Gay athlete’s heroics go beyond Olympics

He may not be on the U.S. Olympic team, but he is a diver and he is gay. I’m rooting hard for the young guy from Australia to win the 10 m platform in the Beijing Summer Games that start tonight.

Matthew Mitcham, though, would say I am precisely the kind of fan who shouldn’t be cheering for him.

It’s true that most of my infatuation hangs on his openness and his unplanned outing of himself. But hey, I am a true diving fan, too, ever since athletes in the sport wowed me in person when I attended a semifinal round at the Atlanta Games in 1996.

“I just want to be known as the Australian diver who did really well at the Olympics,” Mitcham told The Advocate. “It’s everybody else who thinks it’s special when homosexuality and elite sport go together.”

During an interview with an Australian newspaper, the reporter asked whom Mitcham lived with and he replied simply, his partner of two years. Within days, the 20-year-old was swamped with requests for interviews from media outlets from around the world.

Mitcham is ranked third in the world on the platform dive, but still, the international attention he’s received leading up to these games wouldn’t have existed had he not come out.

His point is well-taken. If gay and lesbian people are teachers, actors, grocery clerks, politicians, firefighters, soldiers and corporate executives, why not athletes? Of course it’s not special that 10 percent of the population is working in a variety of occupations.

Then again, for those of us who celebrate all the good things happening in the gay community, having an athlete out himself in such a humble, honest way is a big deal. Sport is a profession that tends to keep people in the closet. The traditions and fears wrapped up with all-male or all-female teams working together in tight relationships tend to intimidate gays and lesbians into silence.

Mitcham acknowledged as much himself. Diving is “such an easy sport to be out in – much easier than football, where you have to be rugged and strong and masculine.”

You know something, this story, Mitcham’s ease with himself, his chances for gold, it all fits. Sport is a huge part of our culture, and in the United States we have the professional leagues filled with first-rates athletes. But who are the people who capture our hearts, who we tell our kids about watching perform the most amazing feats, who grace Wheaties boxes?

Olympians.

For two weeks every four years we marvel at their ripped bodies (think about track and field, swimming, gymnastics, diving, cycling, beach volleyball). We learn their stories, celebrate their joys and share their tears. We never hear them whine about salaries or not getting enough of the spotlight. These are the athletes who we are most proud to say represented our country.

It makes perfect sense that one of the few openly gay athletes in the world is also an Olympian.