More Matthew Mitcham

I've read some comments about Matthew Mitcham's gold medal. There's been complaints that NBC did not choose to mention Mitcham's orientation in the broadcast. They did say that he had quit diving for a while due to depression.

Many people say what does his sexual orientation have to do with his diving as justification for not mentioning it. However, it seems obvious many things are mentioned that have very little to do with athletic prowess. The most obvious, and it's obvious it's simply organized this way, is the nationality of the athlete. Does Bolt being Jamaican have anything to do with his running? What about Phelps being American? Or that he's from Baltimore? Or that his mother is divorced? Or that he had ADD as a kid?

To be fair, Mitcham may not have been the favorite, but there's one undeniable fact. With over 11,000 athletes, he was the only out male, and one of ten gay athletes (the rest were women). Statistics would say that there are far more gay athletes competing in the Olympics, and yet no one is willing to admit it out of fear, either fear because their home country is too repressive, or at the very least, fear that they will lose endorsement money.

This is still a real fact of life. Martina Navratilova, perhaps the most famous of gay athletes, had a tough time getting endorsements after she admitted she was gay. Greg Louganis, who only came out after he retired, had similar issues, especially considering how decorated he was as a diver.

It might be fair to point out that Mitcham is Australian, and had he been American, there would have been more press about it. I suspect that is true indeed. Then, he would have announced he was out in the US. I think it was occasionally mentioned that Rudy Galindo was an out gay male figure skater.

It's funny because I suspect people think that one of David Boudia or Thomas Finchum or both American divers were gay, but again, they've never mentioned it.

The point is that people try to trivialize these matters saying it has nothing to do with athletics, but if that's the case, then why bother talking about girlfriends and spouses during the Olympics? What do they have to do with anything? They have to do with the emotional support of the athlete.

Mitcham credits many people with helping him get through a difficult time in his life, including his partner, Lachlan Fletcher. They needed sponsors to help fly both his mother (his mum) and his partner out to the Olympics, and they needed to get him there as an assistant of sorts. At the very least, it was mentioned in Australian press, so rare it is for a diver to get gold in Australia.

Indeed, Mitcham's past is fascinating outside his orientation. In particular, he used to be compete in trampoline before he was apparently discovered by an Australian diving coach of Chinese origin. (Coincidentally, trampoline is now an Olympic event). Matthew competed in both as a teen before focusing on diving.

There was a focus on Usain Bolt from Jamaica. However, the 100m and 200m is something Americans have traditionally done well and so there's interest in watching a Jamaican do well. The kind of exuberance that Bolt showed is not so different from what an American might do either, and with plenty of Jamaicans living in the US, it's perhaps not surprising that Americans might adopt Bolt as one of their own.

Contrast this with the Kenyan and the Ethiopian and Moroccan trying to win the marathon. The marathon is not typically filled with name American athletes, who often fare poorly at the longer distances. Americans, even African Americans, don't relate well to Africans from Africa, probably imagining them to be some weird running freak that speaks in clicks. Usain, on the other hand, seems like a nice T.O., a bit of a showboat.

This goes to show that a guy like Mitcham can be appreciated, given how much time NBC spent on Boudia and Finchum who both had relatively poor Olympics for the Americans. However, to celebrate Mitcham too much would be to delve into topics that NBC didn't feel comfortable dealing with.

And so it's sad that they had to ignore something and that there are people who back this decision up.

Mitcham's orientation was worth mentioning because so few other athletes would step up and do the same, and to at least acknowledge this would go a little way to saying that this social problem should be a thing of the past.