I don’t see any failure at all, not in the slightest. With the unwavering determination to be himself and living life on his own terms, being a hero and role model to millions of young gays will always be a perfect score.
Shirl, it’s actually very important. In a better world, it wouldn’t be, but in our world, it certainly is.
Most lesbian and gay sportspeople are in the closet. This deprives many lesbian and gay children, who could be good at sport, of role models, and gives the false impression that you need to be hetero to be good at sport.
Not only does it give that impression to lesbian and gay children, who need positive role models, but it gives that impression to everyone, confirming inaccurate stereotypes.
It is so important for lesbian and gay people to “come out” and show how mainstream we are, so we can stop living in the shadows. It is all the more important for celebrities such as Matthew Mitcham to do so, because they can have a powerful impact with challenging invisibility and stereotypes.
He is a hero. And has paid for it with lack of commercial sponsorship, sadly. I wish there were more LGBT sportspeople like him we could be proud of. What a great guy, and an inspiration.
At least gay athletes like Matthew Mitcham are raising the profile of gay people on the world stage. While I wonder how our athletes performed at the Gay Games in Budapest, it is nice to see the gold medal haul at the Olympics and it is nice to see gay athletes who are able to compete with other athletes on a par. Tonight the Olympic Flame will be extinguished but we still have the Paralympics to look forward to. Here we will see true heroes who have overcome their disabilities to compete in the Games and it will be interesting to hear any gay stories from the Paralympics.
The next Gay Games will be in Cleveland, Ohio, USA in August 2014
Matthew Mitchum and other Olympians will likely be there as they get free entry as part of the “From Games to Games” initiative announced by the Federation of Gay Games at Pride House 2012 during the Olympics in London.
His stream of tweets has been one of the highlights of twitter during these games, and hes not just a great role model hes a really nice guy as well- hope he makes it to Rio- especially as he said on ABC last night he will lose his funding after these games and will have to get a job.
To Rio 2016 and beyond, we will be supporting you, Matthew. Your coming out and success are admirable. It is an inspiration for struggling gay youth. WE’ll stick with you in team pink till the end, M&M.
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Just as long as he keeps doing something that leads to lots of shirtless photos, I’ll be happy!
I don’t see any failure at all, not in the slightest. With the unwavering determination to be himself and living life on his own terms, being a hero and role model to millions of young gays will always be a perfect score.
Who cares if he is Gay or not for G-d’s sake. What has his sexual preference got to do with anything.
He’s a damned good diver, he seems like a very nice person, that’s all that counts
Shirl, it’s actually very important. In a better world, it wouldn’t be, but in our world, it certainly is.
Most lesbian and gay sportspeople are in the closet. This deprives many lesbian and gay children, who could be good at sport, of role models, and gives the false impression that you need to be hetero to be good at sport.
Not only does it give that impression to lesbian and gay children, who need positive role models, but it gives that impression to everyone, confirming inaccurate stereotypes.
It is so important for lesbian and gay people to “come out” and show how mainstream we are, so we can stop living in the shadows. It is all the more important for celebrities such as Matthew Mitcham to do so, because they can have a powerful impact with challenging invisibility and stereotypes.
He is a hero. And has paid for it with lack of commercial sponsorship, sadly. I wish there were more LGBT sportspeople like him we could be proud of. What a great guy, and an inspiration.
At least gay athletes like Matthew Mitcham are raising the profile of gay people on the world stage. While I wonder how our athletes performed at the Gay Games in Budapest, it is nice to see the gold medal haul at the Olympics and it is nice to see gay athletes who are able to compete with other athletes on a par. Tonight the Olympic Flame will be extinguished but we still have the Paralympics to look forward to. Here we will see true heroes who have overcome their disabilities to compete in the Games and it will be interesting to hear any gay stories from the Paralympics.
The EuroGames were held in Budapest this year.
The next Gay Games will be in Cleveland, Ohio, USA in August 2014
Matthew Mitchum and other Olympians will likely be there as they get free entry as part of the “From Games to Games” initiative announced by the Federation of Gay Games at Pride House 2012 during the Olympics in London.
For more info about the 2014 Gay Games see http://www.gg9cle.com
For more info about Games2Games see http://gaymes.info/games2games
His stream of tweets has been one of the highlights of twitter during these games, and hes not just a great role model hes a really nice guy as well- hope he makes it to Rio- especially as he said on ABC last night he will lose his funding after these games and will have to get a job.
Sorry that you didn’t follow up your success in Beijing, Matthew. Before you know it you will be going for gold in Rio, 2016.
To Rio 2016 and beyond, we will be supporting you, Matthew. Your coming out and success are admirable. It is an inspiration for struggling gay youth. WE’ll stick with you in team pink till the end, M&M.
He seems a great guy and he is a good role model for younger LGBT people especially LGBT sports people. We need more people like him.
This is such good news . He can only get better now and learn from his experience.
Go Matthew, go. We love you.
A wise decision, Matt, don’t give up you will get to where you want to be. Keep on keeping on :-) You will make it gold in Rio.