Pallone Scored a Hit With His Courage

Thank you for the story on former major league umpire Dave Pallone, who has written a book about his life in baseball as a closeted gay man.

Pallone’s story dramatizes the pain all of us who are lesbian and gay experience when we are forced to hide our identities to avoid discrimination and bigotry.

Professional baseball, like other American institutions, needs to wake up to the fact that lesbians and gay men are active in all walks of life, including major league sports.

A person’s sexual orientation is an integral part of who that person is, and discrimination based on that orientation is just as immoral as racism and other forms of bigotry. For people like Pallone to have to hide a basic part of their identity to do the work they love is a tragedy, benefiting no one.

RICHARD JENNINGS

Co-President, Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation/L.A.