Ten openly gay Olympians have won medals at the Summer Games in London.
Commenting online, Cyd Zeigler, co-founder of Outsports.com wrote, “If Team Gay was a country, it would have finished 31st overall with seven medals, tied with Mexico, Ethiopia and Georgia. They would have beaten the medal count of such countries as Jamaica, Ireland, Argentina and India. They would have finished 21st overall for most golds (four), tied with Iran, Jamaica, Czech Republic and Korea.”
The gold medals winners were: Seimone Augustus, USA, basketball; Carl Hester, Great Britain, equestrian; Marilyn Agliotti, Carlien Dirkse van den Heuvel, Kim Lammers, Maartje Paumen, Netherlands, field hockey; Megan Rapinoe, USA, soccer.
Judith Arndt, Germany, won silver for cycling and bronze medal winners were Edward Gal, Netherlands, equestrian and Lisa Raymond, USA, for tennis.
Zeigler continued, “Over 43 percent of the out athletes (10 of the 23) won a medal in these Olympic Games. That’s over double the percentage of athletes overall who won medals: 20 percent. Team Gay outperformed the percentage of Team USA athletes with medals, 39 percent of which is taking home hardware. A whopping 58 percent of all openly gay, lesbian or intersex Olympians over the years have won a medal, which is an incredible statistic … the argument that athletes can’t come out for fear of performance on a team is destroyed by the result of these Olympic Games.”
