re: Caitlyn Jenner will receive ESPN's Arthur Ashe Courage Award

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I dislike Jim Kelly and he is a bit of a douche IRL, but either Devon Stills or Jim Kelly hands down should be given this award of Bruce Jenner.

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IMO, Vitali Klitschko should get it this year and he should have gotten it last year.

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Vitali Volodymyrovych Klitschko (/v?'tæli 'kl?t?ko?/; Ukrainian: ????´??? ??????´??????? ??????´, [?i't??i?? kl?t?'k?]; born 19 July 1971, Belovodsk, Kyrgyzstan[2]) is a Ukrainian politician and the current Mayor of Kiev (the capital and largest city in Ukraine),[3] head of the Kiev City State Administration and former professional boxer. He is the leader of the Ukrainian Democratic Alliance for Reform and a former Member of the Ukrainian Parliament.[4][5][6][7][8][9] He is the former WBC, WBO and The Ring magazine heavyweight champion and has been conferred as Champion Emeritus by the WBC. Klitschko became actively involved in Ukrainian politics in 2005 and combined this with his professional boxing career until his departure from boxing mid-December 2013.[5][10][11] Klitschko was the first professional boxing world champion to hold a PhD degree.

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Klitschko formally began his political career in 2006 when he placed second in the Kiev mayoral race. He was a leading figure in the 2013–2014 Euromaidan protests, and he announced his possible candidacy for the Ukrainian presidency but later withdrew and endorsed Petro Poroshenko.[nb 1] He was elected Mayor of Kiev on 25 May 2014.[12] Klitschko headed the election list of the winner of the 2014 Ukrainian parliamentary election, the Petro Poroshenko Bloc, but he gave up his parliamentary seat to stay on as Mayor of Kiev.

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Klitschko was one of the dominant figures of the Euromaidan protests.[5] During these protests, he retired from boxing.[5] He confirmed on 28 February 2014 that he would take part in the (early) 2014 Ukrainian presidential election.[82][nb 4] But on 29 March 2014 announced that he had changed his mind and would run for the post of Mayor of Kiev in the 2014 Kiev local election (including Mayoral elections) set for 25 May 2014.[83][84] In the 2014 Ukrainian presidential election Klitschko endorsed the candidacy of Petro Poroshenko.[85] Klitschko won Kiev's mayoral elections with almost 57% of the votes.[12][86] He was sworn in as Mayor on 5 June 2014.[3] The same day the Ukrainian parliament had deprived Klitschko of his MP mandate (Ukrainian MPs are not entitled to combine parliamentary activities with any other public employment).[4] Poroshenko was elected President of Ukraine on 25 May 2014.

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Going back to Ukraine and standing up to Putin, takes some guts.

FWIW, I do think it took some courage for Jenner to do the Vanity Fair cover. Whatever you think of sex reassignment surgery (and I have mixed feelings), to throw yourself on a magazine cover for all the world to see after you've lived as a man your entire life, and subject yourself to public scrutiny, I suspect requires overcoming a lot of fear, even though the fear may be irrational given the current public response.

So I'm not too annoyed that Jenner is receiving this award. I do think the Michael Sam award last year was ridiculous. First of all, Jason Collins actually played in the NBA last season and Michael Sam couldn't break a roster. If you're going to give out the award, give it to Collins. Secondly, if you want to honor a homosexual, give it posthumously to Glenn Burke, who played for the Dodgers in the 70s and got drummed out of MLB because he was gay. Being openly gay in a major sports league in the 70s is a far, far bigger deal then doing it today, when you're going to be welcomed by near-unanimous public support and well-wishes.

But for Sam to come out publicly, it very obviously was not going to be a problem. And there are people who deserve the AA Award more than Sam and Jenner, which makes it very obvious that this is less about honoring the courage of Sam and Jenner and more about advancing a social agenda. That's fine if you want to do that, but ESPN should be more honest about that.

Does he really still have his Dick? You want to be courageous and committed then cut that shite off, otherwise you are just a crossdresser.

This is just more fake left wing grandstanding, don't care if he does call himself a republican.

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Caitlyn Jenner is now honored with the same award as Jimmy V. what a travesty. Jimmy V had real courage. Bruce was afraid of his own penis.

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:melt:

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FWIW, I do think it took some courage for Jenner to do the Vanity Fair cover.

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How does someone electively putting themselves in this situation, courage? He is causing and curing "the problem" he created for nothing more than increased tv exposure. The only thing he's done noteworthy is show he is an attention whore, and apparently that is now deserving of medals. How is that courageous?

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How does someone electively putting themselves in this situation, courage? He is causing and curing "the problem" he created for nothing more than increased tv exposure. The only thing he's done noteworthy is show he is an attention whore, and apparently that is now deserving of medals. How is that courageous?

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In the world we live in, he's been allowed to believe that the way to solve any transgender problems is to change your gender. I don't agree with that prescription in a lot of cases, if not most cases. But in the context of his mindset and our culture, for him to put himself on a magazine cover like that, yes it takes some courage. Most people are going to be very afraid of presenting themselves in an entirely different image to the world and in such a public fashion, and he clearly overcame those fears. I'm not saying he's more courageous than a lot of people, a lot of other people who could have received the AA Award, but it takes some courage to do what he did.

BTW he's never struck me as the same kind of attention whore as his ex-wife and the other Kardashians. Granted I've seen very little of the show. But I suspect he's doing this more because he thinks this is the "right thing to do."

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More so than what Bruce Jenner has been through. I understand diseases are part of unfortunate circumstances, but people like that as well as their families overcome a lot to be even close to the person they used to be. It takes a lot of confidence, determination, as well as courage. To me, none of this applies to Bruce Jenner. That's all.

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Don't get me wrong I think giving him this award is borderline disgusting and certainly don't take my post to say those people don't have courage.

was about to post this

There's so many people that are way more courageous and more deserving of the award than Jenner. Leah Still, Lauren Hill, Noah Galloway, Steve Gleason

You have got to be fricking kidding me