Wednesday, September 14, 2016
Already three individual medals for out LGBT Paralympians in Rio
Out LGBT Paralympians have already won medals across three different sports, hailing from three different countries.
From: OutSports
From: OutSports
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| Marieke Vervoort celebrates her silver medal for Belgium. Warren Little/Getty Images |
Publicly out LGBT athletes at the Paralympics in Rio are already continuing the winning tradition of the out Olympians weeks before them, bringing home lots of medals.
With team competitions still to be resolved, and various individual events still to come, publicly out athletes have already won three medals, including one of each color. They have also been across three different sports and from three different countries.
Half of the dozen gay, lesbian and bisexual athletes we know about in this year's Paralympics are on teams from the United States whose results are not yet fully known, so we anticipate the number of medals to dramatically increase. We'll track their medal performances here.
So far, here are the medal winners:
GOLD
Megan Giglia
Great Britain
Cycling
Won Great Britain's first gold of these Paralympics
SILVER
Marieke Vervoort
Belgium
Wheelchair Racing
Took the silver in the women's 400-meter.
BRONZE
Moran Samuel
Israel
Rowing
Won bronze in women's single sculls
This Trailer For The 2016 Paralympics Will Take Your Breath Away
"There are more disabled people in [this] one advert than in the whole history of British advertising altogether.From: NewNowNext
UK’s Channel 4 released a trailer for the Paralympics, an international multi-sport event that features athletes with a range of physical disabilities, and it is filled to the brim with jaw-dropping talent.
140 different people with disabilities are featured in the video and are shown competing, dancing or simply brushing their teeth, all while filling the screen with passion and positivity.
The song featured in the trailer, Sammy Davis Jr.’s “Yes I Can,” is performed by Tony Dee, who went viral after his wife posted a video of his singing on YouTube.
“We wanted to say any disabled person can be a superhuman,” Dan Brooke, the man responsible for putting the ad together, told The Guardian. “You have everyday people doing amazing things. There are more disabled people in [this] one advert than in the whole history of British advertising altogether.”
Check out the eye-opening trailer for the 2016 Paralympic Games below.
Out Equestrian Lee Pearson Represented Team GB At Paralympics Opening Ceremony
"I never dreamed that the athletes would vote for me," said Pearson. "It genuinely is a privilege."
From: NewNowNext
From: NewNowNext
Out equestrian Lee Pearson was a flag bearer for Great Britain at the opening ceremony of the Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro.
Its the fifth games for the 42-year-old, who has won three gold medals to date. He was nominated for the position by the 264 other Paralympians on Team GB.
“I think that’s why I’m so proud of my fellow athletes,” he told the Telegraph. “To vote a gay bloke to be in that position to lead them out through that tunnel and out into the Paralympic Games is an amazing honour. What an amazing nation we have – we’ve got so many diverse characters, different religions and races.”
“[It] means we’ve moved on even further when people don’t give it any thought,” he added. “I don’t want them to think ’oh, he’s a gay bloke, let’s give him a chance.’ I want them to think ’he’s a nice bloke, who has done what he’s done for the country in previous Games’.”
Considering it rude to vote for himself, he deleted the nomination email and was surprised to learn he had been selected.
“I literally never gave it any more thought. I thought that’s nice to be nominated, but I never dreamed that the athletes would vote for me… It genuinely is a privilege.”
The 2016 Summer Games were the most LGBT-friendly in history, with more than 40 out athletes and several marriage proposals.
Olympic field hockey player Kate Richardson-Walsh, who is married to her teammate Helen Richardson-Walsh, became the first openly gay athlete to carry the British flag at an Olympic ceremony, at the closing events in Maracanรฃ Stadium.
The Paralympics opening ceremony will also took place in Maracanรฃ.
Lesbian Paralympian Considering Euthanasia After Rio Games
"Rio is my last wish."From: NewNowNext
The 37-year-old wheelchair sprinter, who won a gold and silver in London, opened up about the pain of her incurable disease and her desire to end her life to RTL radio.
“I will stop my career after [the] Rio [Paralympics],” she said. “After, we shall see what life brings for me. I’ve started thinking about euthanasia—Rio is my last wish.”
“Everybody sees me laugh with my gold medal,” she told French newspaper Le Parisien, “but no one sees the dark side.”
“I suffer greatly,” she continued, “sometimes sleeping only ten minutes a night—still, I go for the gold.”
In July, Vervoort revealed the dark side of her disease in an online blog post.
“Fortunately I had a better night even though I had a moment of crisis for about 45 minutes,” she wrote.
“With me this morning, it felt like I had slept only an hour, but that was not the case. My body is just exhausted. I let the nurse give me a shot of morphine and this morning went purely on character to the training.”
The athlete also shared plans for her funeral, which she hopes will be a joyful celebration of her life and achievements.
“My funeral, it’s not going to be in a church,” she remarked.
“It’s not going to be with some coffee and some cake. But I want everybody to have a glass of champagne and to say, ‘Cheers, Marieke. All the best. You had a good life. Now you are in a better place.’”
Euthanasia has been legal in Belgium since 2002 and can take place with the written consent of three doctors.
Paralympian falls, gets back up after dropping torch in Opening Ceremony
From: NBC Sports
In an inspirational sequence, Marcia Malsar fell and dropped her torch, got back up and finished her relay leg during the Rio Paralympic Opening Ceremony.
Most eyes in the Maracanรฃ were on Malsar, a four-time 1980s Paralympic track medalist for Brazil who reportedly has cerebral palsy, as she carried the Olympic flame in the rain during the final stages of the torch relay.
Malsar had a torch in her left hand and her cane in her right.
When she fell, aides rushed toward her. Malsar got up and, after the initial help of those aides, finished her leg to hand off to the penultimate torch bearer.
The large crowd in the iconic stadium roared with applause.
Team USA Paralympic flag bearer Allison Jones is LGBT and married
Allison Jones carried the flag for Team USA in the Opening Ceremony of the Paralympics in Rio as an out and proud woman. She carries the hopes of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans community with her.
From: OutSports
From: OutSports
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| Allison Jones of the USA rides celebrates her bronze medal at the London 2012 Paralympic Games. Bryn Lennon/Getty Images |
Allison Jones, the athlete selected as the flag bearer for Team USA in the 2016 Paralympic Opening Ceremony in Rio, is an out LGBT woman.
Jones is married to her wife, Sara Jarrell, which she proudly displays on her Facebook page. The two were married in 2014, according to her Team USA profile, and live together in Colorado Springs.
This will be Jones' eighth Paralympics, and it may be her last. She has already won eight Paralympic medals, including two golds. In the Winter Paralympic Games she competes as a skier.
"Being able to consider ending my Paralympic career with this honor is just amazing," Jones told U.S. Paralympics. "Only one person gets chosen out of almost 300 hundred athletes on the team. That enough people believed in me, my story and my legacy, it's just a real honor."
Israeli lesbian rower Moran Samuel set to be a force in Paralympics
Moran Samuel, a 2015 World Rowing Champion, hopes to bring gold back home for her wife and Team Israel.
From: OutSports
From: OutSports
Openly lesbian Israeli rower Moran Samuel is a force to be reckoned with in the 2016 Paralympic Games in Rio.
Samuel plans to contend for medals in the women's arms and shoulders single sculls event. In 2012, she burst onto the scene with an impressive fifth place victory at the London Paralympic games. She was just one second shy of a bronze medal.
"I was a very young rower in London," Samuel said. "I didn't have the experience of training and competitions that I have now. I did the best race I could do there, and I plan to do the same in Rio."
With her trademark determination, Moran then trained steadily at the Daniel Rowing Center in Tel Aviv with laser focus on reaching the 2016 Paralympic Games. She earned a berth to the games by winning the 2015 World Rowing Championships in Lac d'Aiguebelette, France.
Moran is now in Rio with her wife, Limor Samuel Goldberg, and their six-month old son, Arad. While balancing the demands of motherhood and an Olympic training schedule are challenging, the family pulls this off with admirable teamwork.
"Limor comes from this world of sport, being a swimmer in her past and working now for the Israeli Paralympic committee, so she understands my needs and can support me," Samuel said.
Even her young son helps out in his own way.
"Arad is an amazing baby. He knows I need to sleep well so I can perform my best," Samuel laughed.
In the months leading up to Rio the family lived in a one-bedroom apartment in Italy while Moran trained on Lake Varese. She credits her success with being dedicated to success.
"When I am at home I give 100% to my family, and when I train I do the same," Samuel said. "There are limited resources so I have learned to focus on something and not get distracted."
Rowing was not Moran's first love. Before her rowing career, she was a standout member of the Israeli National Women's Basketball team. In 2006, at the age of 24, her life changed forever when she suffered a rare spinal stroke. Moran recalled that she was hanging laundry one minute, and then the next minute she felt a sharp pain in her back and couldn't breathe. Moran's lower body was paralyzed.
Fortunately, there were still options for her to pursue the sport she loved. After a lengthy rehab, Moran joined the burgeoning Israeli national women's wheelchair basketball team. She also played on the Israeli all-male team Beit HaLohem.
Although Moran's heart was in basketball, she was told that succeed as an elite world athlete, she would have to try a solo sport. In 2010 she started rowing at Limor's insistence. She soon became hooked. Limor was also a rower and thought that Moran would take to the sport well. She was right. Moran has shown outstanding talent and was selected as the 2015 World Rowing Para Athlete of the Year.
"I've learned to push my limits and not be afraid of dreaming big dreams,€” even if they don't all come true," Samuel said. "The only way to improve is by making mistakes -€” by failing, and then overcoming those failures."
She also added that she's learned to never compare herself to others.
"I compare myself to me if I want to get better," she said.
When asked whether she saw herself as a role model, Moran said she hopes she "can make people become their own role models, because even the most amazing story in the world will not help you to overcome difficulties in life if you don't realize the strength lies in you."
Moran pointed out that disabled athletes are often reduced to being one-dimensional, purely inspirational stories. She€” and other people with disabilities are much more than simply an inspiration.
"There's a lot more in my toolbox."
Moran said she hasn't faced any discrimination being an openly gay athlete on the international stage.
"I'm lucky in that manner because everywhere we go, people just take it as it is," Samuel said. "If people think differently, they have never showed it or expressed it to our face."
Nyle DiMarco serves leather daddy realness in the latest edition of Attitude
From: Wicked Gay
Nothing gets our hearts racing more than new pictures of Nyle DiMarco.
DiMarco will be on the cover in the newest edition of Attitude, where he lets his inner daddy out to great results.
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| Photo credit: Jenny Brough/Attitude |
In an interview with the magazine, DiMarco talks about his sexuality and about the deaf community.
"Growing up, I was never afraid to say that a guy was beautiful. Women can say other women are beautiful, so why should it be any different? So I was never really afraid to say that, " he said. "I've always been that way, whether it's male or female. You know, if they're beautiful, they're beautiful."
He went on to say that, "I'm fortunate because our [deaf] community is so small, which means that there is more diversity. One of my best friends growing up is now a drag queen... In the deaf community everybody accepts everybody else because that's who you are, you're part of a community and that's our safe space."
Read more about Nyle's interview at Attitude.
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