Our LGBTQI culture needs to be celebrated
There’s an elephant in the room…and we need to talk about it. The LGBTI community has a long playing, coaching and administering association with the female side of our national game but it’s verging on a taboo subject.
No one wants to confront and embrace the LGBTI people, and their partners, that are involved in our game- and this is a critical time for the issue.
With a women’s national league on the horizon, and a marriage equality plebiscite potentially looming; we need to talk about the elephant in the room and embrace, publically and privately, all aspects of the LGBTI community and culture.
Yes, this is personal. There is a strong undercurrent of passion involved in writing this, and I don’t believe I should write with the complete absence of emotion that underscores much in the journalistic field.
What needs to exist with this hint of passion is reason- and it is important that the points, experiences and questions confronted here are tackled with accentuated reason that allows those not in the context to reconcile this issue for themselves.
Not only is this subject a taboo subject within the women’s footy realm, but it is an issue still confronting society today, despite increased acceptance levels.
Same-sex attracted Australians have 14 times higher self-harm attempts than heterosexual individuals, while 24.4% of LGB people experience a major depressive episode in a year- compared to 6.8% for the rest of the population1.
This is alarming. One can’t help but think that the fact it isn’t legal for gay people to get married still has something to do with this.
The fact that gay marriage isn’t legal sends a dangerous message to young people that they aren’t equal to others, and that their love or choice isn’t good enough: leading to many to try and conceal who they really are- a dangerous precedent.
While women attending the Brownlow not as arm candy, but as a footballer in their own rights, is an incredible step; it remains to be seen how the AFL world will embrace a lesbian player and her partner- of which there are many.
Perhaps the AFL would be concerned with the media spin focusing on the sexual preference of a player, rather than footballing prowess. It’s a confronting dynamic, imagining two women, arm in arm, arriving to an AFL sanctioned event.
It isn’t a simple case of the AFL, VWFL, SANFL, WAFL and similar all acknowledging and accepting the big influence LGBTI people have on the female game- a culture has to be fostered where individuals struggling with their sexuality have to be comfortable to be who they are.
I’ve hid who Iam before. Not because I didn’t have a loving, accepting family- but because I wasn’t loving and accepting of myself.
To some, I fit a gay label very neatly- but in my own mind I couldn’t believe it.
The struggle becomes trying to find a label for yourself to fit into a cultural dynamic- but as an athlete the need to provide material to media gives a sense of embarrassment because the general ethos was that being gay wasn’t talked about.
I’ve lied, I’ve searched for answers at the bottom of a glass, I’ve spent time in hospital beds and I’ve spent time in wonderful long-term relationships with women that have made my life incredible.
Why did I have to spend incredibly dark days in a hospital room to reconcile with who I was, and allow myself to be in a happy and stable relationship with a woman?
At grassroots level, the amount of acceptance for LGBTI people is extraordinary. It permeates every line from administration, to coaching, to the players themselves. In this sense, they aren’t the minority group- I, and players around me, always felt a sense of inclusion in the team environment.
So why can’t we talk about it? Will it take legalising gay marriage to allow women to thank their girlfriends when they receive a Best and Fairest medal, or talking to the media about who has influenced and supported them ahead of the Draft game?
There was some very important research done around this exact topic in 2014, commissioned by the Bingham Cup- the World Cup of gay rugby; and it was called Out on the Fields.2 The study included over 3000 Australians, and 9500 world-wide.
Remarkably, 70% believe youth team sport (<22 years) is not safe for gays; with 75% of lesbians in this youth environment either partially or full in the closet for fear of discrimination from officials or other players.
Essentially teenagers, already at the most vulnerable parts of their life, are afraid to be who they are- and rightly so as the report highlighted that 84% were subjected to verbal slurs (ie dyke, faggot).
Society is becoming more accepting, but footballers don’t feel any safer. Girls are coming through the Youth Girls Championships, through leagues around Australia confused about who they should be- because there is no role model put forward by the AFL that embraces homosexuality.
The AFL picked two incredibly talented women to showcase the women’s game at the Brownlow- and everyone around Australia collectively smiled at how far we come.
I’m not satisfied. If these statistics ring true- there are teenagers everywhere struggling with mental health, self-harm, substance abuse, sexuality- because their biggest role models on the national stage aren’t talking about the girls who stand beside them.
We need an Alex Blackwell.
If you aren’t familiar with the name, she is perhaps one of the greatest female cricketers our nation has ever produced. Not only is she a decorated player with over 200 international matches to her name; she is a qualified doctor and anatomy professor (although she now focuses on cricket) and most importantly, a passionate LGBTI advocate.
She made it her personal mission to stand up and say- I don’t care if administration isn’t comfortable with this, I’m gay and I need people to know that it’s okay and that they shouldn’t have to hide it.
She marched in Mardi Gras with Sydney Swans players, Olympians, fellow team-mates, and told the world of the love she has for her now-wife, Lynsey Askew (herself an International player for England).
She spoke of a crushing moment where she was told that the fewer lesbians in the team, the better. I have previously been told, as the coach of an underage representative team, that the parents held some concerns about me because I had a girlfriend. For someone that was barely comfortable with it themselves, this was an agonising blow.
It’s not okay. We can’t sweep this under the rug- because as a very important once said: “The standard you walk past is the standard you accept.” Cate McGregor, the highest ranked transgender in the army, wrote those words. Boy, do they ring true.
Alex and Cate are trailblazers, and women’s footy- a sport that is bursting at the seams with talent, potential and future opportunities- needs one too.
Why are we lagging behind cricket and other sports on this issue? Because we aren’t talking about it. It is the elephant in the room; the taboo in AFL circles.
So let me finish with this. Don’t accept homophobia around you; don’t accept that it is just the way it is if you are told not to talk about it.
If you aren’t sure of who you are, allow all your emotions to surface instead of cornering yourself and forcing a label you aren’t ready for.
Be yourself, love yourself- and refuse to accept the terms that media and society places upon you to keep who you are under wraps.
I’m now proud to write that Iam gay.
Are you?
References
1 Leonard, W. et al. (2012) Private Lives 2: The second national survey of the health and wellbeing of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (GLBT) Australians, Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health and Society, LaTrobe University, Melbourne.
2 Out on the Fields is a study conducted for the public domain and the full report (or abridged versions and infographics) is available at www.outonthefields.com
