Rendez-Vous Montréal 2006 better know as Montreal’s Gay Games
The Gay Games is a quadrennial athletic and cultural event, which brings together people from around the world. Based on the principles of inclusion and participation, the Gay Games welcomes all people without regard to their sexual orientation, gender, race, religion, nationality, ethnic origin, political belief, physical ability, athletic/artistic ability, or HIV status. There are no minimum standards to qualify for the Gay Games; the only requirement is the desire to support the ideals of the Games. When accepting the Gay Games' challenge to reach for one's personal best in sporting, artistic, and cultural activities, all Gay Games participants become winners.
By creating a safe and accepting environment, the Gay Games offers participants the opportunity to express themselves openly and to experience the camaraderie and validation of sport, culture, and art. The experience can be a highlight in one's lifetime. While individually, participants celebrate personal achievement, collectively, we experience the solidarity of community and celebrate the diversity and scope of the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender community. Through the athletic and arts/cultural events of the Games, stereotypes are challenged and barriers broken down.
Gay Games I was started by Dr. Tom Waddell (a former Olympian from the Mexico Olympics. Dr. Tom has since passed away from AIDS) and was held in San Francisco 1982 with 1600 athletes in attendance. The Gay Games II was also in San Francisco in 1986 with 3500 athletes competing in 17 sports and the addition of cultural events. In 1990 Gay Games III moved on to Vancouver BC Canada where they had 9500 participants. Gay Games IV went to New York in 1994 with 11,000 participants competing in 31 sports and cultural events. It was the largest sporting event in the world. Gay Games V 1998 moved across the ocean to Amsterdam hosting 14,700 participants of which 42% were women. Gay Games VI (to be held next year in Sydney Australia) is hoping to have over 14,000 participants with 50% woman. They have 12 cultural events and 31 sporting events. With still a year to go over 6,000 people have already registered for the Games.
Queer athletes around the world are going to have to make a hard choice in 2006. Normally, gay and lesbian sports fans would be looking forward to the 2006 Gay Games, originally scheduled to be held in Montreal. But following Montreal's angry split with the Federation of Gay Games over questions of control, the city has decided to hold its own event.
And the FGG - the international body in charge of the Gay Games - has countered by deciding to move the official Gay Games VII to Chicago. All of this has left athletes in a quandary over what to do. With two gay games in 2006 - one sanctioned by the FGG and one not - how will they decide where to go?
"The main issue is a cost issue - can we afford to go or not?" says Kenneth D'Souza, a water polo player with the Toronto Triggerfish. "If I could afford to go to both, I would definitely do that. Most people I know wouldn't be able to afford to go to both. They'll have to make a choice."
The organizers of the Montreal event - now called the Rendez-Vous Montréal 2006 Games - are confident that the world's athletes will choose to come to Quebec.
In November, they issued a news release citing the findings of an Équipe Montréal survey of 675 GLBT sports teams worldwide. The results, it said, were overwhelmingly positive: "More than 90 percent of responding teams confirmed their intention to attend Montréal 2006, regardless of the FGG's approval. Even a conservative extrapolation of these results allows us to predict... that we are already sure to exceed 16,000 registrants, 43 percent of whom will come from the United States."
Mark Tewksbury, an Olympic gold medallist and the co-president of the Montreal 2006 Gay Games Organizing Committee, says the Montreal event is much better prepared.
"I want to go where there's going to be the best competition, where there's going to be the coolest facilities, where I get to walk in an opening ceremony and look at the stadium. That's the experience I want. So I'm going to choose the place that's going to give me that. I think athletes, at the end of the day, they don't care about politics."
In fact, Tewksbury says the Gay Games Chicago, simply won't have enough time to organize things properly. With less than 1,000 days to go, Chicago will have little more than two years to organize a financially sound event. Tewskbury says the Rendez-Vous organizers are just going to continue forging ahead.
"We're going to deliver a magnificent event. It's in the Olympic venues, the city is completely onside, people are excited... and people love Montreal as a destination. So I think that, regardless of another event happening or not, Montreal's still going to be a great event."
The Gay Games is a quadrennial athletic and cultural event that brings together people from around the world. Based on the principles of inclusion and participation, the Gay Games welcomes all people without regard to their sexual orientation, gender, race, religion, nationality, ethnic origin, political belief, physical ability, athletic/artistic ability, or HIV status. There are no minimum standards to qualify for the Gay Games; the only requirement is the desire to support the ideals of the Games. When accepting the Gay Games' challenge to reach for one's personal best in sporting, artistic, and cultural activities, all Gay Games participants become winners.
By creating a safe and accepting environment, the Gay Games offers participants the opportunity to express themselves openly and to experience the camaraderie and validation of sport, culture, and art. The experience can be a highlight in one's lifetime. While individually, participants celebrate personal achievement, collectively, we experience the solidarity of community and celebrate the diversity and scope of the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender community. Through the athletic and arts/cultural events of the Games, stereotypes are challenged and barriers broken down.
Places to visit in Quebec
Holiday Ideas Quebec http://www.bonjourquebec.com/gay/
Rendez-Vous Montréal 2006 http://www.montreal2006.org/
See also: Gay Vancouver
Gay Montreal
Everything about Gay Toronto
Gay Calgary
Toronto's new Gay West Village
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