Major League Baseball's All-Star Game was played recently, showcasing this season's best players. Unfortunately, the game was overshadowed by the conduct of one of the participants, pitcher Josh Hader. During the game, Hader got shelled (for those of you not into baseball, it basically means his pitching sucked), but far worse, out in the Twitterverse, some of his old tweets began to surface. In them, Hader spouted racist, sexist, and homophobic nonsense. We (a collective we, I hope) were appalled.

In the two weeks that have followed, similar tweets from Trea Turner of the Washington Nationals and Sean Newcomb of the Atlanta Braves have been unearthed. I'm sure more will follow.

In all three cases, the tweets are old. They came when these still-young men were in high school or college.

My reaction to seeing those tweets from Hader was absolute disgust and hot, intense anger. I wanted him fined and suspended. I wanted him banished from baseball altogether--oddly, not for the degradation of women, but for the racism, for the hate directed at the LGBT+ community. (What that says about me, a woman who is neither black nor part of the queer community as anything other than an ally/advocate, is something for me to continue to unpack on my own.)

Not so fast, my progressive, enlightened husband said. He said he'd hate to be judged on some of the stupid stuff he said when he was seventeen. I had to concede he had a point. I don't remember saying anything terrible when I was younger, but I'm not arrogant enough to believe that actually means I didn't. At seventeen or eighteen or even twenty, we're all still very much a product of where we come from, not where we're headed.

So what to do with Hader and the others? I don't know. There's no satisfying answer, and there won't be until we figure out how to raise all kids to know that being hateful jackasses does not make them cool. That's a bigger issue than this blog can cover today.

What I do know is that Hader got a standing ovation from his team's fans, and that makes me sick. Baseball dealt with the tweets by requiring Hader to meet with Billy Bean, a baseball exec and one of the few out men associated with professional baseball. Hader is also required to undergo sensitivity training and take part in Major League Baseball's inclusion and diversity initiatives.

As for me, I'll be watching for signs of genuine contrition from these men. I hope they use what they've learned from this experience to make a meaningful difference either in society or in baseball (because there's an ugly racist and homophobic nature underpinning the game I love), but I won't be cheering for any of them for a long time.

What do you think should be done when professional athletes or celebrities' bigoted skeletons are revealed? Should their age at the time be taken into consideration?

Other perspectives:

Outsports's Cyd Zeigler gives his take on the situation.

The Twitter users who exposed the old tweets share why they did it.

Here's blogger Clinton Yates

Apology of Nationals' Trea Turner

A final note: The voices of people who belong to the groups targeted by the bigoted comments deserve to have their opinions on the matter listened to, respected, and prioritized.