Charley Sullivan, University of Michigan Rowing Coach

Recently, some prominent athletes like German soccer captain Philipp Lahm and cyclist Graeme Obree have discouraged gay athletes from coming out for safety and morale reasons. But this week, the Associate Head Coach of the University of Michigan’s men’s rowing team offers a thoughtful reply on the importance of being out and authentic as an athlete. Charley Sullivan speaks from his own experience as an out coach and the environment he is able to cultivate for his athletes:

I firmly believe that athletes can only perform at their best when they are able to be themselves. Putting on acts – of pretending to be someone you’re not, of always being brave and never afraid, of not being devastated when your grandfather dies – simply takes too much energy. And acts have a reliable way of cracking under pressure. Teams that take the “military” approach to building team unity – the we-will-dress-alike-in-practice and we-will-all-have-the-same-basic-haircut and we-will-all-believe-in-the-same-God approach – are often basing their hopes for success on a set of external appearances that may or may not actually reflect what’s going on inside the team. The ties that a team needs when the going gets tough must be built of “realer” stuff than everyone having the same slogan on a T-shirt. It’s got to be about things like the desire for the group to succeed as a group, about mutual trust built through daily striving, and about a feeling of truly belonging to the team, no matter what.

Sullivan also calls on university athletic directors to end their “don’t ask, don’t tell” mentality on having coaches that are gay or lesbian. He encourages those coaches who are gay to use their identities as a strength, not a weakness, concluding:

And for me, I’m here, I’m queer and I’m a hell of a good coach for it. To other coaches, come on out and play, the weather can be just fine if you make it so and choose the right places to invest your energies. And you just may find yourself being a better and more fulfilled coach than you’ve ever imagined.

This seems to be a much more affirmative approach. Sullivan seeks to help the world of athletics grow to be more inclusive rather than force his athletes (and himself) to hide in a closet conforming to a chilly, unwelcoming culture.

Chaz Bono appeared on ABC’s Good Morning America today to discuss the “controversy” surrounding his casting on Dancing with the Stars and respond to conservative critics who have accused the network of pushing the “LGBT agenda.” “I’m going to be dancing. I’m not up on there talking about anything other than dancing. People who don’t have gender dysphoria aren’t going to catch it by watching me dance on television,” he said. Wach it:

Meanwhile, the Family Research Council’s (FRC) Tony Perkins used his daily Washington Watch radio alert to slam the network. “Forget ‘Dancing with the Stars.’ ABC is dancing with the transgenders…. the indoctrination is in full swing. This fall, ABC’s picked its first transsexual to compete. Chaz Bono, the famous child of Sonny and Cher, may have been born a woman–but she’ll be dancing as a man. And while the gay community approves, fans certainly don’t.”

Mitt Romney suggested that the government should continue to subsidize religious organizations that discriminate against gay couples in the adoption process during yesterday’s Palmetto Freedom Forum in South Carolina. While the presidential forum focused on the economy and jobs, Romney — whose past liberal stances on social issues have irked conservatives — was asked if religious adoptions organizations should continue to receive government contracts from states that allow for civil unions or same-sex marriage. He responded by professing his support for “religious tolerance and religious liberty” and explained that “means to me that we’re not going to force people of faith to violate their faith in order to carry out their profession”:

ROMNEY: In my state, for instance, about half of our adoptions were being placed by Catholic Charities. They had to get out of adoptions because they would not, under their faith, place children in the homes of same-sex couples. That’s a mistake. We should allow people and institutions to practice their faith and particularly if there are plenty of other institutions that are able to fulfill the responsibilities which government might apply to them.

Watch it:

Of course, it’s one thing for government to allow religious individuals or organizations to opt out of providing services to same-sex couples and another to use tax payer dollars to subsidize their discrimination. Once a state legalizes same-sex marriage or civil unions and defines sexual orientation as a protected class along with factors like race or marital status, organizations that contract with the state should not be allowed to use their religious objections to preempt civil law or benefit from special carve-outs that select against gay and lesbian couples.

But if Romney believes that religious beliefs override the equal protections of individuals, he can’t just stop at the gays (the group that he opposes on religious grounds). He would have to support the government contracting with religious groups who don’t think black people would make for good parents or Asian people or people with disabilities. It’s a fairly bigoted mindset and one that Romney certainly wouldn’t want to apply to other minority groups. The fact that he would allow for the exemption of gay people reveals what he truly thinks of them.

Packed with studies, polls, and analysis, Equality NC’s booklet makes an airtight case against the amendment. Hopefully the legislature will fail to pass it next week, sparing the group a very expensive 14-month campaign to convince voters how harmful the constitutional change would be.

Box Turtle Bulletin’s Jim Burroway points to this Daily Monitor story about a new campaign headed by anti-gay activist Steven Langa to press forward with Uganda’s ‘Kill Gays’ bill. The measure would impose the death penalty or life imprisonment for some homosexual acts (which are already illegal), require people to report every LGBT individual they know, and criminalize so-called LGBT advocacy:

Parents under the Family Life Network and Uganda Coalition for Moral Values (UCMV) have opened a fresh campaign to force the government abandon economic and foreign policy considerations and pass the Anti-Homosexuality Bill 2009.

Mobilising under the ‘Uganda National Parents Network,’ the “Pass the BILL Now Campaign” the parents addressed journalists in Kampala yesterday and outlined their course of action, following revelations lately that Cabinet had abandoned the bill owing to international pressure from donor countries.

“We urge you to do what is right even if it is not politically correct. Remember that your first obligation and loyalty should be to the citizens of Uganda and our children who are our future,” they urged government in a statement signed by Mr Steven Langa, the executive director Family Life Network.

“We ask you not to betray and abandon the parents who voted you into public office. Remember that is the Ugandans who elected you and not donors or foreign governments,” the statement added, noting that Uganda should make friends with nations that share common values. The parents called for formation of an African coalition with common cultural norms and values.

Langa is a proponent of “ex-gay” therapy and has outed alleged gay Ugandans on local radio stations and called for their mass arrest. He is closely connected to prominent American anti-gay conservatives like Scott Lively, who leads a Christian organization in California. The group, Abiding Truth Ministries, has been classified as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center and Lively himself has claimed that “homosexuals [are] the true inventors of Nazism and the guiding force behind many Nazi atrocities.”

Reports have long indicated that the Ugandan Parliament may take up the measure before the end of the year, despite international pressure to abandon it. The bill was initially championed by the American religious far right — most prominently the secretive group The Family, also known as the Fellowship — but many backed away from publicly supporting the measure in the wake of the international controversy. Republican Sens. Tom Coburn (OK) and Susan Collins (ME) co-sponsored a Senate resolution condemning the bill and several Republican representatives had written a letter to the Ugandan president urging him to do everything within his constitutional authority to stop the legislation.