Is figure skating ready to come out of the closet? ::posted Sun, 18 Jan 2015 23:00:05 +0000:: ift.tt/1CpJz1l rss@dailykos (Laura Clawson) Johnny Weir and Tara Lipinski The popularity of figure skating has suffered in the United States in recent years, which can produce one of those vicious cycles: a less popular sport is watched by fewer little kids, meaning fewer little kids see a skater and say I want to do that, meaning the United States has fewer chances to produce the champion that would boost the sports popularity ... you get the picture. At the Sochi Olympics, while the United States won bronze in the newly created team event and Meryl Davis and Charlie White won gold at ice dance, the U.S. did not win an individual medal for the first time since 1936. In recent years, figure skating has also been dinged by judging scandals, has instituted a points system that has failed to eliminate questions about the integrity of the judging while simultaneously pushing skaters drastically toward paint-by-numbers programs oriented overwhelmingly to jumps. But I love it anyway, and the National Championships are this coming week. With Davis and White no longer competing, the United States has a lot of rebuilding to do. But this is also a fascinating cultural moment in figure skating, which in the United States tends to be seen as an uber-gay sport. (The men, anyway.) Interestingly, though, do you know how many top top skaters have come out during their competitive careers? By many counts, the number is two. One of them, American Rudy Galindo, did so in 1996 immediately before winning the national championship—but he didnt come out as a top mens contender. He came out as a nearly retired skater whod been far more successful as a pairs skater and had not medaled in singles to that point. He didnt think he had much to lose, in other words. Part of this is probably because not quite as many figure skaters are gay as popular opinion would have it, but thats not the only reason. This past December, though, a skater came out at the top of his career. That would be Canadian pairs skater Eric Radford, who, with partner Meagan Duhamel is an Olympic team silver medalist and a two-time world bronze medalist with his eyes on the 2018 Olympics. But wait, youre thinking. This is a risk? Even if theyre not out, doesnt everyone know that skating is an uber-gay sport? Actually, its a conservative sport in which many of the powerful figures are defensive about that image. Follow below the fold for more. [Forwarded by the MyLeftBlogosphere news engine. Link to original post below:]
Posted on: Mon, 19 Jan 2015 00:01:54 +0000
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