thinkprogress.org — Australian Olympic diver Matthew Mitcham is the only male gay athlete.Yesterday, Mitcham won the gold in the in the 10m platform diving event, scoring an upset over the Chinese team, which was heavily favored to win. But as Maggie Hendricks at Yahoo’s Olympics blog notes, NBC never mentioned Mitcham’s orientation
Aug 24, 2008 View in Crawl 4
liahAug 24, 2008
Damn, why the hell do the good looking ones have to be gay? He's cute.Either way, I don't understand why they would be required to point out his (or anyone's) sexual orientation.
Closed AccountAug 25, 2008
You have clearly not met the new breed of metrosexual then.I can just picture you in shock as all these gay-acting men get all the beautiful models.
citizengeek2006Aug 26, 2008
The point is not that NBC didn't mention his orientation, it's that they doctored his biographical details in order to omit the fact that he's gay. THAT'S THE PROBLEM. Did the vast majority of Digg members commenting on this article even READ it?!
mercurychaosAug 29, 2008
No one was asking them to say anything like that. If you'd actually read the article, you'd see that he got a grant so that his mother and life partner could attend the event and watch him win the gold - if he had been a straight man, and gotten a grant for his wife to come, I'm sure they would've mentioned it.
mercurychaosAug 29, 2008
"It'd be like pointing out that Bolt was black, when it was plainly obvious that he was"The thing is that it's *not* "plainly obvious" when someone's gay, which is why young GLBT people have so few well-known role models. If they'd simply mentioned that his mother and life-partner came from Australia to watch him compete, it would've been sufficient - there's nothing strange about mentioning the winner's family if they attended.
mercurychaosAug 29, 2008
No, there isn't. But I think it is customary (or at least, not usual) to make some mention of the winner's family if they were there, and his mother and life partner came to watch him compete. If he'd been straight and it had been his *wife*, it would more likely have been included. And the fact is that unless it is otherwise stated, people will assume that everyone out their is straight - so unless it's mentioned. GLBT young people won't have many role models who are like them.