Perspectives

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Levelling the Playing Field for LGBT Athletes

The opening matches of the Six Nations rugby championship this week offered the latest occasion to see our athletic heroes compete at sport’s highest level. It also heralded the start of another major sport competition without open LGBT athletes. By even the most conservative estimates, there could be close to a dozen LGBT athletes in this competition – a small percentage still of the total number of LGBT athletes in sport – yet they remain invisible heroes on the field of play. This lack of visibility and acceptance are problems across sport where discrimination lingers and perpetuates an environment out […]

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The Delicate Dance of Fighting for Equality Overseas

A recent article in The New York Times, “U.S. Support of Gay Rights in Africa May Have Done More Harm Than Good,” has prompted a great deal of discussion among those engaged in international advocacy on the human rights of LGBT people. Despite the “may have,” in the headline, the reporter seems to have concluded that U.S. engagement has indeed been harmful on balance and makes a selective, one-sided case in support of that proposition. Still, the challenge discussed in the article is real. It’s something we advocates constantly consider and navigate as we work to protect the human rights […]

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Campus Pride and Athlete Ally Launch Groundbreaking Sports Inclusion Project

  Campus Pride and Athlete Ally announced Wednesday the launch of the Sports Inclusion Project, (SportsInclusion.org), a first-of-its-kind effort that will work toward lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) inclusion in college athletics and recreational sports on college campuses. The multi-year project will focus on all levels of college athletics and participation within recreational sports, setting a national standard of LGBT-inclusion in sports policies, programs, and practices. Throughout 2016, Campus Pride and Athlete Ally will work with college athletic and sports recreation programs to survey their internal policies, programs, and climate. In 2017, the project will culminate in a groundbreaking […]

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Stop Neglecting the True State of LGBT Refugees

  In December 2011, President Obama published a trailblazing memorandum vowing to apply U.S. power to create safety for LGBT people oppressed and endangered around the world. Among the key means: securing LGBT refugees’ access to the U.S. refugee system. This venerable goal is eluding us. As the president delivers his final State of the Union address tonight, the perils facing LGBT people in many countries around the world have never been so dire. Never have so many LGBT people been so viciously targeted by state and nonstate actors in so many countries. Never before have leaders outside the U.S. […]

How We Leveled The Playing Field: Ten Athletes Whose Courage To Come Out Scored Big For The Cause

  Despite a smattering of high-profile sports figures who’ve come out as gay, homophobia remains a major hurdle in athletics. The good news? The dial has finally started to move, and while change may be coming slowly, it’s irrefutably on its way. Martina Navratilova — 1981 ESPN credits the Czech tennis pro, who came out as bisexual in 1981, with having “expanded the dialogue on issues of gender and sexuality in sports.” “Martina was the first legitimate superstar who literally came out while she was a superstar,” Donna Lopiano, executive director of the Women’s Sports Foundation, said. “She exploded the barrier by […]

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How Homophobia Is Hurting Our Nation’s Foster Children

This week, our nation turns to celebrate the 20th anniversary of National Adoption Month. It’s a time of year marked with an annual proclamation by our president, special events, family gatherings and mass adoption finalizations. Television and radio programs will burst with stories both heartwarming and horrifying in an effort to draw attention to the glaring need to find homes for the 400,000 children that linger, on average, for nearly two years in the foster care system. As someone who’s lectured at the university level about this system, of which I am a product, I have to admit that I’ve […]

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Boxer Who Claimed He Was Drugged In Gay Porn Comes Out As Bisexual

  Professional boxer Yusaf Mack claimed last week that he was drugged and forced into doing a gay porn. Now, he has admitted that he did it by choice and says that he is bisexual. Mack, 35, released a statement on Monday where he retracted previous allegations of being drugged when he made a film with two other men called “Holiday Hump’n.” In the statement, which was initially posted by gossip site TheShadeRoom.com, Mack explains why he claimed to be drugged when he made the film last June. I want to address a few situations with the first being the […]

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Lenny Dykstra Claims He Blackmailed Closeted Umps and Others

  Former New York Mets and Philadelphia Phillies outfielder Lenny Dykstra said that he hired private investigators to dig up dirt on umpires in order to pressure the umpires to call a smaller strike zone and consequently give him more walks. In an interview Tuesday with Fox’s Colin Cowherd on “The Herd,” Dykstra revealed that in 1993, investigators were given a budget of $500,000 to turn up information on umpires that he could then use to strong-arm the umps into calling a more favorable strike zone for him. “Their blood’s just as red as ours,” Dykstra said, as quoted in […]

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Brewers Minor-Leaguer Makes Baseball History By Coming Out Publicly As Gay

For so long, David Denson desperately wanted to reveal to his baseball teammates that he is gay. He just never envisioned it happening in such impromptu and unstructured fashion. A first baseman for the Milwaukee Brewers’ rookie affiliate in Helena, Mont., Denson had just entered the clubhouse a month or so ago when a teammate jokingly referred to him using a derogatory term for a gay male. It was the kind of profane, politically incorrect banter heard in that environment since team sports have been around. That teammate had no way of knowing Denson actually is gay, but the 20-year-old […]

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Black Colleges: Stop Discriminating Against LGBT

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Life is not easy for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) students at the nation’s 105 Historically Black Colleges and Universities, where the subject of same-gender-loving people and lifestyles remains largely taboo. The reality is that most black colleges have not accepted sexual identity diversity as an issue with which they need to be concerned. A number of reasons have been suggested — among these, a level of social and religious conservatism within the black community. Whereas nearly all majority institutions long ago developed programming and institutional support systems to ensure that same-gender-loving persons are able to live authentically, only […]

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