Mark Ballam

Doggone it! Pet Pooch Brings Couple Together Years Before They Can Legally Marry   

Mark Ballam is the director of the Wendy Gillespie Center for Advancing Global Business

When SDSU’s Fowler College of Business wanted to apply for a grant from the federal government to continue funding their Center of International Business Education and Research (CIBER) in 2005, they recruited Mark Ballam, who was then with the CIBER program at Georgia Institute of Technology. “I moved to San Diego in 2005 and while coming to SDSU to run the CIBER program was an amazing opportunity, I moved here not actually knowing anyone,” said Ballam, who now heads SDSU’s Wendy Gillespie Center for Advancing Global Business. “There were moments I thought to myself ‘what have you done?’”    

Dogged Determination
Only a few months after taking the position at SDSU, Ballam was taking his dog, Molly, for a walk when the pair walked into a local coffee shop. Molly locked on to a man sitting at another table, made a beeline for him and jumped into his lap. “This was my introduction to Ross Lopez,” said Ballam. “After chatting for a while, Ross asked if we could share phone numbers and I immediately said ‘yes!’ and we’ve been together ever since.” 

Ballam and Lopez were married in 2014

The couple was together for nine years before they married in 2014, which was their first legal opportunity to do so. To Ballam, the right to marry is just one of the reasons Pride Month is celebrated. “For me, Pride Month is not just a celebration and affirmation for gay people: It’s a time for us to remember the significant struggles of those who came before us, how far we have come, and how far we still have to go in achieving understanding and equality,” he said. “I think it’s important for people today to remember that there was a time when someone like me could lose my job — not because I was a bad employee or didn’t perform well — but simply because I was gay.” 

The Workplace as a Minefield
Ballam saw this happening in the banking industry where he worked in the late 1980’s and early 1990s. “It was quite obvious that your career was clearly in jeopardy if it became known (or even suspected) that you were gay,” he said. “I knew people who were fired because of their sexuality.” 

Ballam’s dog, Molly, remained loyal to Ballam’s husband, Ross Lopez (pictured here) for the rest of her life

He didn’t just need to keep his sexuality hidden at work, but he also didn’t discuss it with his family. “I grew up in a fairly religious Catholic family where being gay certainly was not something to be proud of — to put it mildly,” said Ballam. “Because of this, I learned to avoid talking about my sexuality.” 

With the passage of time, greater state and federal legal protections have been put into place to ensure a safer environment for members of the LGBTQ+ community, both as members of society and in the workplace, including at SDSU. “As a member of the LGBTQ+ community, my experience at SDSU has been a really good one,” said Ballam. “From my first day on campus, I have felt as though my sexuality is irrelevant in my professional life. Also, I am very proud of SDSU’s Pride Center since it symbolizes the respect the university has for our very diverse community.” 

Strides Forward and Backward
However, as Ballam and others in the LGBTQ+ community know, all the progress that has been made can easily be eroded as well. “While we have made great strides in passing legislation to protect the LGBTQ+ community, these rights are again being threatened,” he said. “So far, there have been more than 200 anti-LGBTQ+ bills filed in states across the U.S. that could roll back our progress. Pride Month is an important time to remember that our freedoms and protections for basic rights that have been achieved so far are not guaranteed. Our community — indeed all of us — need to continue to stay vigilant. Because as history has taught us, when critical rights are taken away from some citizens, they can easily be taken away from all.”