ABSTRACT
For the rst time ever at an Olympics, Pride Houses, where gay and lesbian supporters watched and celebrated the events, were set up in Vancouver. The idea for Olympic Pride Houses was that of Dean Nelson and Ken Coolen, two white gay businessmen who invested CAN$100,000 of their own money. The rst Pride House was in Whistler, a ski resort north of Vancouver city. The Whistler Pride House was, initially, a commercial response to the Olympics being scheduled at the same time as the WinterPRIDE ski week, which is operated by Nelson’s company (Gay Whistler, 2009). Nelson then set up a steering committee to expand Pride House into three venues – the main site in Whistler Village, the Vancouver LGBT community centre and at a pub in Vancouver’s gay village. The focus of the Vancouver Qmunity Pride House was to create a safe space for athletes to access social, educational, health and support services (BirchJones, 2010). Patriotic narratives about inclusion and safe spaces for gay and lesbians and Canadianess were prominent within the Pride Houses. For instance, Marion Lay, lesbian sport activist and Canadian Olympic medallist in 1968, celebrated the opening of the Pride Houses as follows: ‘There’s no safer place in the world than Vancouver to come out and make a really strong statement … To be our authentic selves, be true Canadians. To represent Canada. To be the best we can be’ (Pink Triangle Press, 2010). This narrative about Vancouver as a ‘safe’ place to be gay or lesbian is connected to wider discourses about Canadian multiculturalism and samesex rights.
