New York City FC’s Post

Transcript

I've started in 1988, so how many years is that now? Half of these brambles weren't even yet. And the Ramblers are the oldest and largest LGBTQ plus soccer club in the world. We were founded in 1980. A man named Bob Whitmore wanted to find a fellow gay men to play soccer with. And so he put an ad in the Village Voice asking that people who were interested meet in the Rambles, which is the section of Central Park and also where we get our name. We now currently sit at about 300 members. And are getting ready to celebrate our 45th anniversary next year. We're here for anyone that wants to play. I love the community here. I think that there's a bunch of great people and great soccer players. I think in other leagues, you don't really get the social aspect that you get through the Ramblers. Seeing them multiple times a week helps draw you in closer. And so, yeah, I've made a lot of great friends through the Rambos. Things that, you know, we provide a good environment where people can come be competitive but also be social and have fun. Enjoy being a member because of the camaraderie we have, whether it's playing soccer or after going to the bars and meeting each other, talking about how we came out and how we got involved and playing softball. We have a lot of social events, we have a scholarship fund for LGBTQ student athletes and allies, and we're very focused on allowing people to have opportunities to draw connections with other people that I don't think is necessarily built into other soccer leagues around New York. Ready to go, but he could go out. If we win this, then we go to the finals, which we're going to do. We have our semifinals tonight of our D2 league in the New York Ramblers. Blueberries, purple. It is one zero good game so far. To me, Pride is a time of reflection. It's really embracing who I am in all aspects on and off the field. And for me, this month specifically of Pride Month is all about looking at how far that we've come and how far the community still has in terms of progress that can be made. One of the biggest ways that people can kind of help with our mission is to continue to promote the voices of LGBTQ people in sports, even if it's not soccer. I think we're still, unfortunately, in an era where sports are considered to be very heterosexual, very masculine, and not always a safe space for gay men. And that's something that we try to provide for our members, right? We try to make sure that maybe people who didn't have a positive sporting experience growing up can have that as an adult maybe. People who quit soccer in high school or college because they were worried about homophobia can have a chance to come out here and kind of reclaim something that that, quite frankly, is theirs. Bye. Right.