By: Dick Thomas Johnson, CC BY 2.0
The 2020, uh, um, 2021 Summer Olympics in Japan have come and gone. These were unique games in many ways. The delay due to COVID-19, no fans in the stands due to COVID-19, the testing and the restrictions all from the Global Pandemic.
Yet, the games went on and there were many phenomenal performances, including those by openly LGBTQ athletes. According to Outsports there were 183 publicly out athletes that participated in the Tokyo games.
Collectively these LGBTQ athletes earned 33 medals, 11 Gold, 13 Silver, and 9 Bronze. This medal count would have them ranked 7th in the world for total medals, if they were one happy, gay, country. This is more medals than France, Germany, Netherlands, Italy, Canada, and Brazil. They also finished well ahead of any country that criminalizes homosexuality, the closest were Kenya (10 medals), Jamaica (9 medals), Iran (7 medals).
This was a breakout year for “out” athletes at the Olympics. There was triple the number of out LGBTQ athletes at these games than at the 2016 Rio summer games. This was also the first time out trans athletes competed in the Olympics. These LGBTQ athletes represented 30 different countries in 34 different sports.