In “Should we speak”, six athletes break the taboo of homosexuality in sport



Canal + broadcasts a documentary in which six high-level athletes reveal their homosexuality. – Canal +

  • This Saturday evening at 11 pm, Canal + broadcasts “Should we speak”, a documentary in which six French sportsmen reveal their homosexuality.
  • These high-level athletes, three men and three women aged 23 to 38, recount their journey in the hope of making a difference in the world of sport, where the word is slow to be released.
  • While several women showed the way years ago, skater Guillaume Cizeron was until then the only active male athlete to have spoken publicly about it last year.

A barrier will fall this Saturday evening. There will certainly still be little bits here and there, but a big gap will open and sport will be able, we hope, to embrace societal advances in this area. In a documentary broadcast on Canal +, six high-level athletes still active – three men and three women, aged 23 to 38 – publicly reveal their homosexuality to end this great taboo in the world of sport.

This film, titled We need to talk, intends to avoid sensationalism. Moreover, the suspense is quickly lifted. At the end of the introductory credits, the viewer will know the identity of those concerned. A rugby player, a swimmer, a skater, a basketball player, a fencer and a judokate will then recount their suffering, a little, but also and above all their journey and their hope to change mentalities.

“It’s a positive documentary,” explains Arnaud Bonnin, journalist and co-author of the film with his colleague Lyes Houhou. Six people tell the story of where they started from, who they are today and how their story can carry and change things for generations to come. “

The origin of this project dates back to 2015, when the journalist produced a long format for “Football surveys” on the taboo of homosexuality in the most popular sport in the world. He had sought to have players testify with their faces uncovered, without success. “Alone, they weren’t ready. I wanted this speech, this testimony, so I set out to create a collective of athletes, ”he says.

Cizeron the detonator

He tried it in 2018, but still met with refusals. Everything changed last year, when the skater Guillaume Cizeron decided to expose himself publicly to “serve the cause”. He is the very first active male athlete to dare to do so, while several sportswomen have shown the way for a while (Amélie Mauresmo, Marinette Pichon, Amandine Leynaud or Mélanie Henique). The positive reactions have been a weighty argument to convince athletes. Three years have passed, too, and some are now closer to the end of their careers. They understood that they had more to give than their athletic performance.

Among the dozen or so athletes solicited, two refused, five took the plunge. And then a sixth gave his approval at the very end of filming, in March, giving the film yet another dimension: the rugby player. “That changes everything, because here we are going really far in the taboo, explains Arnaud Bonnin. It is a team sport, therefore with integration into a team to be managed, very popular with a lot of public in the stadiums, and which represents the very image of virility. “

The player in question tells in particular the gap between his personal history and the environment in which he evolves, how he received when younger these sentences that we hear too often in the locker room, where it is important not to behave “like a queer ” in the field.

The support of the Minister of Sports

These athletes have in common that they experienced their situation much better from the moment they opened up to a few close friends in the community. “Their greatest suffering is having had to go into hiding,” observes the journalist. Talking about it changed their lives, and that’s what I hope will come out of this film. The sports community is quite capable of hearing this kind of speech. It doesn’t mean that there will be 100% positive feedback, that it will be obvious, but it’s much easier to talk about it than not to. “

By exposing themselves in this way, these six athletes do not want to become ambassadors but to help the youngest, sometimes ready to stop sport because they do not find their place there, and to put an end to these clichés from another time. They also want to encourage federations to do more on awareness and education of coaches.

The Minister for Sports, Roxana Maracineanu, has already welcomed the speech. “You need courage to dare to talk about your homosexuality when you are athletic / athletic. Even today, she wrote on Twitter. It is important and necessary to give a voice to those who break the silence. “

“We have to talk”, Canal +, Saturday June 19 at 11pm



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