Olympic Countdown

Going into the Beijing games the lgbt media again attempted to list the lgbt Olympians competing in 2008. Their highest estimate was 11, but with some athletes coming out since then the list can now be recorded as 24, of which 13 were making their Olympic debut.

This time around women’s football tops the lgbt athlete list with 7 players. For the 3^rd Olympics in a row Germany won the bronze medal. In the team were Linda Bresonik and Nadine Angerer. Nadine missed out on a medal in the previous 2 Olympics because she was the substitute goalkeeper and didn’t actually play in the bronze medal match. But this time she was head goalkeeper and at last received her bronze medal. Unfortunately, Ursula Holl, her substitute, thereby missed out on a bronze.

One player with football in her blood was Isabell Herlovsen, a striker on the Norwegian team. Her father is Olympian and former Norwegian international Kia Erik Herlovsen.

The gold medal was won by the USA. They were coached by Pia Sundhage who had played for Sweden in the 1996 Atlanta games. On the Swedish team in Beijing was Jessica Lindström. Perhaps the most unusual record of any lgbt Olympian has to be held by American football forward Natasha Kai - the record for the most tattoos – over 55 in all!

Handball had 3 lesbian players. In the gold medal-winning Norwegian team were Katja Nyberg and team captain Gro Hammerseng. The pair had been living and working openly as a couple for 3 years and had sought to play for clubs in which they could play alongside each other. Gro had the honour of carrying her national flag in the closing ceremony. Katja was actually Finnish by birth and she became a Norwegian citizen in 2001. The couple have since split up, though they continued to play on the same club until 2011 when Gro retired to have a child.

Alexandra Labracére played handball for France, losing in a first round match to Norway but reached the quarter-finals, where they lost to Russia.

Lee Pearson returned to defend his 3 paralympic equestrian gold medals for Team GB. On 11^th September 2008 he became the greatest lgbt Olympian when his total gold medal tally reached 9. Who knows – will he make it 12 in 2012? In the main equestrian arena Hans Peter Minderhoud won a silver medal. The New Zealand couple of Blyth Tait and Paul O’Brien did not compete, but Blyth was the equestrian team manager for the Kiwis in Beijing, and Paul was an Olympic selector.

Winning a gold medal in women’s hockey was Marilyn Agliotti, She returned after an absence of 8 years to play for the Netherlands after playing for her native South Africa in 2000.

In the diving pool were the 2 Australian Matthews – Helm and Mitcham. Mathew Helm was making his 3^rd Olympic appearance. He had won a silver and bronze at the 2004 Olympics and 2 golds in the Commonwealth Games in 2006. He was tipped for 2 golds in Beijing. However, rising superstar Matthew Mitcham, who had come 4^th in the Commonwealth Games, exceeded most people’s expectations by beating Helm to the gold in the platform competition. Disappointingly, Helm missed any medal.

The remaining medals from Beijing went to Lauren Lappin and Vicky Galindo who won silver with the American softball team. Vicky’s involvement in the Olympics actually goes back to 1996 when, at the age of 12, she took part in the torch relay for the Atlanta games.

Of the remaining lgbt athletes in Beijing 4 were making their 4^th appearance: “veteran” German cyclist Judith Arndt, Australian beach volleyball player Natalie Cook, Brazilian judoka Edinanci da Silva and Australian tennis player Rennae Stubbs. A tennis player making her only Olympic appearance was Israel’s Tzipora Obziler.

German fencer Imke Duplitzer made her 3^rd Olympic appearance. She refused to attend the opening ceremony saying that she didn’t want to be part of the “circus” of a Chinese propaganda spectacle. Canadian swimmer Anne Polinario was also making her 3^rd appearance, coached by her father, gay Olympian Rafael Polinario. Anne defended her Paralympic 50m gold medal.

To finish on a golden note, the US women’s basketball with Seimone Augustus became Olympic champions.

For all official information on the Olympics go to www.london2012.com

Flower Power - Hyacinth

In this special year for sport it seems appropriate that I should bring Ancient Greek sport and flowers together with the story of a tragedy in which the 2 are inextricably linked.

Many Greek states had religious festivals which included sport. The second most important in Sparta all began with a hyacinth.

I’ll only use the word hyacinth to describe the flower because it’s used more for a girl’s name than its original use as a man’s name. For the man’s name I’ll use the more accurate Greek name of Hyakinthos.

The King of Sparta had a son called Hyakinthos. The young prince had everything a Spartan athlete could ever want – good looks, great personality, excellent athletic skills, lots of older men fighting over his attention, and the most perfect god-like body ever seen on a mortal. In fact he was so good that even the gods were fighting over him, two in particular – Apollo, patron god of Sparta, and Zephyrus, the god of the west wind. Even though same-sex relationships in Ancient Greece was common in the gymnasiums and amongst training soldiers all these relationships were monogamous. But Hyakinthos was seeing both gods at the same time. The image below comes from an Ancient Greek dish shows Hyakinthos and Zephyrus together (Zephyrus is the one with wings, of course).

 

Unsurprisingly, Apollo was quite jealous, so he gave Hyakinthos an ultimatum. He must choose only one god to be his lover. The prince, bearing in mind who would be the protector of his state when he succeeded to the throne, chose to stay with Apollo.

Now it was Zephyrus’s turn to be jealous and he planned his revenge. His opportunity came at the annual festival in honour of Apollo in July.

So, on a scorching summer afternoon the great and the good assembled at the Temple of Apollo. All the young athletes lined up, naked, ready to show the crowds what they could do. High up in the sky Zephyrus saw his chance for revenge and waited for the right moment.

Prince Hyakinthos was an expert discus thrower. When it came to his turn he couldn’t resist showing off.  He launched his discus high into the air. Eager to show how good an athlete he was he raced after it as it flew across the stadium, perhaps hoping to impress Apollo by catching the discus when it bounced off the ground. But when it struck the ground it hit a rock and rebounded into the air. Zephyrus was ready to make his move and he blew the discus straight at Hyakinthos. It struck the prince squarely in the forehead, cracking his skull like an eggshell. He fell to the ground, motionless.

As blood poured from his wound and seeped into the sandy soil of the arena the spectators lifted up his limp body and rushed him into the cool air of Apollo’s Temple. Apollo was the god of healing, so if any god could save this young man’s life then surely it must be him. But it was too late. The injury was too severe and he had lost too much blood, and as the whole of the city waited outside the temple, Prince Hyakinthos breathed his last.

The prince’s father was grief-stricken. As he descended the temple steps he could see the fateful arena where his son and heir was killed. A patch of deep crimson in the sand showed the spot where Hyakinthos’s blood had flowed, by now dried by the heat from Apollo the Sun himself. And as Apollo’s heat dried the patch of blood even darker a green shoot began to appear from its centre. Apollo’s grief was turning the blood into a flower.

Legends say that Eros was also there, weeping with Apollo at the death of his lover. From then on the new flower was named hyacinth in his honour. The king gave Prince Hyakinthos a magnificent funeral with lots of sports and contests and his remains were placed in an equally magnificent tomb at the foot of the statue of Apollo.

But the king thought a bigger memorial should be created. The following year the festival of Apollo was renamed the Hyakinthia and extended to three days.

A final twist to the tale is that the flower we recognise as a hyacinth today is not the same as that which the Ancient Greeks knew. In all probability the original hyacinth was a type of lily. It’s 3 petals symbolised royal male power all over the eastern Mediterranean.

The Hyakinthia festival survived into the Roman period and may have been one of the many surviving festivals banned, along with the Olympics and the Great Panatheneaean Games, by the Emperor Theodosius I in 393.

Olympic Countdown

Continuing my chronicle of lgbt participation in the Olympic Games we come to 2006 and Turin which saw more lgbt winter medals than any other – 3 gold, 3 silver and 2 bronze.

At the opening ceremony there was a great chance for well-known Italian fashion designers like Armani to showcase their skills. He designed the official Italian team uniform. In the opening ceremony Chris Witty carried the Stars and Stripes ahead of her team. This was her 3^rd Olympic appearance in 4 years, and she hoped to defend her speed skating gold medal from 2002. Unfortunately, she finished in 27^th place.

Perhaps one of the big surprises in Turin involved two other speed skaters – Renate Groenewold and Ireen Wüst of the Netherlands. Renate was hoping to improve on her silver medal from 2002. The 3000 meters was her favourite distance, the distance in which she has won the most medals. However, in Turin Renate was up against newcomer Ireen Wüst, who beat Renate into silver medal position again. Ireen was considered an outsider in the event, and at the age of 19 she became the youngest Dutch winter Olympic champion on record. Ireen also won a bronze medal in the 1,500 meter event.

Turin saw Swedish skier Anja Parson returned to improve on her medals from 2002. After winning a bronze on the slalom in Salt Lake City Anja became Olympic champion by winning gold. She also won a bronze in the combined event.

Sarah Vaillancourt is the third gold medallists from Turin. Canadian by birth Sarah moved to study in the USA entering Harvard University in 2004. She made the Canadian national ice hockey team in 2005 and took a year off from Harvard to train for the Turin games. In the final Sarah and the Canadians beat Sweden. In the Swedish team were Erika Holst and Ylva Lindberg, both making their 3^rd appearance. By winning silver they improved on their 2002 bronze medals. Three months later they both came out as lesbian.

More figure skaters appeared in Turin than at any games since 1988 – 3 of them. Emanuel Sandhu returned, hoping his 2^nd place in the previous Canadian championships would help him to win an Olympic medal after the disappointment of pulling out injured in 2002. Unfortunately, he finished 13^th.

In 5^th place was American figure skater Johnny Weir making his Olympic debut. Between these games and the next speculation of Johnny’s sexuality seemed to interest the media more than his skating. He always stated that his sexuality, whatever it was, was irrelevant and private. By the next winter games the Canadian media in particular were becoming a bit too persistent and somewhat derogatory about Johnny’s flamboyant skating style.

The American Ryan O’Meara made his only Olympic appearance in 2006 despite having been a competitive pairs figure skater since 1999. Ryan began training with new partner Jamie Silverstein in 2005 and the pair won bronze at the US Championships. Their Olympic results were not so good, finishing 16^th overall. Afterwards Ryan retired from competitive skating and became a coach.

Having gone through all the known lgbt athletes, one final lgbt competitor cannot be named. This athlete was (and still is) a captain in the US army, and the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” regulation, which meant that anyone serving in the American forces would be fired if their homosexuality was admitted, prevented the captain from coming out. The regulation has since been abolished and, to my knowledge, the captain still hasn’t come out publicly. The captain, who  competed in the bobsleigh competition and finished in 6^th place, has not returned to the games. I do know this Illinois-born athlete’s identity, but won’t reveal it (the name hasn’t even appeared in rumours or online lists).

For all official information on the Olympics go to www.london2012.com

Putting It Straight About - the Gay Caveman

This month is British Archaeology Month. I mentioned a handful of gay archaeologists in my post on World Diggers Day, and today I want to expand our horizons further.

We must remind ourselves that attitudes towards sexuality and gender have changed over the centuries and our definitions may not be appropriate, particularly in a society that existed so long ago that very little survives from it.

So you can imagine the media frenzy created a little over a year ago when headlines began to appear in newspapers declaring “The First Gay Caveman Found”.

The background to the story takes us across Europe to Prague. Czech archaeologists found the burial of a man who lived about 4,700 years ago. He belonged to a culture known as Corded Ware, so called because of the frequent use of cord impressions on their pottery. This civilisation stretched across most of northern central Europe.

Even though the skeleton was identified as a man the burial objects suggested something else. Instead of the usual male artifacts like weapons or hand tools this man was buried with none. What intrigued archaeologists most, though, was that this man was buried on his left side facing west. This is the usual position in which women from the Corded Ware culture were buried. But there weren’t any of the usual female burial goods either – cooking pots and jewellery.

You can imagine the conclusion people came to first. Media journalists being what they are, several newspapers tried to reconstruct the man’s whole life-style from the barest minimum of evidence.

Archaeologists jumped at the media immediately. To journalists archaeologists are just nerd in stripy jumpers and took no notice. So you can imagine how much the archaeologists shouted when a couple of months ago, just a year after the story first broke, the media trumpeted the discovery of “the gay caveman’s village”.

Journalists were informed last year that the sexuality of the buried man was unknown. If he was alive today, apart from being very old, the man could prosecute the media under current law for assuming anything about his sexuality based on nothing but their own preconceptions. Just because a man is buried in a female manner it doesn’t make him gay, bisexual, transgender or anything. Without grave goods we can’t even say if he or his culture regarded as such. No-one knows if the Corded Ware people even had any specific attitudes towards different sexualities.

So far archaeologists haven’t come up with a particular reason why the man was buried like this. He could have been buried in preparation for a proper burial later elsewhere; he could have been a visitor from a different culture and buried by the Corded Ware people this way (as early Christians often buried non-Christians in a different manner); or that this man was unknown to the villagers, a stranger found dead outside the village, and they didn't want to insult his memory by burying him in a manner he may not have understood or approved of.

As far as the name “caveman” is concerned, the Cored Ware culture existed in the Chalcolithic period, part of the Bronze Age. They were capable of building their own homes and villages and didn’t live in caves. “Caveman” is popularly given to people living 35,000 years ago – the Neanderthals or Cro-Magnons. The Corded Ware people lived no more than 5,000 years ago.

Surely the world has produced at least one intelligent journalist who knows enough maths to work out the difference between 35,000 and 5,000. Until it has I suppose we can look forward to reading more inaccuracies and misinformation on the subject.

Olympic Countdown

The Olympics returned home in 2004 when they were held in Greece. These were the first games where the lgbt media began to list lgbt athletes. Society had at last started to get used to the idea that there are lgbt athletes and the lgbt media was now proud to point some of them out.

There was only one identified lgbt athlete from the home nation, tennis player Eleni Daniilidou. She debuted in Sydney in 2000 at the age of 17. Eleni had reached No. 22 ranking in the world in 2002 but never reached higher, despite having several championship wins.

As in 2000 equestrianism tops both the lgbt athlete and medal lists. And once again British Paralympian Lee Pearson tops the individual table defending all 3 golds he won in 2000. Three American riders won bronze. Robert Dover, in his 6^th and last Olympics, won bronze in the mixed team 3-day event with Guenther Seidel. Darren Chiacchia won bronze in the mixed team 3-day event. This was Darren’s first Olympics and a series of major setbacks prevented him from returning.

First was a horrific accident 6 months before the Beijing Olympics when Darren’s horse tumbled over a fence and fell on top of him. With multiple fractures, a punctured lung and severe head injuries Darren was in a coma and on a breathing ventilator for about a week. His doctors didn’t envisage a full recovery. But Darren stunned them by recovering enough to climb back on a horse 2 months later. With steely determination Darren returned to competitive riding in 2009.

Then in 2010 Darren’s partner had him arrested for not telling him he was HIV+. In Florida, where they lived, this was illegal. Very quickly this “outing” turned into a bigger personal setback as inaccurate media reports of him being “the Olympian who gave a man AIDS” lost him thousands of dollars in endorsements and business deals. Eventually all charges against Darren were dismissed in September 2011.

The other equestrian athletes were Carl Hester (GB) and Blyth Tait (New Zealand).

Second to equestrianism comes tennis with 6 lgbt players, all except the above-mentioned Eleni Daniilidou were Wimbledon champions – Conchita Martínez, Amélie Mauresmo, Rennae Stubbs, Lisa Raymond, and (in her only Olympic appearance) Martina Navratilova, at 47 the oldest ever lgbt competitor.

Amélie knocked out Conchita in the first round and went on to win the silver medal. But Conchita went on to win a silver in the doubles tournament. One-time life partners and Wimbledon doubles champions Rennae Stubbs and Lisa Raymond returned, but because Lisa is American and Rennae is Australian they couldn’t compete together. They didn’t even get to play against each other. Both Rennae and Lisa (with her doubles partner Martina) went out in the quarter-finals.

Gold medals were won by the life-partners Lotte Kiaerskou and Rikke Skov who played in the Danish women’s handball team.

Diving also produced 2 medals, both won by the Australian diver Mat Helm – a silver and bronze. Also in the pool were paralympic swimmers from Canada coached by former Olympian Rafael Polinario, including his daughter Anne who won 2 gold medals and 3 silver.

Sheryl Swoopes won her 3^rd successive gold medal with the American women’s basketball team, becoming the top female gold medallist.

The remaining medallists of 2004 were German fencer Imke Duplitzer (silver) and Dutch swimmer Johan Kenkhuis (silver). Top German cyclist Judith Arndt also won silver – and a fine for giving the finger sign as she crossed the finish line as a protest against her partner Petra Rossner being dropped from the team.

Nadine Angerer returned as substitute goalkeeper for Germany’s women’s football team, but again missed out on her team’s bronze medal by not playing in the bronze medal match. They beat the Swedish team, on which Victoria Svensson played.

Australian beach volleyball star and former Olympic champion Natalie Cook lost to Brazil in the semi-finals. Another beach volleyball player, South African Leigh-Ann Naidoo, unfortunately lost all her matches.

Finally, judoka Edinanci Silva returned but didn’t improve on her placing from 2000, and Britain’s Rob Newton (from my home county Nottinghamshire) finished 7^th in his heat of the hurdles.

One athlete who didn’t make Athens was Hungarian wrestler Grego Szabo. Just before the games his team managers discovered he had “performed” in many gay videos and banned him for life!

For more, official, information on the Games go to www.london2012.com

Putting Out the Union Jack

Whatever your opinion of the Union Jack (as a national symbol of pride, or a hated symbol of imperialism) you have to admit that it’s a design classic. You can hardly miss it this year with the Diamond Jubilee and the London Olympics. But this week you’ll see it turn London pink because today the World Pride is taking place in the nation’s capital as well.

There was already a good reason to call the Union Jack the gayest national flag around because the design was chosen by one of the “Queens” of Great Britain, James I.

Before we go any further, let’s clear up a common misconception. This flag IS called the Union Jack – named after its use as a flag of national identity flown from the jack staff on a ship. It is also called the Union Flag – it is the flag of the union of the crowns of England and Scotland. The name was given parliamentary approval on 14^th July 1908 when the UK government issued the statement that “the Union Jack should be regarded as the national flag [on land]” - actually the first time in history that the UK officially adopted a national flag. Places like Australia used it long before we did when they adopted the UK naval ensign as their national flag (all the colonies used the blue or red naval ensigns before independence). Before 1908 the Union Jack was a government and naval flag.

So to James I. He was the son of Mary, Queen of Scots and her 2^nd husband Lord Darnley, an arrogant bisexual cross-dresser who was blown to bits by Mary’s 3^rd husband. In 1603 James inherited the English throne from Queen Elizabeth I. James was quite open in his choice of “male favourites”. In fact, when he succeeded to the English throne pamphlets were circulating with declared “Elizabeth was king, now James is queen”.

Politicians then had a problem. In previous centuries, with sea trade and exploration and the accompanying growth in piracy and naval warfare, it was necessary for ships to display national insignia so that your own ships don’t fire on them. Flags were easily seen, so ships around the world carried the first real flags of national identity (as opposed to identity on land being signified by the coat of arms of the person who owned it – like the king). England flew St. George’s Cross and Scotland flew St. Andrew’s Cross. But with the united crowns which flag should the new Great British ships fly, the English one of the Scottish one?

Under international law it should be the Scottish flag because the kingdom of Scotland is older than the kingdom of England. It was decided that the new flag for ships would be that of England and Scotland combined in such a way that neither had preference. The College of Arms came up with these suggestions, with the Lord High Admiral giving his signed approval.

But none of these met with “Queen” James’ approval. Even in those days it was a “queer eye” that taught the straight guy about good design! So James told them to go away and try again. So the heralds went back to square one and came up with a more familiar design …

Heraldically speaking this does gives Scotland precedence – the blue background and white saltire is described first, and the red cross of St. George last. James liked this design and it was used on British ships right up to 1801 when the United Kingdom was created and the Irish cross of St. Patrick was added.

But “Queen” James didn’t provide the only lgbt contribution to the Union Jack. Quite early in the modern gay rights movement this flag emerged in Pride marches. Naturally, it’s just the Union Jack with the red crosses turned to pink.

A much more popular version, below, has been seen everywhere in recent years (including thousands of miles away at Santiago Pride 2008 in Chile). Obviously, it’s called the Pink Jack. It’s the sort of idea that is so obvious you wonder why you didn’t think of it first. The man who did think of it first was David Gwinnutt, an artist and photographer from London who thought that the Rainbow flag was too American. He wanted to create something that said gay and British. In 2005 he created the first Pink Jack for an art exhibition about sexuality. Later that year he carried his flag at several Pride events and he began to manufacture all kinds of Pink Jack merchandise. Just like every other flag, there is no copyright on flag designs and he was happy to let the community adopt it in great numbers.

Olympic Countdown

Before I talk about the sporting achievements at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City was have to look at the one of the blackest incidents in Olympic history.

Long before the Salt Lake City games began they were surrounded in scandal. The city had been awarded the games in 1995, but in 1998 it was revealed that the leaders of the city’s bid committee had offered gifts (and possibly bribes) to IOC members in return for votes. Very quickly the bid committee leaders resigned, followed by many more, and 4 independent investigations began. Even though the bid leaders were charged with bribery and fraud by the US Department of Justice, they were acquitted in December 2003.

The scandal shook and shocked the IOC. Many voices within the organisation were critical of the way this was allowed to happen and called for a complete change in the voting rules. Among the leading voices of discontent was former Olympic champion Mark Tewksbury. He resigned from his position on the IOC Athlete Representative committee in protest, and was supported by many other Olympic athletes who thought the same.

The IOC took a serious look at their rules and drew up a new set that restricted future bid committees and voting members from dealing in “gifts”. The Salt Lake City games were given a new organising committee and they took on the additional responsibility of rebuilding trust and confidence. Putting the scandal behind them the committee succeeded in producing what was one of the most successful (and most profitable) games.

The lgbt contingent in 2002 was led by Chris Witty, who won the gold medal and a world record in the 1 km speed skating event. Next comes Dutch speed skater Renate Groenewold in her Olympic debut. She won the silver in the 3 km event. Renate’s compatriot Marieke Wijsman could only reach 17^th place in her event.

In the women’s ice hockey competition the Swedish team won the bronze medal. Team members included Erika Holst and Ylva Lindberg, who both came out as lesbian in 2006.

Finally on the ice was Canadian figure skater Emanuel Sandhu. Emanuel had never reached lower that 2^nd place since his first Canadian championships in 1997, and this would have qualified him for the previous winter Olympics in Nagano but he wasn’t selected. In Lillehammer he was forced to withdraw with an injury.

Out on the slopes, in both senses, was Norway’s Vibeke Skofterud. Having started cross-country skiing competitively in 1999 she didn’t win any medals until the 2003 World Championships. In Salt Lake City her highest place was 8^th, just qualifying for an Olympic diploma.

Still out on the slopes was Swedish Alpine skier Anja Pärson making her debut. She would go on to win more medals than any other female lgbt Olympian, 6 in all, but only one gold. In Salt Lake City Anja won a silver and a bronze. And in part this was thanks to gay American Nat Brown, who was ski technician to the Swedish and German teams. He had previously coached the US team at the 1988 Calgary Olympics.

Before the nest Olympics in the summer of 2004 the IOC made their first proper ruling on transgender athletes. The rule stated that an athlete’s gender at birth should not be a bar to being accepted as a competitor in any sport as a different gender. Although it was very long way from stating at which point during transition would the reassigned gender be recognised, it was still more recognition than was then being given by other sports organisations.

In my next Olympic post we return to the home of the ancient games and the 2004 games in Greece.

For more, official, information on the Games go to www.london2012.com