GLLA 2018 Pride Guide

GAYLIFE LA PRIDE ISSUE SUMMER 2018
34 GAYLIFE LA PRIDE ISSUE SUMMER 2018
35
OUR HEROES:
BILLIE
J E A N
KING
Billie Jean King (Novembeer 22,
1943-) Billie Jean King, a Long Beach
native who studied at California
State University-Los Angeles, is a
tennis icon who bested self-identified
chauvinist Bobby Riggs in the highly
publicized 1973 “Battle of the Sexes”
match that attracted an estimated 50
million viewers around the world.
A WORLD-CLASS
TENNIS PLAYER,
KING CAME OUT
OF THE CLOSET
AND BECAME A
POWERFUL LGBT
RIGHTS ADVOCATE
The Times of London. “I’ve got a
homophobic family, a tour that
will die if I come out, the world
is homophobic and, yeah, I was
homophobic. If you speak with
gays, bisexuals, lesbians and
transgenders, you will find a lot of
homophobia because of the way we
all grew up.”
King married in 1965 but filed for
divorce in 1987. While married
she began an affair with another
woman that ended in an acrimonious
lawsuit in 1981 that made public her
attraction to women. She reportedly
lost $2 million in endorsements as a
result.
King embraced her lesbian identity
and became an LGBT rights advocate.
She founded the Women’s Tennis
Association and the Women’s Tennis
Foundation and is involved in the
Elton John AIDS Foundation.
King was a tennis phenomenon from
an early age. In 1961 she became
world famous when, at the age of 17,
she won the women’s double’s title at
Wimbledon. Supporters in Long Beach
had raised $2,000 to send her there.
King won 39 Grand Slam titles during
her tennis career, with six of them at
the world-famous Wimbledon.
While King knew during her 20s that
she was a lesbian, being raised in a
homophobic family and culture kept
her in the closet.
“I couldn’t get a closet deep enough,”
King said in an interview with
King received a Presidential Medal of
Freedom in 2009 and was tapped in
2014 to be part of the U.S. delegation
to the Winter Olympics in Sochi.
She missed the opening ceremony
because of her mother’s health
problems (she died in February of
that year) and attended the closing
ceremony instead. Her inclusion was
perceived as a political statement to
the anti-LGBT laws recently passed
in Russia. The laws included bans
on gay adoptions, “propaganda of
nontraditional sexual relations,”
gay pride events and providing
children with information about
homosexuality. As a result, many
LGBT people protested the decision to
hold the Olympics in Sochi.