Lester’s Nick McCarthy out as gay and thanks club for their support | Lester | The Guardian

Contents:

• THE URAGEO JOURNEY OF IAN ROBERTS, GBY LEAGUE'S FIRST OPENLY GAY PLAYER
• LESTER’S NICK MCCARTHY OUT AS GAY AND THANKS CLUB FOR THEIR SUPPORT
• FIRST OPENLY GAY GBY LEAGUE PLAYER KEEGAN HIRST OUT OF RETIREMENT
• I WAS A GBY HARDMAN WHO BROKE AN OPPONENT’S JAW – BUT WHEN I ME OUT AS GAY TO MY PARENTS THEY STOPPED TALKG TO ME

THE URAGEO JOURNEY OF IAN ROBERTS, GBY LEAGUE'S FIRST OPENLY GAY PLAYER

Aborigals, Polynians, Melanians and Southern European migrants provid the game’s first diversy om s Anglo-Celtic base and the terlopers were accepted if they plied wh the and “pped sweet” had no place for homosexual men and to be labeled gay was a slur implyg weakns.

LESTER’S NICK MCCARTHY OUT AS GAY AND THANKS CLUB FOR THEIR SUPPORT

And that’s the way remaed until a pneer smashed the stereotype, beg the game’s first openly homosexual player, a precursor, a full 20 years before Keegan Hirst, the Batley Bulldogs player who this weekend beme the first Brish player to do likewise.

“Until Ian Roberts me out we thought all gay guys were weak, ” says Mar Fenech, the former South Sydney Rabbohs pta and Roberts’s team-mate. His father Ray was his bt iend and was openly speful about anythg gay he saw on televisn. Stereotyp mean ls thkg and for the league muny, surround by a ep emotnal moat, there was no way he uld be tough and father always advised him to “go for the biggt guy” and, crippled by a life nial, he uld sublimate his rage and claw back self-worth by excellg at everythg physil, cludg was all a smokcreen for a new phase of his life, glorly gurated at Sydney gay pub The Exchange.

FIRST OPENLY GAY GBY LEAGUE PLAYER KEEGAN HIRST OUT OF RETIREMENT

“I had a sh of eedom and belongg and saw my first role mols, livg openly as gay men and women. Roberts would nvce them that he was gog to “50-50 clubs”, further throwg them off the trail by paradg wh betiful “girliends” at club 1984, an unlikely hero emerged for 19-year-old Roberts the form of New South Wal premier Neville Wran, who passed a law crimalisg homosexualy. ”It was the same year that Bronski Beat’s tortured g out anthem Smalltown Boy stormed world dancefloors, crystallisg the horror experience which a young suburban man is bashed for attendg a gay club and disowned by his father.

I WAS A GBY HARDMAN WHO BROKE AN OPPONENT’S JAW – BUT WHEN I ME OUT AS GAY TO MY PARENTS THEY STOPPED TALKG TO ME

Neher had any ia he was gay. Eventually old school Souths ach Gee Piggs nonted Roberts about his sexualy, pleadg wh him to stop gog to the gay clubs.