With all of the progress seen in society as a direct result of sports, the gay community has not yet been embraced. Thinking back to Jesse Owens stand against Adolf Hitler, Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier and even the work Title IX has done for promoting female athletes, no real connection has been made with the LGBT community.
Gymnast Josh Dixon joins a short list of Olympians who have come out publicly. He did so in an interview with Outsports over the weekend. While he would like to be judged purely as a gymnast that is a reality he will have to prove on the gym floor rather than with the press. Dixon has linked himself to this identity, and he will be held up as an example if he succeeds.
Dixon, a Stanford alumnus, grew up in a diverse household. He and his two sisters were adopted, and he believes the level of comfort he had at home allowed him to never have an issue with his sexual orientation. When he originally began talking about this he did not expect to have added expectations, but his success has added pressure to the issue.
Dixon finished second out of over seventy athletes competing for spots on the U.S. Gymnastics team for the London games set to take place at the end of the summer. The final auditions will take place in June as the U.S. men’s team gets set to compete against the rest of the world. The men have not won a medal in the team competition since they took gold in Los Angeles in 1984. Dixon hopes to change that.
Will Dixon be able to shine in London as the pioneer for the gay community in sports? There is definitely a homophobic attitude that runs through the sports sector of society and its fans. Kobe Bryant’s slur tells us that there is still work to do in this area.
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