Sports
Former Redskin talks coming out, working with LGBT youth
Wade Davis says former colleagues applaud his decision
Wade Davis (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
Former NFL player Wade Davis spoke about his decision to come out, his work with LGBT youth and his support of President Obama’s re-election campaign during an interview at the Capital Pride Festival on Sunday.
The Shreveport, La., native spoke to the Blade less than a week after he publicly discussed his sexual orientation for the first time during an interview with the LGBT sports website Outsports.com. He said that he has been out to family members and close friends since he was 26.
“At the time I didn’t have the support structure around me with enough family or friends that I really thought would support my choice of being out,” he added when asked about why he did not publicly discuss his homosexuality with his teammates and others sooner. “Also just individually I wasn’t strong enough. I didn’t know who I was enough.”
Davis, 34, played preseason football for the Tennessee Titans, Seattle Seahawks and the Washington Redskins before an injury forced him to retire from the National Football League in 2004. He also played for the Berlin Thunder and the Barcelona Dragons in the NFL Europe league.
He told Outsports.com that he had begun to date a man for the first time while playing in the German capital, but he discussed his boyfriend with his teammates as though he were a woman. Davis also cited rumors he said he heard in the Titans locker room about a player whom his potential teammates thought was bisexual. He said at least one of them suggested that he avoid him to further bolster his chances of making the team.
“It increased my level of posturing,” stressed Davis. “I went from being probably a guy that was trying to be normal to maybe adding a couple extra layers on that to prove my masculinity, to prove that I was just one of the guys. I would say it deepened my closeting for lack of a better word.”
Davis is among a handful of athletes that include former NFL player Esera Tuaolo and former National Basketball Association center John Amaechi who have publicly discussed being gay since their retirement from professional sports.
Former Titans defensive end Jevon Kearse told Outsports.com after Davis came out that his sexual orientation would not have mattered in the locker room — Davis did concede, however, that most of his former teammates were upset that he hadn’t disclosed his homosexuality with them sooner. “I’ve gotten tweets, texts, e-mails, phone calls from guys I haven’t spoken to in years,” he noted. “It’s been just a windfall of love.”
Davis said the majority of his family has also been “very supportive.”
“My parents, who are very religious, are evolving very similar to the president,” he said, referring to Obama’s announcement during an ABC News interview last month that he supports marriage rights for same-sex couples. “They’re having to understand, OK, my son is… now gay so let me now re-evaluate what my true views are on what being gay is and what that would mean for me as a parent.”
Davis added that he has also received positive feedback from black gay men across the country since he came out. “The biggest thing is that they’re happy that I’m finally living in my truth,” he said. “They’re also happy that I’m not only living in my truth, but I’m making sure that others can follow in my footsteps.”
Nearly a decade after leaving the NFL, Davis now advocates on behalf of LGBT youth as a staff member of the Hetrick-Martin Institute in New York City.
“My goal is to teach youth how to thrive, survive and realize that they have potential to make it in the world, no matter what challenges have been placed in front of them,” he said. “My biggest goal is to help make sure our youth have a voice and they understand the power they have inside of them is strong enough to make it through anything.”
Davis, who has been with HMI since February 2011, further described the young people with whom he works as personal heroes who inspire him. “Even though I was an athlete — people think it’s something great, but I wasn’t able to live in my truth until I was 26, 27,” he said. “They live in their truth every day.”
In addition to his work with LGBT youth, Davis continues to support the president’s re-election campaign. He spoke to the Blade while volunteering for Obama for America at a Capital Pride Festival booth.
“I believe in just [about] everything our president represents from his stance on marriage equality to what he wants to do not just for black Americans or white Americans but for every American,” he said, further pointing out that Obama offers LGBT voters with what he described as a clear choice in November. “People will understand that voting for [former Massachusetts Gov.] Mitt Romney is a step back and voting for President Obama is a gigantic step forward in making sure that the values in our community are aligned with equality and non-bigotry.”
Davis conceded he had never considered himself a role model; but he said he has come to embrace his status within the context of his work with the Obama campaign, LGBT youth and as an out gay man.
“I take my role, very, very seriously so I’m going to do everything I can,” he said.
Sports
Attitude! French ice dancers nail ‘Vogue’ routine
Cizeron and Fournier Beaudry strike a pose in memorable Olympics performance
Madonna’s presence is being felt at the Olympic Games in Italy.
Guillaume Cizeron and his rhythm ice dancing partner Laurence Fournier Beaudry of France performed a flawless skate to Madonna’s “Vogue” and “Rescue Me” on Monday.
The duo scored an impressive 90.18 for their effort, the best score of the night.
“We’ve been working hard the whole season to get over 90, so it was nice to see the score on the screen,” Fournier Beaudry told Olympics.com. “But first of all, just coming out off the ice, we were very happy about what we delivered and the pleasure we had out there. With the energy of the crowd, it was really amazing.”
Watch the routine on YouTube here.
Italy
Olympics Pride House ‘really important for the community’
Italy lags behind other European countries in terms of LGBTQ rights
The four Italian advocacy groups behind the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics’ Pride House hope to use the games to highlight the lack of LGBTQ rights in their country.
Arcigay, CIG Arcigay Milano, Milano Pride, and Pride Sport Milano organized the Pride House that is located in Milan’s MEET Digital Culture Center. The Washington Blade on Feb. 5 interviewed Pride House Project Manager Joseph Naklé.
Naklé in 2020 founded Peacox Basket Milano, Italy’s only LGBTQ basketball team. He also carried the Olympic torch through Milan shortly before he spoke with the Blade. (“Heated Rivalry” stars Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie last month participated in the torch relay in Feltre, a town in Italy’s Veneto region.)
Naklé said the promotion of LGBTQ rights in Italy is “actually our main objective.”
ILGA-Europe in its Rainbow Map 2025 notes same-sex couples lack full marriage rights in Italy, and the country’s hate crimes law does not include sexual orientation or gender identity. Italy does ban discrimination based on sexual orientation in employment, but the country’s nondiscrimination laws do not include gender identity.
ILGA-Europe has made the following recommendations “in order to improve the legal and policy situation of LGBTI people in Italy.”
• Marriage equality for same-sex couples
• Depathologization of trans identities
• Automatic co-parent recognition available for all couples
“We are not really known to be the most openly LGBT-friendly country,” Naklé told the Blade. “That’s why it (Pride House) was really important for the community.”
“We want to use the Olympic games — because there is a big media attention — and we want to use this media attention to raise the voice,” he added.
Naklé noted Pride House will host “talks and roundtables every night” during the games that will focus on a variety of topics that include transgender and nonbinary people in sports and AI. Another will focus on what Naklé described to the Blade as “the importance of political movements now to fight for our rights, especially in places such as Italy or the U.S. where we are going backwards, and not forwards.”
Seven LGBTQ Olympians — Italian swimmer Alex Di Giorgio, Canadian ice dancers Paul Poirier and Kaitlyn Weaver, Canadian figure skater Eric Radford, Spanish figure skater Javier Raya, Scottish ice dancer Lewis Gibson, and Irish field hockey and cricket player Nikki Symmons — are scheduled to participate in Pride House’s Out and Proud event on Feb. 14.
Pride House Los Angeles – West Hollywood representatives are expected to speak at Pride House on Feb. 21.
The event will include a screening of Mariano Furlani’s documentary about Pride House and LGBTQ inclusion in sports. The MiX International LGBTQ+ Film and Queer Culture Festival will screen later this year in Milan. Pride House Los Angeles – West Hollywood is also planning to show the film during the 2028 Summer Olympics.
Naklé also noted Pride House has launched an initiative that allows LGBTQ sports teams to partner with teams whose members are either migrants from African and Islamic countries or people with disabilities.
“The objective is to show that sports is the bridge between these communities,” he said.
Bisexual US skier wins gold
Naklé spoke with the Blade a day before the games opened. The Milan Cortina Winter Olympics will close on Feb. 22.
More than 40 openly LGBTQ athletes are competing in the games.
Breezy Johnson, an American alpine skier who identifies as bisexual, on Sunday won a gold medal in the women’s downhill. Amber Glenn, who identifies as bisexual and pansexual, on the same day helped the U.S. win a gold medal in team figure skating.
Glenn said she received threats on social media after she told reporters during a pre-Olympics press conference that LGBTQ Americans are having a “hard time” with the Trump-Vance administration in the White House. The Associated Press notes Glenn wore a Pride pin on her jacket during Sunday’s medal ceremony.
“I was disappointed because I’ve never had so many people wish me harm before, just for being me and speaking about being decent — human rights and decency,” said Glenn, according to the AP. “So that was really disappointing, and I do think it kind of lowered that excitement for this.”
Puerto Rico
Bad Bunny shares Super Bowl stage with Ricky Martin, Lady Gaga
Puerto Rican activist celebrates half time show
Bad Bunny on Sunday shared the stage with Ricky Martin and Lady Gaga at the Super Bowl halftime show in Santa Clara, Calif.
Martin came out as gay in 2010. Gaga, who headlined the 2017 Super Bowl halftime show, is bisexual. Bad Bunny has championed LGBTQ rights in his native Puerto Rico and elsewhere.
“Not only was a sophisticated political statement, but it was a celebration of who we are as Puerto Ricans,” Pedro Julio Serrano, president of the LGBTQ+ Federation of Puerto Rico, told the Washington Blade on Monday. “That includes us as LGBTQ+ people by including a ground-breaking superstar and legend, Ricky Martin singing an anti-colonial anthem and showcasing Young Miko, an up-and-coming star at La Casita. And, of course, having queer icon Lady Gaga sing salsa was the cherry on the top.”
La Casita is a house that Bad Bunny included in his residency in San Juan, the Puerto Rican capital, last year. He recreated it during the halftime show.
“His performance brought us together as Puerto Ricans, as Latin Americans, as Americans (from the Americas) and as human beings,” said Serrano. “He embraced his own words by showcasing, through his performance, that the ‘only thing more powerful than hate is love.’”
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