For
many, Robbie Rogers was probably not a household name, especially in LGBT
households. Then, on February 15 of this year, Rogers made a dramatic
announcement on his website: He was gay, and he was quitting soccer. These
points were not unrelated as no male American athlete in a major sport had come
out while still playing professionally. Then in May, Rogers reversed course on
one of those points and signed with the Los Angeles Galaxy. Now, for OUT magazine’s
August Sports Issue, Rogers talks with OUT
contributor Matthew Breen about
his journey from a closeted soccer player to LGBT role model.
Rogers was no longer just a retired soccer player; he was
a history maker – just six months after coming out to his “conservative,
Catholic, close-knit” family. “Growing up, I learned that being gay was a sin,”
he tells OUT. “It was not something
you could be, and it wasn’t something my family would talk about much – it was
obviously something that scared the shit out of me.”
That feeling had been scaring him from an early age. “I
felt different for a long time, but when I was 14 and going to high school, I
was like, Oh, OK. This is what’s going
on: I’m gay. And then it was, I’m
good at soccer as well…there are no gay soccer players,” Rogers remembers.
In his head, he became good at keeping these two identities separate. “I just
repress being a gay male, as awful as that sounds,” he says. “I look back now
and think, Gosh, that’s sad. TO think
there are other kids [feeling] like that is really scary, but I just felt that
soccer was so important in my life that I was willing to do it.”
Rogers did keep is soccer and personal lives separate for
some time. He admits, to keep up the persona, he dated girls for some time.
“Before I became true to myself I dated girls. I very much acted the part as a
straight footballer, which is pretty sad, but I felt like I had to mask that
side of me,” he notes.
Now, Rogers has been dating guys, but don’t let soccer to
be the impetus for meeting him. “In London I dated a guy for a few months. He’s
till one of my good friends, but its’ been tough to meet people in West
Hollywood,” he says. “It has to happen in an organic way, where someone
introduces himself and is genuine and doesn’t want to talk about soccer
straight out the gate. When I started dating this guy in London, I just went up
to him. I’m sure I’ll meet someone in a random place – the grocery store or
wherever.”
Through the course of his long coming out journey, Rogers
has now learned to embrace his role as a spokesperson for those who are now struggling
with coming out. “I want to help people, especially kids who feel the same way
I did; it makes me sick to remember the way I felt and to think that they feel
the same way. Now I have this platform that hopefully I can use to reach people
in a positive way.”
