Kev Maxen be first male ach a US men’s pro sports league to publicly e out as gay | CNN

Contents:

• THE FIRST GAY PUB I DARED SET FOOT NOW HAS A RABOW PLAQUE. HERE’S WHY THAT MATTERS
• KEV MAXEN BE FIRST MALE ACH A US MEN’S PROFSNAL SPORTS LEAGUE TO PUBLICLY E OUT AS GAY
• CALIFORNIA SCHOOL BOARD ADOPTS SOCIAL STUDI TEXTBOOKS THAT CLU GAY RIGHTS AFTER WARNGS OM ERNOR
• COLORADO SPRGS INTRODUC NEW ‘GAY PIANO BAR,’ INS
• WHAT MAK JUDY GARLAND A GAY IN? EXPERTS EXPLA WHAT SHE AND OTHERS, OM DIANA ROSS TO MADONNA, HAVE MON
• KEV MAXEN BE FIRST MALE ACH A US MEN’S PROFSNAL SPORTS LEAGUE TO PUBLICLY E OUT AS GAY

THE FIRST GAY PUB I DARED SET FOOT NOW HAS A RABOW PLAQUE. HERE’S WHY THAT MATTERS

Colorado Sprgs’ Premier Gay BarFeaturg a Staff of Profsnal Sgers providg Live Performanc at All Tim!

The cy’s send “official” gay bar is a small space wh a rabow flag and yellow logo pated on the glass door outsi. Josh Frankl, left, and John Wolfe at ICONS, the Colorado Sprgs gay piano bar they own together.

“When we moved back here, there wasn’t a gay bar downtown at all, and that didn’t s right wh me, ” Frankl said. “I wanted to make a space that jt did not apologize at all for beg gay and weled everybody here to see what ’s like to celebrate who we are.

KEV MAXEN BE FIRST MALE ACH A US MEN’S PROFSNAL SPORTS LEAGUE TO PUBLICLY E OUT AS GAY

Growg up the cy the 1990s, Frankl said homophobia was all too faiar to him. “I thk part of our missn is to sort of refe what means to be gay 2023 Colorado Sprgs, ” Frankl said.

But the g days and months, the bar stepped up to fill big sho as the only official gay space town. Frankly, I’d have served a prison jt for him to hold my hand, like he did his off-whe Vxhall Nova on the drive there, breakg only to change, he took me for strawberry cir the Gloucter, a pub at the park’s edge, takg my tremblg hand his and reassurg me: “It’s actually a gay bar. Gay pubs are far more than bars; they’re refug.

CALIFORNIA SCHOOL BOARD ADOPTS SOCIAL STUDI TEXTBOOKS THAT CLU GAY RIGHTS AFTER WARNGS OM ERNOR

On Sunday, the first a new seri of rabow plaqu will be stalled at the Gloucter – now the Greenwich Tavern – cementg s place gay home the workg-class Medway area of Kent, where we met when he sold me a phone cred rd at the lol petrol statn, “queers” like were wily perceived as predatory, perverted, spic or simply scum. ”After the strawberry cir, served by a man a tight whe vt – the only other gay man I’d seen real life – the squiggly summer sunlight ma a strobe effect through the park’s tre.

The first time I saw wh him, when I was 18, I realised he had echoed the love story of the two protagonists, who also had their first kiss the twilight of Greenwich Park’s tre, and their first experience of a gay pub at the Gloucter.

COLORADO SPRGS INTRODUC NEW ‘GAY PIANO BAR,’ INS

The explanatn for his obssn is now clear: there was such a pcy of same-sex love stori that this was the first time many young people had seen a same-sex kiss, or peeked si an actual gay bar after dark. The project remds people “that we have always been here, good tim and bad, ” David Robson of the London LGBT+ Foms’ Network said when the plaqu were film and my own story were workg-class gay love: not dandyish and sheltered by the polse of privilege, but the btal realy of beg perceived a non-mascule boy.

WHAT MAK JUDY GARLAND A GAY IN? EXPERTS EXPLA WHAT SHE AND OTHERS, OM DIANA ROSS TO MADONNA, HAVE MON

It was a powerful and rarely told tersectn – and one that, even more rarely, ends rather happily, wh a betiful scene of fiance and acceptance played to a Mama Cass waltz on the sk I disvered that I wasn’t the only wi-eyed baby gay my boyiend had been chasg through those ancient chtnuts that summer. For me, the plaque honours that private moment as well as the shared history of the LGBTQ+ ’s the msage I’d impart to anyone who thks such symbols are meangls, as the unique social history of the UK’s gay bars is endangered by gentrifitn, hook-up apps, the st of livg crisis and even assiatn. Like many workg-class, closeted gay boys, I’d hi unr the glovebox of my boyiend’s Nova when we drove back om the park, lt anyone saw.

It whispered to ckney-accented gay boys like me: there are others like you. Kev Maxen has bee the first male ach a US men’s profsnal sports league to e out as gay. Per Outsports, as of September 2022, there have only ever been 16 players NFL history to publicly e out as gay or bisexual.

Carl Nassib beme the first active NFL player league history to announce that he is gay 2021. Per Outsports, Maxen is the “first publicly out male ach a major Amerin men’s pro sports league, ” wh WNBA ach Curt Miller, who publicly me out to the media as gay 2015, also a publicly out male ach an Amerin profsnal sports league. Homosexual acts are illegal Malaysia and punishable by f and up to 20 years prison.

KEV MAXEN BE FIRST MALE ACH A US MEN’S PROFSNAL SPORTS LEAGUE TO PUBLICLY E OUT AS GAY

You are young people, and I’m sure a lot of you are gay and progrsive, ” he said addrsg the dience. The Sprgs was once home to the Gay and Lbian Fund of Colorado, a Pri Center, multiple LGBTQ nonprofs, and gay bars like Hi ‘n’ Seek, The Unrground Pub, and V-Bar. Nearly every one of them has closed s doors, ceased operatns or, the se of the Gay and Lbian Fund, moved to Denver.

Though Colorado now boasts robt anti-discrimatn protectns for LGBTQ people and n claim s first openly gay ernor, Jared Polis, as well as s first openly transgenr legislator, Brianna Tone, the state has not always been an in of progrsivism—nor has the cy of Colorado Sprgs. “It’s gotten much better sce [Amendment 2], and there are other stat that are much more homophobic than Colorado Sprgs is, so I feel like some regards, as a populatn we have reemed ourselv.