Matthew Mitcham, the openly gay diving champ who brought home a gold medal for Australia at the recent Beijing Olympics, is being honored with a limited edition postage stamp along with other Aussie Olympians. The Australia Postal Service is honoring their Olympian gold medal winners with these stamps which could very well be sold out by now. Mitcham was a standout because he was the only non-Chinese athlete to win a gold medal at the games.

  Matthew Mitcham treated the "story" of his being gay in a very matter-of-fact-manner and it wasn't an issue at the games--nor was it covered very well either. When asked a question in pre-Olympic newspaper interview about who he said it was with his partner of two years, Lachlan who was also in attendance at the games. Apparently he wasn't hiding anything nor did he plan on a "coming out" announcement. It simply was an open answer. While the NBC viewing audience for the games went out of their way to go after all the human-interest stories of the athletes at the games, Mitcham was conveniently left out of this cavalcade of inspirational stories. Bloggers and journalists called out NBC for this and the network did apologize.

 A side note here. NBC needed to be called out for other things in its coverage. It would have been a good idea to show the live events AS they happened rather than tape delay to the West Coast. It was unnecessary.  At the very least they could have let us know it was NOT live. We realize that by the time nighttime network coverage kicked in it was morning in Beijing so that not a great deal of high-profile events were taking place. But..beach volleyball? We aren't putting the sport and the athletes down but it seemed like this was the premiere event at the games! It wasn't even good eye candy for gay men. While the women jumped around and played wearing next to nothing (how sexist!) the men wore baggy shorts and t-shirts--ugh.

 The honor for Matthew Mitcham is yet another significant symbol for gay rights in Australia. Earlier this year the government announced it was overturning almost 100 discriminatory laws in the country, although reformation of the marriage act is still off the table. The Australian Capital Territory is meeting with national resistance to its plans to allow same sex couples to hold formal ceremonies recognizing their relationships. 

  Unfortunately laws in the USA make similar stamps impossible. Portraits of living people are forbidden on United States postage stamps and stamp subjects, with the exception of United States presidents, have to have been deceased for ten years. The only exceptions seem to have been a stamp commemorating the men hosting the flag at Iwo Jima and Lindbergh's flight----although neither stamp featured the likenesses of the men involved.  Too bad. If the postal dept wanted to make money they'd have the law changed. Can you imagine how many people would buy stamps that featured Michael Phelps or other stars?