{"id":20099,"date":"2014-07-14T12:30:57","date_gmt":"2014-07-14T02:30:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nofibs.com.au\/?p=20099"},"modified":"2019-04-13T23:57:57","modified_gmt":"2019-04-13T13:57:57","slug":"ian-thorpe-did-not-have-a-sweet-sixteen-burgewords-creatingwaves","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/ian-thorpe-did-not-have-a-sweet-sixteen-burgewords-creatingwaves\/","title":{"rendered":"Thorpie did not have a Sweet Sixteen: @burgewords #CreatingWaves for @IanThorpe"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

\"FALES<\/a>

FALSE START: Ian Thorpe falls from the blocks.<\/p><\/div>\n

I WASN’T\u00a0going to write about Ian Thorpe\u2019s coming out. What more can there be to say about this moment in his life, which has huge ramifications for him but should have none for us?<\/p>\n

But then I read one article\u00a0which got me angry, the kind of piece I\u2019d hoped to avoid but which\u00a0<\/span>I knew would surface: the \u2018Ian Thorpe Lied To Us\u2019 type article.<\/p>\n

I also wanted to watch the interview he gave to Michael Parkinson before forming too many thoughts.<\/p>\n

The only unexpected moment was when \u2018Thorpie\u2019 recalled being asked about his sexuality at the age of 16.\u00a0Parkinson picked-up on Thorpe\u2019s affront at this and ran with it, creating the\u00a0sense that 16 was just too young to be asked such a question.<\/p>\n

Thorpe then qualified his view: that to ask anyone about their sexuality is unnecessary, but went on to assert that had he not been asked at that young age, he would not have stayed closeted so long.<\/p>\n

If it was a nosey journalist who asked him as a 16-year-old, then I agree, it was an affront, but I don\u2019t believe it\u2019s enough to leave this pivotal moment in Australia\u2019s same-sex attracted history at that.<\/p>\n

\n

Still feel like Thorpie shouldn\u2019t have been tempted to lie, or are you starting to \u2018get\u2019 the self preservation which drove his denial?<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Let\u2019s look at the world Ian Thorpe inhabited at \u2018Sweet Sixteen\u2019. I don\u2019t mean his swimming career – he was well on the ascendant at that age. I want to illustrate the world for a closeted 16-year-old gay man.<\/p>\n

On October 13, 1998, Ian Thorpe\u2019s 16th birthday, the age of consent for gay men was\u00a018. Ever since 1984, when the decriminalisation of homosexual acts between men resulted in an age of consent for\u00a0straight people and lesbians of 16, the law had remained unequal.<\/p>\n

That legislation – The Crimes (Amendment) Act 1984<\/i> – would not be repealed until another nasty-sounding law – The <\/i>Crimes Act 1900<\/i><\/a>\u00a0– was amended in 2003.<\/p>\n

In October 1998, for two men to live together in a de-facto relationship was still a political act. The Property (Relationships) Legislation Amendment Act<\/i> was not created until the following year, requiring further amendment in 2002, 2008 and 2009 to remove\u00a0discrimination against same-sex attracted people financially in almost 100 other pieces of state and federal legislation.<\/p>\n

There was no form of legal coupling for same-sex attracted\u00a0people in 1998, a situation which has not altered in NSW, or anywhere in Australia, to the present day.<\/p>\n

In 1998, same-sex adoption and surrogacy were\u00a0illegal and would remain so until 2010.<\/p>\n

In 1998, any person who decided to bash, abuse or kill a gay person in NSW would have had the \u2018Gay Panic\u2019 defence at their disposal.<\/p>\n

This is the most recent piece of law reform for LGBTQI people in NSW, having been abolished in May this year. In Queensland and South Australia, \u2018Gay Panic\u2019 is still a legal form of defence.<\/p>\n

We know that Thorpie didn\u2019t limit himself to swim-meets\u00a0on home soil – he competed in places where\u00a0widespread marginalisation of same-sex attracted people was and remains common, including Japan and Greece.<\/p>\n

But the most dangerous destination Thorpe travelled to in his 16th year was Malaysia, where he won four gold medals at the Kuala Lumpur Commonwealth Games, but risked deportation, prison terms, fines and public whippings if he had acted on his same-sex attraction whilst in that Muslim country.<\/p>\n

There was some good news for the millions of HIV\/AIDS patients in 1998 – many of them were returning to work, despite the often crippling side effects of anti-retroviral drugs. No longer the short-term death sentence it had been, there were enormous question marks over the long-term effects and efficacy of combination therapies on the epidemic. Survival time after contracting HIV was simply unknown.<\/p>\n

\"Ian<\/a>

Ian Thorpe with young fans in 2006.<\/p><\/div>\n

So, asking the 16-year-old Ian Thorpe if he was gay was tantamount to asking him if he was attracted to the proposition of engaging in illegal sex which could never result in a legally recognised relationship with no hope of creating a family unit, including children.<\/p>\n

If Thorpie had said yes to the sex, but found himself the victim of homophobic attack, his attacker would likely have gotten off or received a lesser sentence. There was\u00a0also the fear of contracting HIV\/AIDS in the mix.<\/p>\n

Is this an attractive proposition, or one which even you, in Thorpie’s\u00a0position, might deny?<\/p>\n

Another young man said yes to the sex a week before Thorpie\u2019s 16th birthday. His name was Matthew Shepard<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Taking into account the time difference between the US state of Wyoming\u00a0(where Shepard was bashed and left to die on a barbed wire fence by a pair of homophobes, later dying of his wounds), and NSW\u00a0(where\u00a0the\u00a0Thorpe family celebrated\u00a0Ian\u2019s 16th birthday), the two events would have occurred\u00a0at about the same point in time.<\/p>\n

Sexual acts between men had been legal in Wyoming since 1977, and Shepard was over the age of consent at the time of his death. He had it better legally than Thorpie, but Matthew Shepard\u00a0still ended-up suffering and dying as a result of\u00a0his sexuality.<\/p>\n

Still feel like Thorpie shouldn\u2019t have been tempted to lie, or are you starting to \u2018get\u2019 the self preservation which drove his denial?<\/p>\n

Laws do not change everyone\u2019s behaviour, of course, but consider the impact of legislation on one of Australia\u2019s highest-profile gay men – Justice Michael Kirby – who did not come out publicly until he was 60 years of age, during the same year as the The Property (Relationships) Legislation Amendment Act NSW <\/i>(1999).<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>

The Hon Justice Michael Kirby.<\/p><\/div>\n

Kirby had lived with his de-facto spouse Johan van Vloten for thirty years prior, during part of which time they hid their relationship from family, friends and colleagues. Kirby came out by simply listing his partner in Who\u2019s Who <\/i>once their cohabitation and all its rights and responsibilities were legally protected.<\/p>\n

Then there are the ‘unofficial laws’ which\u00a0encourage\u00a0same-sex attracted people to remain in the closet\u00a0–\u00a0‘The Laws of Nature’\u00a0– as hard for young people to argue against as invisible faith, yet\u00a0so often cited by homophobes,\u00a0and\u00a0so powerful they kept\u00a0generations of lesbian women closeted in places where there were\u00a0never laws against homosexual acts between women, and still impact on gay people everywhere.<\/p>\n

This issue clearly goes beyond legislation, but could Kirby have risen so far in his profession without being closeted? Could Thorpe? Those of the \u2018They Lied To Us\u2019 team could do with answering such questions. Thorpe\u2019s query to Australia last night challenged us to consider\u00a0how much we wanted and needed him to lie.<\/p>\n

Ever since seeing Ian Thorpe interviewed during the Sydney 2000 Summer Olympics, I have known he was same-sex attracted. It was simply his demeanour, the same way of patting his solar plexus with a bent wrist as I do\u00a0when using myself\u00a0to illustrate a point.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a subtle but giveaway gesticulation.<\/p>\n

Whenever I witnessed people speculating about Thorpe\u2019s orientation, I challenged their determination to claim him for \u2018their team\u2019, because a team is what a male Australian sports legend must declare a position on: he is never his own man, his countrymen feel like they own him.<\/p>\n

By the mid-2000s it became painful to watch Thorpe\u2019s slow-motion train wreck, without being able to do, say or write anything to help in the journey every out same-sex attracted person must endure.<\/p>\n

Some journalists reached out to him. One open letter<\/a> by founding editor of DNA magazine Andrew Creagh stood out for me. It was assertive enough to get to the truth, and empathetic\u00a0enough to express what was needed despite Ian Thorpe\u2019s closeted situation.<\/p>\n

A journalist who asks a 16-year-old swimming star of either gender whether\u00a0they are straight or gay should rightly come away looking like an idiot, not only because it\u2019s a dumb question, but also because these days a 16-year-old\u00a0(gay, straight or anything else) is considered a self-determining adult as far as sexual orientation is concerned.<\/p>\n

Same-sex-attracted 16-year-old boys were not considered adults prior to 2003, we were considered a danger to ourselves who needed \u2018protection\u2019 from wand-waving homosexuals trying to recruit us\u00a0onto the \u2018wrong\u2019 team.<\/p>\n

Such fantasies are laughable now, but in their day they were nails\u00a0in the closet door.<\/p>\n

Congratulations and best wishes to Ian Thorpe. His coming-out is a far greater achievement than any gold medal. It’s a life-changing validation for teenagers batting for the same team, and their families; and it means that when he manifests the\u00a0relationship and new career last night’s interview hinted at, at least he won’t have to come out again and again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 I WASN’T\u00a0going to write about Ian Thorpe\u2019s coming out. What more can there be to say about this moment in his life, which has huge ramifications for him but should have none for us? But then I read one article\u00a0which got me angry, the kind of piece I\u2019d hoped to avoid but which\u00a0I knew […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":20103,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[3434,1624,675,1542,585,855,854],"tags":[1964,1961,1967,1966,1970,1960,1972,293,1969,1971,1962,1968,1965,1963],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/THORPIE.jpg?fit=799%2C400&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3t0mw-5eb","jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20099"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20099"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20099\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20103"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20099"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20099"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20099"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}