Monash University Media Release
The announcement of Mitch Brown, a former AFL player, as the first openly bisexual male player in AFL history presents an important opportunity for the league to combat discriminatory behaviour and homophobia within its culture.
Dr Erik Denison, Faculty of Arts at Monash University says:
“Mitch Brown has shared some very sad and troubling stories about the deeply rooted homophobic culture in the AFL as well as the unhealthy masculine culture.
“It’s great that AFL leaders, including the CEO, are publicly supporting and congratulating him for coming out. However, I would also expect them to apologise to Mitch for not creating a safe environment for him to play his sport, and for failing to fulfil public commitments made by the AFL to change the homophobic culture.
“The AFL signed a commitment in 2014 to become a world leader in efforts to stop the pervasive homophobic language used at all levels of the game.
“This is an opportunity for the AFL to work with Mitch and other LGBTQ+ people in the AFL community to fulfill this commitment and drive long-overdue change to culture and behaviour at all levels of the game.”
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Easier for a former, but not an existing player?
Surely a person is either male,female of bi-sexual, just where does an “openy bi-sexual male ” fit into this picture?
jonangel:
Gender, sex and sexuality are three very different things. Bisexual means he’s sexually attracted to both men and women. You may be getting confused with intersex, which is a diverse category of those with varied genetic/chromosomal/hormonal/anatomical differences that mean they do not precisely fit either of the two poles of our bimodal sexual distribution.
Thank you and I’d agree. My post was obviously badly worded, the point I was trying to make, is what is wrong with being bi-sexual?
I’d suggest many people over the course of their lives have been attracted to those of the same sex as themselves and also the opposite sex.
I’m happy for him and hope that the media can resist them and they pronouns.