'good for you, glad you're happy' etc... not congratulating someone.

Fortunately this shouldn't be a problem as this community seems very positive.

I'll say it myself, good on ya jason.

Kinda regret this post cos It came across quite bad... I was jus curious is anyone agreed with me.

I jus realised how poorly I worded this. What I'm saying is the whole point is to not make a big deal if he says he's gay (negatively) but making a big deal positively almost has the same effect like it's a big deal. Straight or gay who cares... Like I said it's nature. It's nothing that should be discussed but I geuss it's innevitable that ppl r gonna judge negatively.

Also - I've been a bit hypocritical as I've jus made a semi-long post about some1 coming out lol. My bad

go away

He plays on Cake, I thought this was obvious.

(Kidding, lots of respect for him. Poker's always been kind of a boy's club, so I can understand the hesitation).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinsey_scale

0 = Completely straight

6 = Completely gay

His Majesty Mr. Koopa,
It was obviously really hard for him to come out, and it was obviously the right thing for him to do. I think that doing the right thing when it's hard (even if it might be really easy for someone else or it SHOULD be really easy in a perfect world) deserves some props.

you should really be more embarrassed to be writing in public like that.

Yes there is. See Kinsey scale in which I believe I am a 4. Also wiki prison sexuality. Am I being trolled?


His lips are a bit too small but not bad overall. Though that shirt is dreadful.

very good, best of luck to him and *** close minded people

Yea I hear ya actually. I found it quite hard to describe my point. But with the way you're suggesting he deserves props ur definitely right.

My bad - Feel free to delete my post

weird, a long time ago (~7 years probably) when I was first getting into poker, someone I know who reads SomethingAwful linked me to a video of jcarver playing online and commentating. He said the f-ggot word like 100 times in 30 minutes. Was kinda annoyed by it at the time when I was in PC mode. I guess it's kinda standard though for a closeted gay to act that way.

didn't mean for this post to be negative. Cool blog and GL

The guy chose to come out, and effectively be himself, if people think it takes courage to be themselves that's fine obv.

I understand people think he now magically opens himself to criticism about his sexuality but look at this thread, people are congratulating him and talking as if he has made some astounding achievement.

It does take courage when there are still places in this country where people risk getting beaten or killed for being gay.

If you don't get that, IDK what to tell you.

Powerful stuff, glad he did this, for himself and the community.

Interesting aspect of his story is that being an online grinder, clearly makes it easier to stay closeted. That is, bosses like Jason can go into the tunnel vision as he described, spending a great bulk of their time isolated in their abode. Granted for now in the US, this existence is much much less common, it's still speaks to the the (relatively greater) isolated nature of online poker. And to a lesser extent, speaking as live pro, poker in general. Obviously there are plenty of exceptions to this, as poker pros can be quite social, and many maintain strong poker comrades. Saying online poker was conducive to the identity-restraining Jason felt, one could argue that for example a noob lawyer working 100 hrs/week on his first job might have similar results. Similar drive, dedication, tunnel vision. But being out in the world, and not glued to yer monitors, prospering in yer skivvies day to day, is clearly different. There is plenty of good and bad that comes w/ the poker pro lifestyle.

My emphasis of this point, simply goes back to my original statement. Jason is doing a great service to other grinders out there who may be suppressing their gayness or sumn else. Inspiring stuff.

Not trolling at all. I had no idea that there was such a scale.

Do you really think he runs this risk at all? By this logic it takes courage to drive a car in a city with high alcohol use because a drunk driver might run into you more often than other places.

This isn't news outside of the poker community, he's not going to be vilified by anyone, I hope, for coming out. I just happen to think it's not a huge deal that a guy wants to be gay in 2012.