Imagine how much more money he will get from Nike when he turns pro next year. Turning a 150k yearly contract to a few mil over 5 years. Great financial decision. Nothing but respect.
I hope this is a joke. no one should get payed extra for being gay
Imagine how much more money he will get from Nike when he turns pro next year. Turning a 150k yearly contract to a few mil over 5 years. Great financial decision. Nothing but respect.
Someone coming out as gay is a non-event for most people and after a few days, people will stop discussing Nico’s sexuality.
No problem with him being gay but the coming out thing as an athlete will most certainly be a net lost as a runner. As of this moment, the focus will be more on his sexuality than his running. I saw this happen with Nikki Hiltz which I guess is ok if that's what you want.
No problem with him being gay but the coming out thing as an athlete will most certainly be a net lost as a runner. As of this moment, the focus will be more on his sexuality than his running. I saw this happen with Nikki Hiltz which I guess is ok if that's what you want.
You’ll be thinking about Nico’s sexuality when he wins the NCAA XC championship this fall? He’s still my favorite American runner.
There’s far less tolerance for non-binary or transgender people, so Nico won’t have the same negative experience as Hiltz.
Imagine how much more money he will get from Nike when he turns pro next year. Turning a 150k yearly contract to a few mil over 5 years. Great financial decision. Nothing but respect.
Someone coming out as gay is a non-event for most people and after a few days, people will stop discussing Nico’s sexuality.
There are some sports like figure skating, high diving, and swimming where there have been a number of high-profile male athletes coming out and announcing their lifestyle choice.
The mystery to me is why people make more of a deal about males "coming out" rather than women "coming out" - especially in the sports Arena ?
This might create controversy in some countries but not in the USA and most developed economies.
I will not be making any comments in this thread because the mods would surely ban me again. During the summer they have brought on a new level of unfunness to LRC that is hard to imagine. It’s a shame, since the potential of using Flag in this thread in humorous ways seem quite lengthy.
You are making the erroneous assumption that any of your posts were fun to begin with.
The term "Flag," or any attempted clever uses of it, stops being funny for the large majority of Americans after junior high. That's been true for 20+ years now. It's just lame and old, old man.
If it is who he is. Of course we will think about it. And he told us it is who he is so that we would think about it. He may have a size 10 shoe or he may weigh 135 pounds but he didn't tell us those things. We think about NP when we think about him. We think about Lex and Leo when we think about him. And now we will think about his sexuality when we think about him. Those are all aspects of who he is.
I have a different take on it. If you don't see someone else being gay as an issue you wouldn't necessarily care either.
So, good for Nico but, I am more interested in him as a runner. Whatever he is in his private life I respect... but like Oscar I don't really care.
As a gay man, I appreciate your take on this. In a utopian world, someone being gay wouldn't matter because it would be treated as a normal acceptable thing. In the world we live in, where there is so much mistreatment of gay people, it does. As Nico said, he struggled with accepting himself due to societal messages he received about being gay. Thus, his coming out in that societal context matters to him and many other gay people (myself included) who at one point in their lives struggled with self-acceptance. As midpackgal noted, his coming out is particularly significant for younger gay runners to be able to see him as a role model.
I would add that it's one thing to not care about people's private lives (with the caveat that our relationships are actually rather public when you think about it), it's another to type "who cares" on a message board about a high-profile runner coming out. Simply posting "who cares" can come across as insensitive at best and dismissive at worst, which is why I downvoted it. Using the handle "Oscar Wilde" also raises some questions about that poster's motive. I would ask the person who posted that to reflect on why they felt the need to type "who cares" on this thread. There are lots of threads on this board I don't care about. I simply don't click on them. I don't see people typing "who cares" on other threads. Why this one?
I will not be making any comments in this thread because the mods would surely ban me again. During the summer they have brought on a new level of unfunness to LRC that is hard to imagine. It’s a shame, since the potential of using Flag in this thread in humorous ways seem quite lengthy.
Letsrun is the same to me as it was during the summer. Maybe it's you?
I'm happy for Nico and think it must be a big weight off his shoulder. That being said. I do have one quibble with tpart of his statement.
This is a quality of myself as well as so many other people that should be accepted and celebrated just the same as a straight person’s identity is.
Why does he talk about a straight person's sexual orientation being celebrated? Is being heterosexual ever celebrated? No it's not. No ever puts a "straight" flag on their front porch. The closet being straight comes to being celebrated is maybe a baby shower but you can have a baby shower for a gay couple as well.
There is no straight equivalent of PFLAG - Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbian and Gays. So being straight isn't celebrated.
If it is who he is. Of course we will think about it. And he told us it is who he is so that we would think about it. He may have a size 10 shoe or he may weigh 135 pounds but he didn't tell us those things. We think about NP when we think about him. We think about Lex and Leo when we think about him. And now we will think about his sexuality when we think about him. Those are all aspects of who he is.
I don’t think you speak for everyone. When I look at Nico, I see a guy that ran 13:11 as a 20-year old and him being gay is no more relevant to me than his shoe size or weight.