Johny Weir

This was only a matter of time. Johnny Weir has been forced to switch from real to fake fur.
Weir wore a costume for his free program at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships two weeks ago that included a small amount of — gasp! — white fox fur on his left shoulder. Not surprisingly, he received enough protests and hate mail from animal rights advocates that he has decided to replace the fox with faux fur.
The death toll in Haiti is more than 150,000. Soldiers are dying in Afghanistan and Iraq. One in 10 Americans are unemployed and homeless shelters are swelling. But hey, Johnny Weir wore a piece of fur on his costume! We can’t have that!
“I would like to announce that due to pressures and threats from a certain animal rights group, I will be changing the genuine fox fur on my free program costume that I will use in the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver, B.C., to white faux fur,” Weir said in a statement first posted on icenetwork.com. “I made this decision after several threats were sent to me about disrupting my performance in the Olympic Games and my costume designer, Stephanie Handler, was repeatedly sent messages of hate and disgust. I do not want something as silly as my costume disrupting my second Olympic experience and my chance at a medal, a dream I have had since I was a kid.
“I hope these activists can understand that my decision to change my costume is in no way a victory for them, but a draw,” Weir continued. “I am not changing in order to appease them, but to protect my integrity and the integrity of the Olympic Games as well as my fellow competitors.
“Just weeks away from hitting my starting position on the ice in Vancouver, I have technique and training to worry about and that trumps any costume and any threat I may receive.”
Priscilla Feral, president of Friends of Animals, told The Associated Press that no one from the group had threatened Weir.
“If he’s made the smart decision I hoped he’d make, to shun the skins of animals and not decorate his costumes with them, that’s a very good thing and I’m happy to hear it,” Feral told The AP.
Weir has strong opinions and is not shy about expressing them or defending them. When asked about the fur during the U.S. championships two weeks ago, Weir said he thought “it was lovely.”
He also said “PETA has been up my butt since the 2006 Olympic Games. I get postcards and nasty hate mail and videotapes of animals being skinned. And while I feel bad and understand their side of things, I take my little autograph card and I sign my name and I draw a chipmunk with X’s over its eyes and I mail it back. Don’t attack me for a personal choice. You’re protecting animals. We have soldiers dying all over the world. Choose your battles. Don’t pick on me.”
That was then. Apparently, even Johnny can take only so much. “When ‘Friends of Animals’ starts sending my costume designer hate faxes, it’s gone too far,” Weir tweeted recently.
So now it will be fake fur. Whew. Thank God. The Olympics can go on and we can focus on weightier, more important matters, like whether the cheese fondue to be served at the Swiss Olympic House represents an abuse of cows.
from ESPN
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Castor Semenya

JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA – South African runner Caster Semenya will keep her 800-meter gold medal from the world championships, and the results of her gender tests will be kept confidential, the South African sports ministry said Thursday.
The ministry also said in a statement that the International Association of Athletics Federations has agreed to allow the 18-year-old Semenya to keep her prize money.
“Whatever scientific tests were conducted legally within the IAAF regulations will be treated as a confidential matter between patient and doctor,” the sports ministry said. “As such there will be no public announcement of what the panel of scientists has found. We urge all South Africans and other people to respect this professional ethical and moral way of doing things.”
On Wednesday, the IAAF said the gender tests performed on Semenya had not yet been completed. The body had been expected to announce its findings Friday.
Before the 800 final in Berlin, the IAAF said it had ordered gender tests because of Semenya’s muscular build and rapid improvement in times. The case set off a storm in South Africa, and the IAAF was accused of violating her privacy. South African track officials were accused of failing to protect her.
Australian newspapers said in September that Semenya has male and female sexual organs, but the IAAF has refused to confirm or deny those reports.
After Athletics South Africa president Leonard Chuene admitted he lied about tests being conducted before the worlds, South African Olympic committee officials suspended him and the rest of the track body’s 12-member board.
The Olympic committee appointed one of its members, Ray Mali, as ASA’s administrator. When Mali moved into the track body’s Johannesburg offices this week, one suspended ASA official had to be escorted from the premises by police.
The sports ministry said Thursday it had asked the IAAF to apologize for its role, and had received this response: “It is deeply regrettable that information of a confidential nature entered the public domain.”
The IAAF also told the sports ministry it was not the source of leaks about the case.
from Reuters
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KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI – The Kansas City Chiefs have released troubled running back Larry Johnson.
A two-paragraph statement from the team Monday simply listed Johnson’s statistics and announced his release. Johnson was due to come off a two-week suspension Monday.
Johnson apparently caused the Chiefs to run out of patience after his latest brush with controversy. He questioned coach Todd Haley’s credentials on his Twitter accounted, insulted fans and used a gay slur. He then repeated the slur to reporters the next day.
Johnson needed 75 yards to breaking the team’s career rushing mark.
He established an NFL single-season record with 416 rushing attempts in 2006 when he set a franchise single-season mark with 1,789 rushing yards. He was a first round draft pick in 2003 from Penn State.
from Fox4
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Dieux du Stade

PARIS, FRANCE — Ewen McKenzie, recently sacked by French Top 14 club Stade Francais, on Monday slammed his former employers and accused them of prioritising the recruitment of good-looking players for the club calendar.
“Stade Francais is the best team in the world in terms of marketing,” the Australian told sport daily L’Equipe.
“It’s an international brand. But on the level of their sporting approach some things are shocking. Paris are verging on amateurism.”
He went on to accuse club president Max Guazzini of “only seeing two things – his calendar and the (team’s home ground) Stade de France”.
The popular Stade Francais calendar ‘Dieux du Stade’ (Gods of the Stadium), features nude and semi-nude photographs of team members.
“He has a marketing outlook which is not always in the best interests of sport,” said McKenzie.
“For example, Max could recruit one player over another just because he has a better look for the calendar.
“I had players in my squad who I never chose. Others were requested to leave the club because they didn’t want to pose for the calendar any more.
“I had certain players forced on me who, for me, shouldn’t have been in a team targetting the Top 14 title.”
Guazzini reacted later with disdain to McKenzie’s remarks.
“He has found a job in Australia, and it is imperative for him to justify the reasons why Stade Francais, which is a well known club in Australia, sacked him and all he comes up with are derogatory remarks,” he told French radio station RMC.
“From A to Z, everything he said was rubbish.
“Professionally speaking, ask the players, he didn’t work, he did absolutely nothing.
“In terms of recruitment, we did exactly what he asked of us.”
Former New South Wales Warratahs coach McKenzie was recruited in mid-2008 after the departure of Fabien Galthie. He was sacked on September 8 after the club endured a disastrous start to the season.
He has since been recruited by Queensland Reds for three Super 14 seasons.
from AFP

PARIS, FRANCE – A Mainly Muslim non-league French side said they could take on rivals consisting of gay players after all, four days after snubbing them in what the former on Saturday insisted was a “misunderstanding”.
Paris Foot Gay (PFG) were set to play fellow Creteil side Bebel, who are composed of mainly Muslim players last week but Bebel cried off a day beforehand, sending an email in which they regretted they could not honour the match as doing so was “against their principles”.
“Sorry, but because of the name of your team and in keeping with the principles of the team, which is a team of practising Muslims, we cannot play against you,” said the e-mail, according to PFG’s co-founder and current president Pascal Brethes.
It added: “Our convictions are stronger than a game of football. Sorry to have informed you so late.”
PFG deplored what they saw as a “homophobic” decision.
But today, Bebel director Zahir Belgharbi insisted there had been “a misunderstanding” and sent out a statement through club lawyer Benedicte Puybasset indicating they were indeed ready “to play the match”.
Mr Puybasset regretted that the matter had grown out of all proportion but local league president Jacques Stouvenel said both clubs had been summoned to a meeting next Tuesday to assess the situation, warning that Bebel could be disciplined or even thrown out of the league.
Mr Belgharbi said today’s statement was designed to “re-establish the truth and settle everything on the grounds of good sense,” rowing back on the initial snub.
“We had rejected playing this match not on the grounds of homophobia, as we have been accused of doing, but simply because the name of the club (PFG) did not seem to us to reflect our vision of sport, ” said Mr Belgharbi, saying his club believed no ethnic or religious slant should be placed on footballing matters.
“We reacted by turning down the invitation from Paris Foot Gay for fear of it leading to an instrumentalisation on the part of this club in that it was highlighting the homosexuality of its players,” he added.
Mr Brethes says his club is a haven for all kinds of races and also welcomes non-gay players.
from News.com.au