Olympic Wonder Women

The more I watch the Paris Olympics, the more I become that gif of Jo March just going “WOMEN!” Also, the more I watch Team USA women win, the more I become that person screaming, “RED-WHITE-AND-BLUE M*THERFUCKER! THESE COLORS DON’T RUN B*TCH!” Anyway, I hope you’ve been enjoying the games as well. As a lifelong fan of the Olympics (as imperfect as they are and have always been), I fall in love with the magnificent scope of human excellence every four years.

As I continue my renaissance as a sports lover this year (turns out I don’t dislike sports, I just dislike most men’s sports), this is also the first year of gender parity with the same number of male and female athletes. So there’s no better year to root, root, root for your home team – and it should be noted that most of America’s medal winners so far are women. Ahem.

Yesterday we added two more to that tally with US Women’s Gymnastics winning the team gold and US Women’s Rugby winning the bronze (also the first Olympic medal for any US team in rugby 7s, male or female, period). Both wins were emotional and inspirational. I’d also like to note for the record, I’ve been an Ilona Maher fan since the 2021 Tokyo games. So her new-found stardom is just wonderful to behold, even if she is straight. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Instead, for all the Olympic sapphics, if you happened to watch the Gymnastics Team Finals live, you were treated to two-time Olympic medalist and proudly out retired gymnast Laurie Hernandez providing color commentary and slipping in a sly lesbian roommates joke based on a popular old Vine. We stan a queer broadcasting queen, who’s got jokes!

I can’t wait for what all these amazing athletes can do for the rest of these games.