Learship & Operatnal Teams - Internatnal Gay Rugby

Contents:

• THE GAY GBY CLUB NOTTGHAMSHIRE ENSURG THE SPORT IS PLAYED AN 'CLIVE AND FORTABLE ENVIRONMENT''IN A NON-CLIVE SI THEY WOULD SEE THGS THEY SAID AS BANTER WHEN FACT WAS HOMOPHOBIC'NOTTGHAMPOSTBOOKMARKSHARECOMMENTSNEWSBYGURJEET NANRAHLIFE WRER04:00, 24 JAN 2020BOOKMARKWALTER NOWLAN, DAVE LAWRENCE AND CHRIS HANDLEY, MEMBERS OF THE NOTTGHAMSHIRE HURRIN SQUADNEVER MISS A MANSFIELD STORY AND READ THE LATT HEADL WH OUR EE EMAIL UPDATMORE NEWSLETTERS SUBSCRIBEINVALID EMAILSOMETHG WENT WRONG, PLEASE TRY AGA LATER.MORE NEWSLETTERSWE E YOUR SIGN-UP TO PROVI NTENT WAYS YOU’VE NSENTED TO AND IMPROVE OUR UNRSTANDG OF YOU. THIS MAY CLU ADVERTS OM AND THIRD PARTI BASED ON OUR KNOWLEDGE OF YOU. MORE THANK YOU FOR SUBSCRIBG!WE HAVE MORE NEWSLETTERSSHOW ME SEE OURPRIVACY NOTICE SEE OURPRIVACY NOTICE&TIM;GROUP 28 NEVER MISS A MANSFIELD STORY AND READ THE LATT HEADL WH OUR EE EMAIL UPDATINVALID EMAILSOMETHG WENT WRONG, PLEASE TRY AGA LATER.SIGN UPNO THANKS, CLOSEWE E YOUR SIGN-UP TO PROVI NTENT WAYS YOU’VE NSENTED TO AND IMPROVE OUR UNRSTANDG OF YOU. THIS MAY CLU ADVERTS OM AND THIRD PARTI BASED ON OUR KNOWLEDGE OF YOU. MORE &TIM;GROUP 28THANK YOU FOR SUBSCRIBG!
• HEARD OF THE STEELERS? NO, NOT THEM, THE GAY GBY TEAM OM LONDON
• JOG THE WORLD'S FIRST GAY GBY TEAM CHANGED MY LIFE. SO I MA A FILM ABOUT
• THIS GAY GBY TEAM IS CHANGG HEARTS AND MDS EVERY DAY
• LIST | 5 GAY RUGBY STARS WHO ARE OUT AND PROUD
• LESTER’S NICK MCCARTHY OUT AS GAY AND THANKS CLUB FOR THEIR SUPPORT
• DISMANTLG STEREOTYP: 10 INSPIRG GAY RUGBY PLAYERS AND PERSONALI
• IS GBY AS GAY AS LOOKS? A CURUFC PLAYER’S PERSPECTIVE
• TACKLG HOMOPHOBIC ATTUS: THE STRAIGHT MEN WHO PLAY FOR GAY GBY CLUBS

THE GAY GBY CLUB NOTTGHAMSHIRE ENSURG THE SPORT IS PLAYED AN 'CLIVE AND FORTABLE ENVIRONMENT''IN A NON-CLIVE SI THEY WOULD SEE THGS THEY SAID AS BANTER WHEN FACT WAS HOMOPHOBIC'NOTTGHAMPOSTBOOKMARKSHARECOMMENTSNEWSBYGURJEET NANRAHLIFE WRER04:00, 24 JAN 2020BOOKMARKWALTER NOWLAN, DAVE LAWRENCE AND CHRIS HANDLEY, MEMBERS OF THE NOTTGHAMSHIRE HURRIN SQUADNEVER MISS A MANSFIELD STORY AND READ THE LATT HEADL WH OUR EE EMAIL UPDATMORE NEWSLETTERS SUBSCRIBEINVALID EMAILSOMETHG WENT WRONG, PLEASE TRY AGA LATER.MORE NEWSLETTERSWE E YOUR SIGN-UP TO PROVI NTENT WAYS YOU’VE NSENTED TO AND IMPROVE OUR UNRSTANDG OF YOU. THIS MAY CLU ADVERTS OM AND THIRD PARTI BASED ON OUR KNOWLEDGE OF YOU. MORE THANK YOU FOR SUBSCRIBG!WE HAVE MORE NEWSLETTERSSHOW ME SEE OURPRIVACY NOTICE SEE OURPRIVACY NOTICE&TIM;GROUP 28 NEVER MISS A MANSFIELD STORY AND READ THE LATT HEADL WH OUR EE EMAIL UPDATINVALID EMAILSOMETHG WENT WRONG, PLEASE TRY AGA LATER.SIGN UPNO THANKS, CLOSEWE E YOUR SIGN-UP TO PROVI NTENT WAYS YOU’VE NSENTED TO AND IMPROVE OUR UNRSTANDG OF YOU. THIS MAY CLU ADVERTS OM AND THIRD PARTI BASED ON OUR KNOWLEDGE OF YOU. MORE &TIM;GROUP 28THANK YOU FOR SUBSCRIBG!

Niamh LewisMar 1, 2021, 09:52 AM ETWhen Eammon Ashton-Atkson, an Atralian televisn reporter, cid to film his gby club as they went to the biannual Bgham Cup 2018, he uld never have imaged the posive reactn a documentary about would film Steelers is about London-based Kgs Cross Steelers, the world's first gay gby club and one of over 60 such sis world-wi.

"She's got a certifite for the hight achg level, and sce she left the Steelers she's been nsistently overlooked and not even shortlisted [for jobs] than men who are ls qualified and ls experienced than her, which is heart-breakg and disgtg, " Ashton-Atkson beg gay 2021 wtern society is often unremarkable today, you don't have to go back very far to fd trmatic stori.

HEARD OF THE STEELERS? NO, NOT THEM, THE GAY GBY TEAM OM LONDON

Then, 2019, Atralia's Israel Fol spouted his famo anti-gay ments on Instagram, sayg "hell awas" gay opened the drawer and started the ed aga om scratch, and turned to the unnventnal documentary has bee. "For those guys who were settg up that team 1995, they were real trailblazers bee they were gog out to different teams Essex week--week out smashg down stereotyp one game of gby at a time and om what I heard, the men Essex, they had never met an openly gay man before, let alone an openly gay sportsman. Wh lots of new Gay & Inclive Rugby Clubs settg up across the globe each year, ’s more and more likely that you live close enough to one to get volved wh and enjoy all kds of gby – regardls of your genr, sexualy, ethnicy, relign, size or gby the Map Search below or scroll through the Global Club Listgs lower down this page to fd an IGR club.

Here, queer people were reclaimg their place on the pch – an arena they grew up beg told they didn’t belong Israel Fol began postg “hell awas homosexuals” on social media I realised I had to tell the story of the club – and my own story. There was the ocsnal homophobic sledge, but over time the Steelers won the rpect of the straight burly Brish men bee not only did they beat them on ocsn, they showed them that we’re all pretty much the forward to me takg my mera to Amsterdam to film the club at the Bgham Cup, the world cup of “rabow” gby. It was only when Israel Fol began postg “hell awas homosexuals” on social media that I realised I had to tell the story of the club – and my own like Dan Palmer, I too have Fol to thank small part.

JOG THE WORLD'S FIRST GAY GBY TEAM CHANGED MY LIFE. SO I MA A FILM ABOUT

Internatnal Gay Rugby is a Charable Inrporated Organisatn, registered England and Wal wh our registered office at 71 Holland Road, Wt Ham, London, E15 3BP, England, Uned Kgdom (Chary Number – 1154241) provi our member clubs wh velopment support and rourc the areas of club anisatn, recment, retentn, fundraisg, event management, and, regnal and natnal unn relatns. “The nice thgs about those gam is, on the pch I’m a different person, but afterwards was gog for a drk wh them, and changg their perceptns of what gay gby is and how gay people n play gby and actually jt challengg them on thgs, ” he explaed.

Photograph: Ryan Byrne/Inpho/ShutterstockFellow Lester player Dunne revealed his bisexualy last year, around the same time Nassib announced he was gay and a few months before Atralian Cavallo ma headl across the world by sharg his news. As a rult, has tradnally rerced an orthodox form of twentieth-century masculy that is lked to those who are whe, middle class, able-bodied, and, most important to this analysis, heterosexual (Symons, 2009).It is now wily regnized, however, that twenty-first-century sport is a social stutn that shap and impacts upon the liv of gay and lbian athlet too.

Sce soclogist first began to qutn the role that sport plays the productn and reproductn of mascule inty the mid-1980s (Dunng, 1986), there was a slow progrsn om examg sport as a se of male ntrol over women, to regnizg the tersectn between sport and sexualy that rults om the largely heteronormative and homophobic culture of profsnal sport the 1990s and the first of the twenty-first century (Rowe, Markwell, & Stevenson, 2006).It was this hospable perd of time that gave rise to sexual orientatn-segregated sportg spac for gay men. Concerng the foc of this chapter, gby, the first soclogil vtigatn occurred the Uned Kgdom by Price and Parker (2003) and they found the existence of the untry’s first gay club (formed 1995) was prcipally anized around pg perceived or actual homophobia of mastream gby.The new Millennium brought chang attus toward homosexualy, not only to society, but also to mastream sport (Anrson, 2014).

THIS GAY GBY TEAM IS CHANGG HEARTS AND MDS EVERY DAY

Exemplifyg this shift empirilly, the first prehensive vtigatn of the experienc of gay mal playg on ostensibly heterosexual teams was nducted by Anrson 2005, and he found that matters had begun to change.

This was a fdg that was affirmed by yet further outlook upon the gay male athlet by straight men 2011 (Anrson, 2011).Today, has been repeatedly shown that heterosexual athlet, generally, are creasgly acceptg of homosexualy (Anrson, Magrath, & Bullgham, 2016; Anrson & McCormack, 2015; Bh, Anrson, & Carr, 2012).The reason for this acceptance has to do wh changg attudal disposn toward gay men and changg masculy among heterosexual mal.

347) was the first to e the term “clive masculy” to scribe mascule performanc that view hegemonic masculy as unsirable wh a willgns to embrace femy “ls ncerned wh migatg homosexual spicn through homophobia and heterosexism”.

LIST | 5 GAY RUGBY STARS WHO ARE OUT AND PROUD

There is also evince for creasg societal acceptance of gay athlet and a softeng of media attus toward gay male athlet both the Uned Kgdom and Uned Stat wh a shift toward clive masculy (Cleland, 2014, 2018; Kian & Anrson, 2009).Rugby and MasculyRugby, which Dunng (1986, p.

In this manner, twentieth-century gby players nsolidated their masculy wh gby servg to privilege heterosexualy.The prence of gay players the hypermascule, physil gby environment may be the ultimate subversn of the myth of gay men beg effemate and un-mascule (Symons, 2010), a siar manner to the challeng to tradnal nstctns of femy that female players prent (Wright & Clarke, 1999). This is bee the volvement of gay players a space that has been a fundamental source of heterosexual male power unrm masculy and challeng the boundary between gay and straight mal and ultimately the perceived differenc between men and women as a whole (Anrson, 2002).For example, former Welsh ternatnal player, Gareth Thomas—who is one of the most well-known and rpected players Welsh gby history (McGivern & Miller, 2017; Zhu, 2016)—me out December 2009, to an “overwhelmgly supportive” rponse (McCormack & Anrson, 2010, p. His rerd as one of the most succsful players the sport, bed wh his mascule appearance and physil playg style were certaly ntrary to the mythil reprentatns of gay mal and may expla the posive rponse.

Th, there has been a softeng of the culture associated wh playg gby, driven by younger players g through the system who are creasgly rejectg, if not challengg the prevly accepted e of homophobic disurse that is ed by olr members of the gby muny.However, Thomas remas one of very few male athlet to reveal their sexualy durg their gby reers. 118) and a haven for those who had been exclud or ostracized om the mastream gby culture.For their analysis, Price and Parker (2003) examed the Kgs Cross Steelers Rugby Football Club, an amatr gby club based London and the self-claimed world’s first gay gby club. The number of gay gby clubs around the world has steadily grown, spurred by the creatn of The Internatnal Gay Rugby Associatn and Board (IGRAB) 2001.In Ireland, the first gay gby team was found 2003.

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

The juxtaposn of the emphatilly mascule bodi wh the female props associated wh drag artists challenged tablished disurs surroundg gby and masculy and yet the club has been wily accepted by the media and gby admistrators.Atralia’s first gay gby club, the Sydney Convicts have been embraced by the cy’s gby muny wh s founr Andrew Purchas award the Orr of Atralia medal that regniz outstandg achievement and service by Atralians. The bed ssns allowed hierarchi of masculy to be reworked and facilated teractns and discsns between the players (Gorman-Murray, 2013).Fally, Gaston and Dixon (unr review) examed a recently formed grassroots gay gby team the Uned Kgdom, the Liverpool Trons. In ntrast to the experience of the Steelers, the Trons were accepted and openly weled by the straight gby clubs that they played agast.Signifintly, they claim that while the barriers between heterosexual and homosexual men had dimished a greater issue now li wh the gay muny.

Wh a narrowg of acceptable behavr plac tradnally associated wh gay sociabily clive gby clubs may now be affordg a more clive range of homosexuali addn to masculi.MethodsThe central foc of this rearch was to exame the changg stcture of clive men’s gby clubs the Uned Kgdom and the members’ associatns wh the gby muny.

Fdg participants for this rearch was not difficult as the number of clive men’s gby teams has grown om ls than a dozen clubs one ago to eighty-four clubs the Uned Kgdom and Wtern Europe as regnized by and registered wh the Internatnal Gay Rugby Board. Semi-stctured terviews of ten players om each team occurred alongsi, participant observatn and wrten rpons to a participant-requted qutnnaire provid sight to the ratnale as to why the men seek to bee members of the nearly all gay men clive clubs.Communitg wh members of the clive teams was based on a nvenience sample of five clubs loted the English Midlands to southern England. As one gay player said wh a lgh, “They jt don’t know they’re gay yet”.Given the nature of clive club members who participated this rearch we opted to exclu heterosexual members of the clubs (only five heterosexual players were intified over the urse of the rearch).

DISMANTLG STEREOTYP: 10 INSPIRG GAY RUGBY PLAYERS AND PERSONALI

In addn to the BSA guil, the Appalachian State Universy’s Instutnal Rearch Board (IRB) approval of human subject rearch for this project is available by ntactg the lead thor.RultsGay men’s participatn sport, general, and gby football, particular, has been the object of rearchers’ tert for years (Anrson, 2002, 2011; Bnier & Brownell, 2012). The purpose, rather, was to explore via a ground theoretil approach the possibly changg stcture of gby the Uned Kgdom as relat to the rise clive gay men’s gby teams and their impact on the sport England and beyond.Naturally, qutns of homophobia and masculi did arise. That fdg alone mak this rearch novel: This is not the experience of gay men clive clubs prevly (Price & Parker, 2003).In addn, the nature of masculi as pertas to the social, cultural, and temporal experience of many of the participants was examed but did not bee a central foc of this rearch.

Instead, our thematic dg found three new areas of tert this vtigatn: (1) the social pal sought by and gaed by many participants on clive men’s gby clubs, (2) clubs’ prence for many gay men as a “safe haven”, and (3) for some gay men their participatn wh the clive gby club was merely a hobby and a means for them to meet other gay men wh siar terts sport. He later wanted to expla that he unrstood that not only his fellow clive men’s gby teammat saw him as a gay man and member of the club, but that when he wore his Hampshire jersey on non-gby days while walkg or travelg around town other townspeople “probably knew” he is gay. The nversatn wh the two spectators/former players was direct reference to ncerns exprsed by rearchers regard to ncsns and the effect of improper tacklg techniqu on younger players England and elsewhere (Pollock, Whe, & Kirkwood, 2017).What then followed was a nversatn between the two approximately seventy-year-old former Rochter Rugby Club players when asked about chang the sexual orientatn/genr inty of current players, and not the laws of the game, regard to acceptance of gay men most levels of the sport.

A few sub-them emerged discsg the rise of clive gby teams wh admistrators, spectators, gay players, and players om non-clive clubs, openly intifyg as gay or otherwise, when the first rearcher met wh members of an clive gay men’s club and men om another non-clive club. The first of the them is nearly all participants om the “normal” teams were aware about some gby unterparts—and teammat are gay—and no one terviewed seemed to give the matter a send thought.Members of the clive teams agreed wh that asssment wh his teammate addg that the history of English gby was such that, “if you were good (at the game), didn’t matter (if you were gay.)” His ments of “normal” teams were particularly strikg.

IS GBY AS GAY AS LOOKS? A CURUFC PLAYER’S PERSPECTIVE

Asked if the gay members of the lol clive team found the e of the term to be offensive, one clive team member shgged and replied “Why?” He add to a round of lghter om both clive and “normal” players, “They all know we’re queer”. At the re of McCormack and Wignall’s argument is tent; and the tent of the men was that of bondg through banter the way McCormack and Anrson (2010) have also shown occurs between gay and straight male athlet.The ncept of the “normalcy” of homosexualy arose a number of tim durg other terviews wh the clive gby team members. Asked why he and his gay teammat did not ntue playg gby wh their straight iends, he psed as he looked across at another field where approximately fifty men age seventeen to approximately thirty-five were trag while his clive team’s group of twenty players worked out on another field, and said, “It jt was done that way”.Before the advent of the first openly all-gay men’s team, the London Steelers, the mid-1990s and then the San Francis Fog 2001, gay men were not seen as mascule enough (Anrson, 2005b), as one clive team player said, to play gby after sendary school and to their universy years.

What this separatn of straight and gay gby players effectively did was create a divisn of active gby participatn between the two groups begng at age ten to twelve years (om sendary school to universy) until well after universy years. Interviews wh the clive team players suggt that most of the gay men did not re-emerge on the gby scene until they were their late twenti to early thirti.Gay men, seekg to fd a team for which they uld play, would oftentim, many players said, approach a “normal” team’s club admistrator or pta and say they were terted playg.

TACKLG HOMOPHOBIC ATTUS: THE STRAIGHT MEN WHO PLAY FOR GAY GBY CLUBS

“We get ”, the pta said as the four walked back to their trag ssn.The notn of homophobia, perceived or otherwise, rarely emerged discsg the “safe haven” ncept wh the clive team players and is discsed below. The two sis would scrimmage for one hour wh substut brought on as the ach emed necsary.A group of ten members of the area’s clive gay men’s gby team, the Ruffians, were already suated the bleachers wag for the scrimmage to start.

It remas rare to have an openly gay man playg at higher levels of gby the Uned Kgdom and elsewhere; is not necsarily seen as homophobia or discrimatn agast gay men, although the homophobia certaly exists parts of gby culture. Rather, as noted above, is the systemic nature of the excln of gay men and boys durg their school years that apparently is leadg to a form of self-segregatn by the gay men and boys themselv.When asked about that possibily, several of the players disagreed and said they had played on other gby teams that were, at the time, clive.

“They said they were LGBT iendly team, but weren’t really”, the first player said.“Not knowg too much about the sport I, too, took up as a hobby and a way to meet other gay men”, Dean, age thirty-five, wrote a follow-up email after this ial meetg.