The European Gay and Lesbian Sport Federation (EGLSF) attended the 2-day European Lesbian* Conference held in in Vienna from 5-8 October, 2017 in order to present our workshop in the “Fields of sport: empowering or oppressive spaces for minorities?” section.
EGLSF presented the work we do for our 22 000+ members, the work we do with the Erasmus + EU programmes such as VOICE, Heroes of Football and Queering Football, and then opened the floor to an open discussion.
The workshop discussions raised important issues and brought home the diversity of our community. As well as being sportswomen we are also older lesbians, lesbians struggling to exist in countries where our mere existence is threatened with the death penalty, feminists, and more. Sport is our way of expressing ourselves but our sport, our sports partners, our sports organisations and our sports leaders need to accept the diversity of our community and recognise that it is our strength. We are not there yet. But we are willing to take on the challenge, to try and move things forward and create a fully inclusive and safe environment for us all in which to enjoy our sports.
We thank our sponsors the VOICE Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union and FARE #FootballPeople for enabling us to be present at this conference.
For more information on:
EGLSF:
The European Gay & Lesbian Sport Federation (EGLSF) was founded in 1989. Its aims are to:
- fight against discrimination in sport on grounds of gender identity or sexual orientation
- stimulate integration in sport and emancipation of athletes regardless of gender identity or sexual orientation
- enable and support the coming out of athletes
- exchange information and enable co-ordination between European sport groups and tournaments
- support the founding of new gay/lesbian/bisexual/straight/transgendered/queer and mixed sport groups
We are a federation, which is open to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, queer, and non-binary sports groups and organisations. At the moment this network has more than 22,000 members within over 115 organisations and sport groups. In the EGLSF all member organisations are autonomous: the Federation is operating as a servicing and coordinating body.
The EGLSF is the governing body of EuroGames, the largest LGBTIQ multi sport tournament held in Europe. The last EuroGames 2016 were held in Helsinki, Finland. The next games will be held in Rome, Italy in 2019
Our members are invited to join the General Assembly. This annual Assembly is the highest decision making body of the Federation. The members of the EGLSF board are elected (for three years) by the General Assembly.
“European Gay & Lesbian Sport Federation,” “EuroGames,” with the star, are trademarks of the European Gay & Lesbian Sport Federation.
www.eglsf.info
www.twitter.com/eglsf
FARE Football People action weeks: www.farenet.org
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