Your Story: Duston Mazzella

by IQA Staff | July 12, 2013

Editor's Note: We were so inspired by everyone sharing their stories of how quidditch made a positive impact on their lives on Facebook that we would like to publish your story. Simply send an email to editorial@internationalquidditch.org telling us how quidditch has made a difference for you, and we may publish it on the IQA website. These stories are posted as received, except for spelling and grammatical changes

Photo by Michael E. Mason/IQA Staff.

Well, I feel like my whole experience with quidditch really hasn't come into view until the last few days when a flurry of postings of all these sorts of equality issues on the “IQA: All the Regions!” page. Prior to that I had just kind played quidditch and had a great time - I hadn't put any thought into it's own impact on my life or what that has done for me yet. Well as I was reading the different people posting different things across the Facebook interwebs, Alex Leitch of Hofstra posted something along the lines of quidditch being for the gays (I can't remember the exact post, and yes, I know I can scroll down the Facebook page, but that's too much effort for me in the middle of this midnight rant/ramble). Though there was quite a reaction to his words, it put everything into perspective for me. Being a gay male quidditch player, it was interesting to see how Alex had seemed to have a positive experience through his quidditch-ing and how it was an open and welcome community.

Inspired by his words, I sent him a message on Facebook:

Hey Alex,

You definitely have no idea who I am, but I wanted to share something with you because, well what you posted on the IQA regions page just made me really reflect on my own experience through quidditch and ...well ...yeah here its goes:

Well, when I was growing up a kid I was super active and athletic and was doing a bunch of sports that a lot of other kids were doing - football, soccer, baseball - yeah, that stuff; I just felt like I fit in. Like being a part of a team just was great because we all worked together to reach a certain goal and compete and what have you. Well that really definitely started to change around adolescence when I became aware of me being gay and how that type of person was perceived, especially in the athletic community, and especially in the woods of West Virginia. When jokes and stuff like that started to happen...I think you might get what I'm going at with "jokes"... and making fun, I definitely felt excluded and eventually just stopped being active in sports altogether for a good 8 years.

Quidditch, on the other hand, wasn't that at all. I was at the birth of the team I was on (Arizona State) and I thought that would be something that the more "jock"-esque people on the team would pick me on. But I was a great player. I surprised myself on my decent athletic ability and how well I play on a team. And my team could give a s**t if I was gay or not. It was amazingly open-minded and great, and for the first time in a long time I felt accepted and equated to everyone else in this sort of realm. And although the other parts of my life weren't at that same level, and indeed in the society of Red-State AZ it wasn't, I at least had this. And I felt like I opened up a huge gate for other gay people on our team to be open. Although I certainly didn't recruit people, but I felt like my openness and the acceptability of the team just allowed for just a positive and great environment for all different types of people, and even more gay people to join. At Western Cup II we had a roster that was like 1/3 gay people - we could have fielded gay! - and we won the tournament. Though that's really relevant to the whole issue, but it just felt great to be and still be apart of something great.

So, I feel like the longer I write this, the clearer it's becoming as to why I am writing this. I think what you said in your posts reflected highly on my own experience in athletics and in life. Quidditch is a sport that isn't like all other sports - it isn't exclusionary. Quidditch accepts all types of people, with open arms - and I think that is something quintessential for our sports survival. It was also great to hear someone have the same view as I did, and possibly something similar.

Okay that is all, I just wanted to say I really appreciated your words and thought I'd share! I hope you have a great season and summer and life and all that.

-Duston

Though not the most eloquent wording and spelling I have ever accomplished in my life, I got everything I needed out and felt like I connected with someone outside of my own community of quidditch players that really felt how I felt. And everything I stated I still find to be true. I think the acceptance and openness of quidditch is what defines it from other sports. Certainly people might not think that that makes this athletic event elite (or something along those lines), but I don't think that's how it should be viewed. Quidditch accepts and pushes every type of person, only if you let it in. I've seen super-nerds who've read the books 20 times over come out and transform into these incredible and passionate athletes, breaking all these stereotypes that we assign to certain people based on race, gender, orientation, what-have-you.

Now forwarding to this most recent FireMercs. I was drafted by Tony Rodriguez for the Red Team and was fortunate to be put as one of the starters for the team. After the first day of gameplay our team was undefeated, and into the second day we defeated the Green Team going into bracket play as the 1-seed. When I was sitting in the stands for one of the games a friend of mine came up to me and just started talking about the tournament and whatnot. Eventually he mentioned something along the lines of some of the girls in the tournament talking about cute guys there. He leaned into me and asked, “Hey, so are you gay?” and I responded, "Yeah.” He stated, “Okay, because some of the girls just thought you were effeminate, but, like, when you play, you play really rough and tough like a straight guy.” Though this might not have been the exact usage and word choice, the message was pretty clearly that.

This interaction has brought to my inevitable response to what quidditch means to me: Quidditch is a window for me to perform in an athletic contest without the social constraints that society has set upon me to hinder me in anyway. And for those whose idea of a flamboyant, skinny man not being able to give a tackle and wrestle an ex-football player-sized man, I'm here to prove that people like me can play aggressively and out of what our ‘norm' should be. Though the interaction with my friend may seem like a back-handed compliment, I can't think of it like that. It's positive because I've challenged someone's thought of what a gay man can do in any sort of athletic realm. And I think that this idea is shown through all different types of people who play this sport, in that the athleticism and teamwork isn't defined by your status in the world, but by how you play on the field. Quidditch, for me, is an opening into which people can see all of me - the homosexual, and the athlete, and the white, and the black, and the athlete - and respect it, and respect me - for all of me. And in a world full of nastiness and labeling, it's something like this sport that sheds, even if it's a little bit, these notions. I don't want this to be some kind of rallying call, but more of a personal thank you to quidditch for allowing me to be able to even just challenge these thoughts. I thank quidditch deeply.