Collegiate track and field athlete went from being a closeted and scared freshman to a tireless advocate for LGBT athletes on his Bucknell campus.

FEATURE HIGHLIGHTS

By Sean Coyne
For Outsports.com

I was sitting in a bar near the Bucknell campus this year with a guest speaker who had just spoken as part of an athletic department program for athletes. At the bar, we ran into a bunch of guys on the lacrosse team and I was a bit wary.

The lacrosse guys always made me slightly uncomfortable, because I assumed that being on such a hypermasculine sport would make them very homophobic and possibly dangerous to me, an out member of the track and field team. I soon learned that stereotypes can work both ways.

Over a few beers, the speaker and I got to talking with these guys about the issues faced by LGBT athletes. I could not have been more wrong about their feelings on the subject. The lacrosse captains were two of the nicest guys and were very receptive to what I had to say about issues I've faced on my team, and that some of their teammates have probably also faced.

I talked to them about the Safe Space program for athletic teams (a program I started to create a safe environment for LGBT athletes), and they agreed to happily participate. I couldn't believe it -- here these jocks I had assumed to be homophobic were to become the second men's team at Bucknell to become a Safe Space.

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