World Outgames - Schism in LGBT Sports Communities Over Gay Games VII

Schism in LGBT Sports Communities Over Gay Games VII

In 2001, the bidding organization from Montréal, Canada won the right to negotiate with Federation of Gay Games (FGG) for a licensing agreement to host the 2006 Gay Games, but after two years of failed negotiations Montreal broke off talks at the 2003 FGG annual meeting in Chicago. There were three main points of contention, over which neither party could agree:

• Size of the event
• Size of the budget — especially the planned break-even participation point
• Financial transparency

In a weakening global economy following international terrorist attacks, including 9/11, the FGG wanted Montréal to be able to plan for a successful Gay Games even if participation did not meet Montréal's optimistic projection of 24,000 participants, twice the level of participation of the previous Gay Games in 2002. Due to financial problems in previous events, the FGG also asked for transparency into Montréal 2006's financial activities. After Montréal refused to continue talks, the FGG held a second round of bidding in which Chicago and Los Angeles bidders, who had put forth well-received bids to host the 2006 games in the first round along with Montréal and Atlanta, chose to bid. Ultimately, the FGG awarded Gay Games VII to Chicago Games, Inc.

The Montréal organizing committee nevertheless decided to proceed to hold an athletic and cultural event without the sanction of the FGG; this plan developed into the first edition of the World Outgames, and the creation of its sanctioning body, the Gay and Lesbian International Sport Association.

Due to limited personal and organizational resources, many individual and team participants were forced to choose between Gay Games Chicago and World Outgames Montréal, a situation exacerbated by the two events being a week apart. The closing ceremony of Gay Games Chicago on 22 July 2006 was only 7 days before the opening ceremony of World Outgames Montréal on 29 July 2006. This meant that those who competed or performed in Chicago would have little recovery time before Montréal. The split resulted in a lower quality of athletic competition at both events because neither could claim the whole field of competitors. Team and individual sports were hurt alike. Few teams were able to field complete squads for both events; In wrestling, 100 wrestlers competed in Chicago (comparable to previous Gay Games), but only 22 competed in Montréal, by far the lowest number for any major international tournament. There was some advantages to the games being so close together time wise and location wise. For some overseas participants who had to travel far, the convenience of the two events being only a week apart and not far from each other enabled them to attend both. Many did not attend at all. After Chicago drew approximately 12,000 participants, Montréal drew an estimated 8,000 athletes—a third of the organization's original projections."

Since 2006, the need for a secondary global multisport event has been the subject of much debate, especially after the final financial figures for 2006 were released. The Chicago Gay Games VII ended with no debt and all bills paid. In contrast, the Montréal World Outgames ended with 5.3M Canadian dollars of debt."