Video Time 2: What's Love Got To Do With It?

All Out have made a predictably stupid and pukey video imagining What If A Gay Olympian Won At Sochi?
Well, I guess they've gotta spend all that money they get on something.
"The Russian government just made it a crime for gay people to show their love in public", the video claims, falsely.
All Out's press release admits this claim is untrue - or rather says it is "unclear" ie it's not what the new propaganda law actually says.
When there are so many anti-gay things going on in Russia, why say you're against something that hasn't happened?
The video imagines a female ice-skater who gets a gold medal but can't kiss her girlfriend in celebration.
Imagine if a gay man won an Olympic gold medal and thanked and embraced his boyfriend!
Just like Matthew Mitcham did in 2008, you mean?
US TV networks edited out all mentions of his then boyfriend, Lachlan Fletcher.
And what reassurance is the trite title and message here, Love Always Wins, when gay and bisexual men are being beaten up after being found through gay sex sites on the internet?
Similarly the new law against "propaganda of non-traditional sexual relations to minors" - and the rhetoric behind it - seems most concerned with propagating the myth that gay men prey on kids.
It is a grave tactical error to reduce this campaign to gay love, when Russian homophobes keep going on about gay SEX.
If we base our arguments on mendacity, tomfoolery, and most of all on prudery - and willingly submitting to our castration as gay men - they have won.

Remember: If you think this short film is a load of silly old sentimental wank that only serves Western power, that means you DON'T CARE and are WORSE THAN HITLER!
All Out believe there is "an anti-gay war waging in Russia" right now.
Well, it's always good to keep things in perspective.
And if history has shown us there's one sure-fire way to stop a war, it's by asking people to click on an e-petition.
Or alternatively why not ask some celebrities to wear a crappy t-shirt?
That'll learn 'em!

PS Human Rights Campaign - America's largest/wealthiest gay organisation - has come up with the inspired "campaign" to get famous Americans to support LGBT Russians by wearing a t-shirt.
HRC have been given $3 million to spread the gay word across the world.
Scott Long writes on HRC and the Vulture Fund: Making Third World poverty pay for LGBT rights.

Matthew Mitcham: Crystal Myths

AUSTRALIAN 10-metre platform diver Matt Mitcham says he battled a methamphetamine addiction in 2011 that almost derailed his career and his life, but the 2008 Beijing gold medallist will be free to compete on future Australian Olympic teams. 
In a book to be released on Monday, ``Twists and Turns,'' Mitcham reveals his battle with low self-esteem, anxiety and depression, panic attacks and repeated self-harm as a teenager, which helped begin his dependence on crystal meth... 

The Australian (and all gay media).

Now, far be it from me to accuse Matthew Mitcham of making this up just cause she's got a book to sell, but it does seem odd that his "addiction" to crystal never showed up in any of the random and frequent drug tests professional athletes have to undergo. 
Still, if I was a minor celebrity gayer, and was trying to make my rather dull, bourgeois and vanilla life sound interesting I'd probably make up a story about how "I battled a Tina addiction", too.
Like what that Rufus "My In-No-Way-Made-Up Drugs Hell" Wainwright did...

Olympics: Those Out Gay Athletes In Full

1. Carl Hester, British equestrian.
2. Matthew Mitcham, Australian diver.
3. Err, that's it.

According to OutSports.

OutSports say they also know of 19 female athetes who are out:
Marilyn Agliotti (Netherlands, field hockey); Judith Arndt (Germany, cycling); Seimone Augustus (U.S., basketball); Natalie Cook (Australia, beach volleyball); Lisa Dahlkvist (Sweden, soccer); Carlien Dirkse van den Heuvel (Netherlands, field hockey); Imke Duplitzer (Germany, fencing); Edward Gal (Netherlands, equestrian); Jessica Harrison (France, triathlon); Alexandra Lacrabère (France, handball); Jessica Landström (Sweden, soccer); Hedvig Lindahl (Sweden, soccer); Maartje Paumen (Netherlands, field hockey); Carole Péon (France, triathlon); Mayssa Pessoa (Brazil, handball); Megan Rapinoe (U.S. soccer); Lisa Raymond (U.S., doubles tennis); Rikke Skov (Denmark, handball); Ina-Yoko Teutenberg (Germany, cycling).

11,000 athletes are competing in the London Olympics.
This suggests only 1 in 520 is out.
Or 1 in 3,000 men.

• Carl Hester is interviewed in the current issue of Attitude.

Matthew Mitcham: The Colour Of His Hair

"I certainly don't see [being gay] as a burden, I never did, especially with how much attention the LGBT [lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered] cause has been getting lately with marriage equality … and with how few openly gay sports stars there are around at the moment. ''I don't mind attention being put on it.
''Ideally I would like one day for sexuality to be as unimportant and uninteresting as hair colour, or eye colour or even just gender in general. One day it will get to that.
''But until it is easy for sports people to come out without fear of persecution or fear of lost sponsorship income and stuff like that, or fear of being comfortable in the team environment, I don't mind attention being brought to my sexuality in the hope that it might make other people feel more comfortable … in being comfortable enough about who they are in their sporting environment.''

Matthew Mitcham interviewed by the Sydney Morning Herald. 
I wonder if any other divers in this year's Olympics is gay?
Can't think of one.

Fagburn Awards 2: Sports Personalities Of The Year

1= Max Brick & Tom Daley.

Fagburn doesn't care about you, but he has always thought that the only sport that really matters is the Diving 10 Metres Platform Synchro.
Our boys won gold medals at it at something called the Commonwealth Games this year.
Well done, lads.
It was very much a joint effort - it had to be.
Though some papers ran profiles of the adorable (official!) Tom Daley afterwards that wrote Max Brick out of the story.
Even though the same newspaper had run "ironic" Pass Notes about Max Brick two weeks before about how every newspaper kept writing Max out of this story.
Tom Daley - Fagburn loved the moving backstory about you and your wonderfully supportive dad and his battle with cancer, and your own battle with school bullies.
Max Brick - we love you just as much and your own battle with a silly blinkered media-driven world where two become one.
Kudos to you, young sir.

3. Matthew Mitcham - Also a diver. Australian. Gay. Adorable.

4. That cute Portugese one who plays the footyball.

Tom Daley: Golden Boy

"When Rob Daley gate-crashed a press conference given by his champion-diver son Tom and asked, "Tom, can you come and give me a cuddle please", teens around the globe cringed in empathy with a clearly embarrassed Tom while grannies went "Aaah". In a good-natured, poignant film, Jane Treays explores the relationship between father and son. The pair are extremely close; they have fun, make daft jokes and enjoy each other's company... Treays films Rob ferrying his son to and from school, and to competitions, where the handsome young swimmer is a big hit with hordes of teenage girls - and grannies, of course."
Radio Times previews Tom Daley: The Diver and His Dad on BBC1 tonight.
Sounds unmissable, doesn't it?
This morning Tom Daley won a gold medal in something called the men's 10m synchro platform at the Commonwealth Games.
Well done, Tom.
He also now has his own all-singing, all-diving website tomdaley.tv - Tom says he'd like to be a TV presenter.
And tomorrow, in what looks like a match made in heaven, Tom is up against Matthew Mitcham in Delhi.
Mitcham - a friend of Dorothy and a friend of Tom Daley - won a gold medal at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, thus proving that gay men can do sport, even if gay men are only any good at one sport - diving.
Can't wait.

Matthew Mitcham: And Tonight Matthew's Going To Be...

An article appeared on Guardian Online earlier this evening; 'Gay Games in Cologne set to welcome 10,000 competitors'.
"Around 10,000 gay and lesbian athletes from around the globe are expected to descend on the western German city of Cologne tomorrow to participate in the international Gay Games," Kate Connolly reports.
She also tells us; "The Australian Olympic gymnast Matthew Mitcham, who won a gold medal at the Beijing Olympics in 2008 and is one of the few major athletes to have ever come out, will open the event."
Matthew Mitcham is not a gymnast, he's a diver.
Everybody makes mistakes - Fagburn probably does it on a daily basis - but considering the article's subject matter and seeing as Matthew is indeed one of the few major athletes to have ever come out - and went on to win an Olympic gold medal winner to boot - it's pretty insulting to get the sport that he excels at wrong.
Oops.