On Saturday, a gay men’s chorus of 100 singers were humiliated when they tried to sing the National Anthem prior to a San Diego Padres game at San Diego’s Petco Park. What made the incident even more strange was that it was suppose to be a tribute and special day to recognize the LGBT community in a special Out at the Park Day.
As the chorus took the field and began to sing the Star Spangled Banner, a contractor immediately put on a woman singing the song and blasted it to the point where it totally drowned out the chorus. The men stayed undaunted and continued to sing the song all the way to the end even though few in the stadium heard it.
As they began to file of the field, they were bombarded with boos, insults and name calling. Fans yelled such things as “you sang like a girl” and “that’s the best you ever sounded”.
On Sunday, the San Diego Padres released a statement saying that they had disciplined an employee and fired the contractor they had been working with regarding the sound and audio at the stadium. The San Diego Gay Men’s Chorus accused the Padres of homophobia and asked for an immediate investigation and disciplinary action from Major League Baseball. The Padres said that they didn’t think the incident was done intentionally and they did blame team personnel for not stepping in during the situation to rectify it.
The Padres publicly apologized to the Chorus and accepted full responsibility for the incident. As they stood in the middle of the field, a pre-recorded music track for the national anthem, that had been played the night before, came on but, as they were about to start singing, a female voice began loudly singing the song. When it was all over, the chorus just stood there embarrassed and humiliated.
Bob Lehman, the executive director for the chorus said, “The song finished and nothing happened. Nobody spoke. We didn’t know what to do.”
In a Facebook post, the choir officially stated that, “What should have been a night of joy and celebration at Petco Park last night instead turned into a nightmare raising serious questions about the homophobia of the San Diego Padres organization and its relationship with the LGBT community.”
In addition, even though the Padres had invited the chorus to officially entertain their crowd, the chorus was told that they had to buy tickets to the game in order to do so.
PHOTO CREDIT: Twitter