On Thursday I came across this excellent piece by Karen Ocamb, news editor at the LGBT magazine Frontiers, about what the Los Angeles Dodgers’ “It Gets Better” video means to her. Ocamb recalls how she once met the gay son of iconic former Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda, who later refused to acknowledge that his son was gay and had died from AIDS. Ocamb said she’s harbored ill feelings toward the Dodgers ever since — and almost didn’t post the teams’ “It Gets Better” video on her blog, LGBT POV.
“Then I watched it,” Ocamb writes. “Since I don’t watch Dodgers baseball, I don’t know who these guys are. The HuffPo identifies them as coach Don Mattingly, James Loney, Matt Guerrier, Jamey Carroll, A.J. Ellis, Rod Barajas and Hiroki Kuroda saying, ‘you are worthy,’ and ‘you’re not alone, we’re on your side’ in English, Spanish and Japanese.
“I suspect they know about the legendary Tommy Lasorda and may know that Tommy Lasorda Jr. was gay and died of AIDS,” Ocamb writes of the Dodgers who appear in the video. “But whether they do or not doesn’t matter. I was moved by their sincerity – and dare I say – it got better for me seeing how the Dodgers had changed.”
Ocamb’s moving piece prompted me to again reach out to John Blake, executive vice president of communications for the Texas Rangers, to find out whether the team has made a decision about filming an “It Gets Better” video. If you’ll recall, when asked about an “It Gets Better” video last month, Blake told Instant Tea the team was “considering our options and the timing of any initiatives.”
The Rangers begin the playoffs this afternoon against the Tampa Bay Rays in Arlington.
“I really have nothing new to report,” Blake said in an email Thursday evening. “We plan to look at what the best approach may be once the playoffs conclude.”
Watch the Dodgers’ “It Gets Better” video below.
