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Michael Irvin appears shirtless, in just a pair of shoulder pads and jeans, on the cover of July's Out magazine, and in an article, the Hall of Fame wide receiver discusses his passion for equality rights spawned from his relationship with his gay older brother.
Irvin, an NFL Network analyst and ex-Dallas Cowboys star, told the gay men's magazine that he discovered his late brother, Vaughn, was gay some time in the 1970s when he saw him walking the streets of his Fort Lauderdale, Fla., neighborhood wearing women's clothing.
Irvin, the 15th of 17 children born to a preacher, idolized his older brother, who died of stomach cancer in 2006, for his charisma and success as a bank manager. Still, Irvin admitted he was rattled at the discovery of his brother's behavior -- something that was accepted by his family but never discussed.
Irvin went on to a decorated football career at the University of Miami, where he won a national championship with the Hurricanes in 1987, and later the Cowboys, with whom he won three Super Bowls in the 1990s. He said the knowledge of his brother's sexual orientation contributed to his much-publicized womanizing.
"(I) realized maybe some of the issues I've had with so many women, just bringing women around so everybody can see, maybe that's the residual of the fear I had that if my brother is wearing ladies' clothes, am I going to be doing that? Is it genetic?" Irvin told the magazine. "I'm certainly not making excuses for my bad decisions. But I had to dive inside of me to find out why am I making these decisions, and that came up."
Living in fear that his brother's secret would somehow reflect poorly on his own public persona ultimately helped Irvin realize the lonely existence many closeted athletes must feel.
"I'm not gay, but I was afraid to even let anyone have the thought," Irvin said. "I can only imagine the agony -— being a prisoner in your own mind -- for someone who wants to come out. If I'm not gay and I am afraid to mention it, I can only imagine what an athlete must be going through if he is gay."
Yet Irvin, once a leader in the Cowboys' locker room, said he could have supported a gay teammate during his playing days.
"I believe, if a teammate had said he was gay, we would have integrated him and kept moving because of the closeness," Irvin said. "We had a bunch of different characters on that team. Deion (Sanders) and Emmitt (Smith). I believe that team would have handled it well."
Irvin hopes society can reach a point where gay athletes are comfortable enough to come forward.
"Hopefully, as we move forward, we'll get to a place where there's no way it's even considered; it just is what it is and everybody can do what they do," Irvin said. "That's the ultimate goal."
As an African-American, Irvin says it comes down to one issue for him: equality.
"I don't see how any African-American with any inkling of history can say that you don't have the right to live your life how you want to live your life," Irvin said. "No one should be telling you who you should love, no one should be telling you who you should be spending the rest of your life with. When we start talking about equality and everybody being treated equally, I don’t want to know an African-American who will say everybody doesn’t deserve equality."
Irvin, an NFL Network analyst and ex-Dallas Cowboys star, told the gay men's magazine that he discovered his late brother, Vaughn, was gay some time in the 1970s when he saw him walking the streets of his Fort Lauderdale, Fla., neighborhood wearing women's clothing.
Irvin, the 15th of 17 children born to a preacher, idolized his older brother, who died of stomach cancer in 2006, for his charisma and success as a bank manager. Still, Irvin admitted he was rattled at the discovery of his brother's behavior -- something that was accepted by his family but never discussed.
Irvin went on to a decorated football career at the University of Miami, where he won a national championship with the Hurricanes in 1987, and later the Cowboys, with whom he won three Super Bowls in the 1990s. He said the knowledge of his brother's sexual orientation contributed to his much-publicized womanizing.
"(I) realized maybe some of the issues I've had with so many women, just bringing women around so everybody can see, maybe that's the residual of the fear I had that if my brother is wearing ladies' clothes, am I going to be doing that? Is it genetic?" Irvin told the magazine. "I'm certainly not making excuses for my bad decisions. But I had to dive inside of me to find out why am I making these decisions, and that came up."
Living in fear that his brother's secret would somehow reflect poorly on his own public persona ultimately helped Irvin realize the lonely existence many closeted athletes must feel.
"I'm not gay, but I was afraid to even let anyone have the thought," Irvin said. "I can only imagine the agony -— being a prisoner in your own mind -- for someone who wants to come out. If I'm not gay and I am afraid to mention it, I can only imagine what an athlete must be going through if he is gay."
Yet Irvin, once a leader in the Cowboys' locker room, said he could have supported a gay teammate during his playing days.
"I believe, if a teammate had said he was gay, we would have integrated him and kept moving because of the closeness," Irvin said. "We had a bunch of different characters on that team. Deion (Sanders) and Emmitt (Smith). I believe that team would have handled it well."
Irvin hopes society can reach a point where gay athletes are comfortable enough to come forward.
"Hopefully, as we move forward, we'll get to a place where there's no way it's even considered; it just is what it is and everybody can do what they do," Irvin said. "That's the ultimate goal."
As an African-American, Irvin says it comes down to one issue for him: equality.
"I don't see how any African-American with any inkling of history can say that you don't have the right to live your life how you want to live your life," Irvin said. "No one should be telling you who you should love, no one should be telling you who you should be spending the rest of your life with. When we start talking about equality and everybody being treated equally, I don’t want to know an African-American who will say everybody doesn’t deserve equality."
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