Today, on International Transgender Day of Visibility, I’m going to be standing out the front of a major Australian hardware chain, frying up snags and cooking onions to sell to the great masses that congregate there, every weekend to raise funds for my football club, the St Kilda Sharks. It’s an experience repeated by thousands of people all over Australia every week of the year, but for me it will come with increased anxiety and trepidation. As a transgender person, being visible can be challenging. Or frightening. Or dangerous. I am incredibly fortunate that I am so well-supported at my football club as a transgender athlete. The women I play alongside, who coach us and run the show are l
Proud 2 Play are thrilled to continue pursuing our vision of a world where all LGBTI+ people can lead healthy and active lifestyles, by formally announcing our partnership with some of Victoria’s largest state and national sporting associations. In an innovative, collaborative approach, Proud 2 Play are working with Cricket Victoria, Tennis Victoria, Football Victoria and Athletics Australia to ensure inclusion for all LGBTI+ people in sport. The work, funded through Sport and Recreation Victoria’s "Strengthening LGBTI+ Inclusion In Sport" project, is centred around providing members of the sporting community with education and support on LGBTI+ inclusion in sport, and assisting sporting org
Tennis champion Martina Navratilova recently called the participation of transgender women in elite female sporting competitions “insane” and “cheating”. And she’s not alone. Several other prominent women athletes have also used social media, mainly Twitter, to voice their concern about the eligibility of transgender women in sport, including former British swimmer Sharron Davies, double Olympic champion Dame Kelly Holmes, and former long-distance runner Paula Radcliffe. There is an inherent contempt that lies within these statements, and it impacts more than just trans athletes. It can impact the integrity of public discourse by reducing the debate to be about whether trans women are “real
Marriage equality was momentous, but there is still much to do to progress LGBTI+ rights in Australi
Image: George Groves/Midsumma Wednesday, November 15 2017, Northbridge Plaza, Perth, 7.00am: “Yes responses, 7,817,247, representing 61.6% …” read the chief statistician of the Australian Bureau of Statistics, David Kalisch, on the big screen. The huge crowd erupted. Hugging, crying, comfort, joy. That was one of the happiest moments of my life, along with December 7 2017, when marriage equality legislation passed the federal parliament. For younger generations, this was the moment one of our defining and most hard-fought social movements had succeeded. We had won, despite the barriers put in front of us and the damaging impact of the postal survey. As concisely put by Anna Brown, director
6 March 2019 RE: TRANSPHOBIC BEHAVIOUR DISPLAYED BY SAM NEWMAN Proud 2 Play, in conjunction with Pride Cup Australia, Stand Up Events, Pride in Sport (ACON), AFL Pride Collective, and in association with the AFL, offer the following statement regarding transphobic behaviour recently displayed by Sam Newman on social media. Transgender and Gender Diverse people experience disproportionately higher rates of mental health issues and low rates of participation in sport through fear of discrimination or harassment. In recent years, the Australian sporting community have advanced their practices to match the expectations of wider society by increasing their acceptance of Trans and Gender Diverse p
