During this year’s Winter Olympics, figure skating got more attention than it has since the Nancy Kerrigan/Tonya Harding incident in 1994. Lacking any real scandals, the media decided to make a really, really big deal out of an Olympic figure skater possibly being gay.
Yes, you read that correctly.
Seriously, was anyone surprised?
Yes, ladies and gentleman, Olympic skater and three-time US Champion Johnny Weir is probably not heterosexual. And he’s not the first member of the Boy’s Club to compete. It was positively shocking to many people when former US Champion Rudy Galindo came out in 1995. For some reason. I mean, really? Is there any sport gayer than figure skating? Yeah, of course there are a few heteros in the mix, as Elvis Stojko is very quick (and loud) to point out. There’s also always a straight guy competing on Project Runway. Remember that biker guy who favored tight black jeans…wait, never mind. There are just some places that we should not be surprised to find our same-sex-loving male friends, and figure skating ranks pretty well near the top. It’s up there with fashion design and hairdressing.
But this year, the question was actually posed: “Is Johnny Weir too gay for the Olympics?” Some of us didn’t feel such a thing is possible. Macho manly-man and adamantly heterosexual Elvis Stojko—a 37-year old single former Olympian who has never dated anyone, ever—has said that figure skating should be about “masculinity, strength, and power”. Kinda makes you wonder why he didn’t play hockey instead. Or not.
But Weir is very much his own man. The aspiring fashion designer who is responsible for most of his own costumes has said, “I love beautiful things, and if that means having a fur coat or diamonds or even if I want to wear a tiara someday, then that’s just the way it’s going to be”. He likes to wear his lip gloss, and who of us will ever forget the night he was robbed of a medal but showed dignity and grace, wearing a crown of roses and carrying an enormous rose bouquet from his fans? When asked about whether he was disappointed with the results of the competition, he waxed philosophical, saying, “As Lady Gaga would say, ‘I have all my role models out there’. I may not be the most decorated person in the skating world, but judging by the audience reaction…they go on my journeys with me”.
I dare say that he is probably the most decorated person in the skating world. He just doesn’t have any Olympic medals. He endured commentators laughing after saying his name; hearing competitors referred to as ‘athletes’ while he was ‘ever-flamboyant’; and even read that RDS, the Canadian ESPN, suggested that he undergo a gender test or compete against women. The whole time, he kept his cool and, at a press conference to address the RDS comments, joked that he grew stubble to prove that he is, in fact, a man.
The really, truly wild part about this whole story is that Johnny Weir has never once said that he is gay. When asked, he has responded, “I don’t think it should matter”. He’s right. But there are one or two things that sort of give it away a little bit. Maybe it’s the costumes, or the crown of roses, or the lip gloss, or performing in the Olympics to Lady Gaga’s “Poker Face”, or posing wearing platform stilettos, or the feathers and leather and fur.
But will he ever say it out loud? He might have to, because we might have some trouble seeing it through his p-p-p-p-poker face.