Insanely Athletic, Insanely Sexy

By all means, take selfies every day.

Love a classy group shot.

Admiring the...view.

Cue the 'Baywatch' theme song.

Sorry about your hand, beb.

So it does work!

Classic cub.

Moody...mysterious...art.

We only endorse beautiful men.

He's a family guy...swoon.

But how?

Thatt looks difficult. Here, have some water.

'Take Us to the Gym' (à la Hozier)

Teamwork, guys. It's a thing.

Good luck at the Olympics, team!

They're insanely talented atheletes who just happen to be insanely sexy.

Medical officials from the International Olympic Committee announced on Sunday that new policy would affect transgender athletes. The IOC said the new policy is to allow transgender athletes to compete without regard to any gender confirmation surgeries. These are recommendations, not rules, (for other organizations, including international sports federations) to follow, but they will go into effect for this year’s summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.

IOC medical director Dr Richard Budgett said, “I don’t think many federations have rules on defining eligibility of transgender individuals. This should give them the confidence and stimulus to put these rules in place.”

The rules aren’t uniform for men’s and women’s categories, however. Trans men will be allowed to compete in men’s competitions “without restriction,” but trans women must prove that their testosterone has been below 10 nanomols per liter for at least a year prior to competition. Previous guidelines from 2003 required gender confirmation surgery and two years of hormone treatment.

The guidelines were a result of a “Consensus Meeting on Sex Reassignment and Hyperandrogenism” meeting in November 2015 in Lausanne, Switzerland; the meeting was not announced. Though the guidelines have not yet been widely distributed by IOC, OutSports.com received the new guidelines from “a trusted source.”

The question of gender verification became a global issue in 2009 when South African runner Caster Semenya was forced to submit to sex tests after winning the 800m world title; she was approved to compete and went on to win silver at the London Olympics in 2012.

For the list of guidelines, go to OutSports.com

The Edmonton Oilers have teamed up with Pride Tape, an initiaitive by the Institute for Sexual Minority Studies and Services at the University of Alberta to encourage young queer players to join hockey. 

According to the Pride Tape Kickstarter page:

Pride Tape is a badge of support from the teammates, coaches, parents and pros to young LGBTQ players. It shows every player that they belong on the ice. That we’re all on the same team. And we need your help to make it a reality.

When Pride Tape is up and running, proceeds will support LGBTQ youth outreach initiatives, such as You Can Play and the Institute for Sexual Minority Studies and Services. That means every roll of tape will make an impact on and off the ice.

The Oilers were the first NHL team to use Pride Tape—they played with their rainbow sticks on Sunday during their annual Skills Competition at Rexall Place.

Oilers defenseman Andrew Ference said that he and his teammates are all "proud to play for a team and city that supports diversity and human rights."

For Ference, however, Pride Tape and what it stands for is more personal. Growing up he had a friend who quit hockey because he was gay and didn't feel comfortable in the locker room. 

“It’s something that means a lot to me, knowing that you’ve had friends who were directly affected," Ference told Metro News.

“This conversation wouldn’t have happened when I started playing hockey," he added. "We know that trickle down effect will happen to the younger kids playing the same sport,” 

The Edmonton Oilers Community Foundation (EOCF) also donated $8,000 to become a founding partner of Pride Tape, which has surpassed its fundraising goal. Pride Tape will use the funds to create an initial run of 10,000 rolls of tape, with plans to expand to as many teams as possible, as well as to other sports.

Check out a video on the partnership below: 

Out100 Honoree and Athlete of the Year Abby Wambach has scored more goals than any other person in the history of international soccer. She’s also openly gay and continually vocal about equality in sports. “ I hope the women, the studs that come behind me, get better pay and get treated a little more like the men,” she told us last year.

Now the athlete, who retired from soccer at the end of 2015, will dedicate her next career to fighting for equality. At the MAKERS conference, Wambach shared further insight with AOL CEO Tim Armstrong.

"It's astonishing to me at that the executive level at many, many Forbes 500 companies, there are very few women, very few people of different orientations, different colors, different ethnicities. So I want to tackle the biggie. And it's the thing that drives me the most crazy—it costs zero dollars to treat someone equally."

Wambach has since been on the campaign trail with Hillary Clinton. Oh, and she’s also getting her own Barbie doll (with a shaved head!). 

With the Super Bowl on Sunday, Pantene's hopped on the football train with a campaign featuring hunky NFL players being geat dads to their painfully cute daughters. 

There's just something about a giant man braiding his little girl's hair that makes me want to, I don't know,  Photoshop myself into the background and pretend like I'm witnessing a memory in the making.

Check out the Pittsburgh Steelers running back DeAngelo Williams, New Orleans Saints tight-end Benjamin Watson and Dallas Cowboys tight-end Jason Witten doing some little girl hair below:

Openly gay athlete Michael Sam, a former University of Missouri Tigers football player,  recently penned a letter for the Columbia Tribune condemning Missouri’s “religious liberty” bill, which legalizes LGBT discrimination on the basis of religious beliefs. He writes:

"Missouri lawmakers are dangerously close to passing an extremely harmful bill (SJR 39) that would make it easier than ever to discriminate against gay Missourians and their families. This so-called “religious liberty” bill is just another way to undermine the dignity of LGBT people and their families."

Sam continues:

"Similar anti-gay measures have been creeping into legislatures across the country — Indiana, Georgia, North Carolina — and everyone from businesses to voters to sports leaders have made one thing clear: Discrimination will not be tolerated in their states. Now I’m calling on everyone in Missouri, from business leaders to sports clubs, to echo that sentiment, to stand up and say: Not in our state."

Read the full letter here.

In the world of sports, homophobic slurs are all too common in stadiums. But Mexico’s national soccer team is taking a stand against this discrimination.

El Tri players have launched a campaign called “Abrazados por el Futbol,” which translates to “Let’s Hug for Football” or “Embrace for Football,” to encourage fans to be more aware of the words they use. The video was published on the team’s YouTube channel last week and asked spectators to refrain from using offensive and derogatory language. The word “puto” is the most commonly used word during games and translates to “faggot” or gay prostitute, and often refers to the opposing team’s goalkeeper.

The campaign was started after FIFA recently fined the Mexican Soccer Federation $20,000 for its chants. Last year, FIFA also fined Mexico for the same reason during the 2014 World Cup, though the country was later cleared of the charges. 

Sadly, Mexican officials plan on contesting the fine, arguing that the word isn't discriminatory in context.

Watch the campaign video:

One of the queerest things about homophobia is that many of its targets are not actually homo. Not because homophobia is a blunt, inaccurate baseball bat—though that as well—but because homophobia is used as a way of policing all men’s behavior, whatever their actual sexual preference. Or just to bring them down a satisfying peg or two That’s so GAY!! What are you, a FAG?? etc. etc.

Now that overt homophobia is increasingly uncool and sometimes illegal, it perhaps tends to be directed even more at men who are not officially gay or bi—albeit in a “joshing” way. Especially if they’re hotter and much more famous, wealthy, and talented than you—and we’re talking about football (disclaimer: soccer in the US).

During last week’s match between Real Madrid and Barcelona, the 31-year-old Portuguese football ace and underwear god Cristiano Ronaldo—Real’s star player—was targeted from the stands with chants of “MARICON,” the Spanish equivalent of “faggot.” Apparently this has been going on for a while.

Francisco Ramirez the director of the Spanish LGBT Observatory said: “For months the Real Madrid player Cristiano Ronaldo has been the continued object of insults and malicious rumours from the tabloids, and also from sports journalists and…players, in order to humiliate, offend and denigrate a great football player.”

Ronaldo is, by the way, not just a great football player—he’s one of the greatest of all time. He’s also currently the highest paid footballer in the world, which of course just makes him and his prettiness all the more intolerable. Ronaldophobia is perfectly understandable, really.

“It is necessary to clarify,” added Ramirez, “that homophobia does not necessarily mean that people who suffer are homosexual, but only that other people believe it or use it to insult, harass and humiliate others.”

I have no burning interest in Ronaldo’s “real” sexual orientation—someone who has reportedly been involved with a series of female supermodels. But lots of people do—straight and gay. Last year a photo of him horsing around with his bearded Moroccan kick-boxing buddy Badh Hari was seized upon by many as “proof” that Ronaldo is GAY!! (it’s never lower-case “gay”— and of course never, ever "bi"). Football pundits “worried” on TV that “cuddling” his buddy would “affect his performance.”

Football is a very odd game indeed.

Perhaps I don’t have enough imagination, or perhaps I’m just not repressed enough, but when I saw the photos I only saw two young men enjoying each other’s company and, rather wonderfully, not being afraid to show it. Not afraid, in other words, that people would think them…GAY!!

I also found myself wondering that if they were actually having a secret gay relationship they might have been rather more inhibited— and Hari might not have have captioned the pic of him picking up a grinning Ronaldo “Just married!”

But then, probably nobody really believed that the photos proved Ronaldo was having a gay romance— they were just a way to have a phobic little faux scandal and chastise him again for being a free, affectionate spirit with loads of money and talent and no modesty.

But however you interpret it, Ronaldo feels no need to deny rumors and the abuse or react to them at all. He really doesn’t give a shit what you or I think. Which is what drives so many of us—especially us English with our herd mentality—crazy.

When he played in the UK from 2003-2009 for Manchester United—the same club David Beckham had played for before moving to Real Madrid—Ronaldo was regularly abused from the terraces and also became the target of an especially vicious and sustained homophobic campaign from the UK media. Ronaldophobia was a national sport.

Unlike savvy, needy Beckham, proud Ronaldo didn’t go out of his way to curry favor with the press and play the self-deprecating game. Worse, he was younger, better looking, more talented—and, fatally, wasn’t English.

The UK’s biggest-selling tabloid repeatedly attacked the “arch metrosexual” as they dubbed him (as in, I guess, “arch villain” and “arched eyebrows”), for sunbathing too much, for wearing “tight silver shorts” on holiday, for his interest in grooming, his “perfectly shaved chest,” and generally being a big poof.

They even ran a piece comparing him to George Michael—who is also olive-skinned and GAY!! GEDDIT??—suggesting he fancies “playing for the other team,” and basically just shouting “MARICON!” at him over and over again.

Ronaldo’s response? He went on holiday wearing a pink baseball cap. With a pink flower behind his ear. After the UK press went predictably berserk again—including publishing photos of a male friend ACTUALLY TOUCHING HIM while he was wearing that GAY!! hat and GAY!! flower—he was pressed for a response: “I don’t see what is wrong with that if you are comfortable with your sexuality,” he replied, matter-of-factly.

The English of course aren’t comfortable with anything. Least of all themselves. Which is where much of their Ronaldophobia came from—and will likely surge back again with a passion if he returns to Manchester United as has been rumoured lately.

In that recent match against Barcelona where he was called MARICON! by the terrace oafs, Ronaldo was as shameless as ever—scoring a stunning winning goal in the last few minutes. Then in the locker room afterwards he lost no time stripping down to his white Speedos and showing off his buff, tanned, shredded body in a team photo with the celebrating Real lads.

What a careless, thoughtless, utter bastard. Why can’t he show some respect for the feelings of ugly, untalented men everywhere? Whatever their sexuality.

To mark their 20th anniversary as the UK’s first gay rugby team, the Kings Cross Steelers stipped down and posed for a new book to be published by indie 'zine Meat.

Entitled Meat The Kings Cross Steelers, the book features 29 players from the team’s 200-strong membership. All the players were photographed by Meat’s founder, Adrian Lourie.

Lourie, who started Meat in 2010, said that he was “tired of the body shaming that goes on within the gay community.” His aim is to “celebrate the bodies of ‘ordinary gay men.”

Christopher Kang, 1st XC player of The Kings Cross Steelers, who is featured in Meat, also agrees with Lourie in regards to male body image.

“I see myself as a pretty average looking-dude so I don’t really see myself as a pin-up anything,” Kang said.“So I’m chuffed that I’ve had the good fortune of joining a long line of Meat magazine dudes alongside so many of my fellow Steelers. The Steelers has not only helped pave the way for inclusive rugby teams but also helped hanged perceptions about gay sportsmen.”

Alex Smith, Chairman of the Kings Cross Steelers said: “Despite so much progress over the last 20 years, it can still be very difficult to be an out gay man, made even more so by a lot of unhelpful noise around how to be, act or look within the community. That’s why I’m proud that the Kings Cross Steelers have partnered with Meat to help show that anyone can be a pin-up by simply being yourself.”

He added: “For two decades, our club has helped hundreds of men – big, small, gay or straight – realize the great maxim about rugby: that it is a game for people of all shapes and sizes – truly a sport for everyone.”

If the pictures aren’t enough, be sure to watch the teasers for more of the hunky team’s players:

On Tuesday, former baseball pitcher and current (for now) ESPN analyst Curt Schilling shared the kind of narrow-minded, bigoted view of transgender people that allows for the passage of bills like North Carolina's HB2 and Mississippi's HB1523, essentially making it okay to discriminate against LGBT people while forcing trans people to use bathrooms that don't align with their gender identity. 

You can see the post here (because it doesn't need to be further broadcast), but it's the same kind of out-of-date and out-of-touch representation that trans people have had to deal with from those who couldn't be bothered to take the time to educate themselves about what they're protesting. 

Related | Trans North Carolinans Speak Out Against Discriminatory 'Bathroom' Law

Schilling captioned his post:

"A man is a man no matter what they call themselves. I don’t care what they are, who they sleep with, men’s room was designed for the penis, women’s not so much. Now you need laws telling us differently? Pathetic.”

ESPN, one of the more LGBT-friendly sports properties, was quick to issue a response, saying that they were "taking this matter very seriously and are in the process of reviewing it.”

Schilling then redoubled on his position in a blog post where he claimed people are “dying to be offended so you can create some sort of faux cause to rally behind.” And then, still unapologetic, Schilling told WEEI Wednesday morning that he was "blindsided" by the backlash:

“This, I don’t wanna say snuck up on me, but it did. My comment was as innocuous and non-aggressive as anything anybody can say. I’m still trying to figure out how all this happened.

[...]

“This is the world we live in...[The backlash] is because of the violent non-tolerant minority that shuts up anybody that doesn’t say something that they believe should be said.

[...]

"My question is why. Why is this a hot topic? What did I do that was risky?"

Schilling's confusion is...not understandable, so much as very apparent. What's also apparent is his ignorance of the issues at hand, or the fact that these bathroom bills aren't about protecting women and children so much as denying a vulnerable population basic human rights. 

But to put this in terms that Curt Schilling can understand: there's a reason why I don't make comments about baseball—because it's boring as fuck except for when the guys pat each other on the butt, and moreover, because I don't know anything about it.

Of course, shitting on the Mets and shitting on an entire population that is not violent, or "non-tolerant" but simply wanting to be treated like human beings are two different things. And from what I've heard around New York, the former is pretty much warranted. 

So, what is so risky? Ignorance. Why is this a hot topic? Because state governments have made it one. And finally, Schilling, having a trans colleague at ESPN in editor Christina Kahrl, should know better than to play into the "transgender = predator" narrative. And a little research would show that gender is not as black and white as he and other proponents of discriminatory laws make it out to be. 

Related | #TransIsBeautiful and Inspirational In This Video for Transgender Day of Visibility

But considering that this is hardly the first time Schilling has stuffed his cleets in his mouth, that is perhaps expecting too much. 

In a brief statement yesterday, ESPN announced that analyst and former Red Sox pitcher Curt Schiling has been fired after he made some offensive comments about transgender people:

ESPN is an inclusive company. Curt Schilling has been advised that his conduct was unacceptable and his employment with ESPN has been terminated.

Related | Why Curt Schilling Was 'Blindsided' by the Backlash Over His Anti-Trans Post

On Tuesday, Schilling shared a transphobic post to Facebook along with the comment:

"A man is a man no matter what they call themselves. I don’t care what they are, who they sleep with, men’s room was designed for the penis, women’s not so much. Now you need laws telling us differently? Pathetic.”

He later mansplained that his comment was "innocuous and non-aggressive" and that he was simply a victim of people who were “dying to be offended" to "create some sort of faux cause to rally behind.” 

Schilling has refused to comment on his termination, but his son Grant previously took to Facebook on Tuesday to defend his dad:

“And while I will say he’s not the most well informed in the modern LGBT+ culture, i can assure you he’s made great strides to understand people today. If he were a bigot he wouldn’t have allowed my Trans friends to stay over, he’s respected pronouns and name changes- never once have I heard him say something to me that I thought he should keep quiet about.”

This, however, is not the first time Schilling's comments have landed him in hot water at ESPN. In August he was suspended for a month after comparing radical Muslims to Nazis, and last month he suggested Hillary Clinton be "buried under a jail" over her email scandal.

Schilling, being a former professional baseball player, should know, then, that it's one, two, three strikes you're out at the old ballgame known as modern society. 

Schuyler Bailar was one of the best female divers in the country when he was in high school. He has since come out as trans, but his skills in the water have not changed; Bailer became the first openly transgender male to compete on a NCAA Division 1 men’s team when he joined Harvard’s swim team.

Though Bailar is not ranking as well as he did in high school on the girl’s swim team, he did recently beat his own best time. “I got sixteenth place, which is obviously not first place, but the whole team was on the side of the deck, jumping up, and screaming for me. I was ecstatic. It was more glory than I would have gotten in first place, probably because I was myself.”

Watch the interview: 

Watch: First Trans Male Swimmer Opens Up on Ellen

Watch: First Trans NCAA Division 1 Male Swimmer Opens Up on Ellen

The countdown has started to the next summer Olympics: We are down to 100 days until the 2016 opening ceremony kick off in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. As competing countries are starting to unveil their new athletic gear, we had to stop and pause on the British team's new uniforms, with Out cover boy Tom Daley front and center.

Daley debuted his new swim briefs, part of the Olympic athletic collection designed by Stella McCartney and Adidas.

The designer posted a sneak peek on her Twitter account...

Introducing the #TeamGB and #ParalympicsGB 2016 kit designed by Stella and @adidasUK. pic.twitter.com/tl2xRLzNJ1

— Stella McCartney (@StellaMcCartney) April 27, 2016

And Daley was kind enough to retweet a close-up:

With 100 days to go...the 2016 Team GB kit was launched! @stellamccartney and @adidasuk some amazing stuff!pic.twitter.com/mvkEzJFubO

— Tom Daley (@TomDaley1994) April 27, 2016

Enjoy those on Tom Daley's Instagram while we go renew our gym membership.

Tom Daley Reveals His New Olympic 'Uniform'

When football referee Jesús Tomillero publicly came out, he became Spain's first openly gay referee. Now, only 14 months later, Tomillero feels pressured to leave the Andalucían Regional League after months of abuse, The Guardian reports. Tomillero says his breaking point was last Saturday during a match between Portuense and San Fernando Isleño, where aggressive football fans hurled scores of insults towards him after he issued a penalty.

When Tomillero issued the penalty one fan yelled: “That’s that poof who was on the telly! You can stick the goal up your arse, you fucking poof.""Everyone in the stadium laughed," Tomillero told ElEspanol. 

In fact, Tomillero publicly coming out was the unavoidable byproduct of filing a formal complaint against a kit man for homophobic abuse. Andalucían Reginal Legal issued a nine-game ban to the kit man, but the league has remained silent on the issue. Tomillero described it as “absolutely incredible” that Peña Madridista Linense’s kit man got only a nine-game ban when “football is educating 14- and 15-year-olds."

The Spanish football world is not exactly known for being the most progressive. Even football superstar Cristano Ronaldo has been called gay slurs.

Queen of dry wit and drier martinis Chelsea Handler is back with a new Netflix talk show, Chelsea, following the success of her docu-series Chelsea Does... and, of course, her former E! show Chelsea Lately. On her sixth episode, which became available for streaming today, out-and-proud soccer star Robbie Rogers stopped by the studio to talk about his frustrations with the lack of openly gay athletes in his league and in the world. 

When Handler asked Rogers about his feelings on closeted fellow sportsmen and women, he explaind: "It frustrates me... after I initially came out, and played with the Galaxy, I was like, 'Ok, more people will come out. It's just kind of becoming the norm'... And now it's been four years—this is my fourth season—and there's not another gay soccer player in the MLS."

Rogers and sports journalist Bill Plaschke cited fear of teammate and fan reactions as a major reason for athletes choosing to remain in the closet.

The soccer icon remains hopeful. "It will change eventually. Our world's changing. The United States is changing."

Check out the clip below.

Chelsea is now streaming new episodes Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays on Netflix. 

Jed York, owner of the San Francisco 49ers football team and CEO of the brand, has called for a repeal of HB2, the law passed in North Carolina blocking legislature protecting LGBT citizens and, subsequently, demanding trans students use the bathrooms associated with their birth certificate sex. 

In addition, York donated $75,000 dollars to Equality North Carolina, the self-proclaimed largest LGBT advocacy group in the state. 

York explained in a public statement: 

The San Francisco 49ers are deeply concerned about North Carolina’s recently-enacted House Bill 2, which overturned protections for LGBT people and sanctioned discrimination across the state. HB 2 does not reflect the values of our organization, of our country, or the majority of North Carolinians.

We firmly believe that discriminatory laws such as HB2 are bad for our employees, bad for our fans, and bad for business. We believe that HB2 will make it far more challenging for businesses across the state to recruit and retain the nation’s best and brightest workers and attract the most talented students from across the country. It will also diminish the state’s draw as a destination for sporting events, tourism and conventions, and new business activity.

Discrimination is wrong, and we believe it has no place in North Carolina or anywhere in our country. As an organization that prides ourselves on being inclusive and welcoming to all, we strongly urge Governor Pat McCrory and the leadership of North Carolina’s legislature to repeal this law in the current legislative session.

Along with other NFL team owners, York went to Charlotte, NC this past week to discuss the Super Bowl. Charlotte's mayor has publicly rejected the HB2 law and is actively fighting against it and meeting with groups working toward equal treatment of trans citizens. 

NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy told ESPN: "We embrace diversity and inclusiveness in all of our policies, The Panthers have made clear their position of non-discrimination and respect for all their fans. The city of Charlotte also has made clear its position."

The NBA, whose All-Star game is set to take place in North Carolina in 2017, has thus far declined to change locations in solidarity against the bill.

Owner of San Francisco 49ers Demands Repeal of Anti-Trans Bathroom Law

Move over, Tom Daley. There’s a new out summer Olympic hopeful jumping in the pool.

Víctor Gutiérrez, 25, who plays on the Spanish water polo headed to Rio this summer, came out publicly as gay in an interview with Shangay magazine.

 

Este es el resultado de una decisión valiente y sopesada. Me costó decidirme pero estoy orgulloso de poner mi granito de arena en la visibilidad gay en el deporte. Gracias a mi familia que siempre me ha apoyado, a mis amigos incondicionales que han estado a mi lado, al equipo de Shangay por el cuidadísimo reportaje, y a todos aquellos que de una manera u otra me han hecho ser la persona que soy. Y sobretodo a Javier Caceres Perez por ser la cabeza pensante y darme las fuerzas que necesitaba para dar este paso al frente. Este soy yo. Abrazos y besos para todos!

A photo posted by Victor Gutierrez (@victor_g91) on May 25, 2016 at 7:15am PDT

In his exclusive with the Spanish gay magazine, Gutiérrez highlighted that he had come out to family and friends and felt ready to make the next step by going public. He also pointed to “70 homophobic attacks in Madrid so far this year” as part of his motivation for coming out.

The Catholic country has enjoyed marriage equality for more than a decade, but resistance remains from conservative groups who are against LGBT rights.

The Rio games will begin Aug. 5.

Olympic Water Polo Player Comes Out Ahead of Rio Games

Former Canoeing champ and Tema Great Britain member Matt Lister is Attitude’s newest cover man, alongside Laith Ashley. Lister came out when he was 20 and opened up to the publication about his experience. 

“I didn’t want to come out while I was in school because I was already bullied for being a fat, spotty kid and I was bigger than everyone and I was hairy. I may as well have just worn a target. I didn’t want to add another thing to that pile, so I just waited till the last year of school, when I was in the sixth form.”

Lister has since become a LGBT Athlete Ambassador and model. 

“I would never shame someone for not coming out because it’s a personal choice and it’s a difficult thing to go through, but I feel as if it’s a necessity for the LGBT community because you’re in the public eye. People are watching you, even people who aren’t involved in sport that maybe want to get into it, but they don’t try because they think it doesn’t fit them.”

Check out a behind the scenes video below and the full story here. 

The World CrossFit Regional Championship is taking place in Madrid this week, and the men from the CrossFit TLV club are participating—in style.

In what looked to be a bold move to support more LGBTQ inclusion in pro sports, the three athletes, Avi Yona, Ram Dover, and Gil Lior, caught everyone off guard by removing their team shirts to reveal brightly colored sports bras.

The audience clearly loved the moment. In an otherwise serious and generally macho competition, the gesture was considered a statement for gay rights (Pride month starts on June 1st in Israel), but the team later clarified that it was simply meant to bring some color and playfulness into the event.

Regardless, this symbol of gender-fluidity is not lost, especially in a time when more and more athletes are going out of their way to promote respect and protection for their LGBTQ teammates.

One of the sports commentators, audible in the video below, says that the entire team of athletes wearing sports bras is "the most outrageous thing I've ever seen."Really?! The life of a sports commentator must be very dull.

Further proving that inclusion and acceptance in professionals sports is neither a hard concept to grasp nor practice, the NBA has released its 2016 Pride collection.

In the midst of its end-season madness, the National Basketball Association has partnered with the Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network to give every NBA fan a chance to showcase some hometown pride.

“Professional sports showing up for LGBT people is one of the biggest cultural developments of the last decade, and really the last five years,” Eliza Byard, executive director of GLSEN told Outsports. “The NBA has been showing up for LGBT youth and for GLSEN for a number of years. Having this be a league-wide initiative, knowing any LGBT fan in the country can choose to celebrate their team and themselves with one of those shirts, that’s a whole new thing.”

All proceeds from sales of the pride line benefit GLSEN, but are only available until Monday. Get it here. 

NBA Partners with GLSEN for Pride, Rainbows Every Team Logo