Former tennis pro Margaret Court, who compares gay people to Hitler, to receive Australia’s highest honour
Margaret Court looks on during a Tennis Hall of Fame ceremony on day nine of the 2020 Australian Open at Melbourne Park on 28 January, 2020 in Melbourne, Australia. (Getty/ Morgan Hancock)
Homophobic former tennis star Margaret Court, who thinks gay people are “abominable”, could be awarded Australia’s highest honour.
According to Reuters, it has been reported that Court is set to be awarded a Companion in the General Division of the Order of Australia (AC) award on 26 January, the national Australia Day holiday.
Court has already received an Order of Australia award in 2007 for her services to tennis.
This year Australia Day falls as the Australian Open begins, as the tennis Grand Slam was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Although Court had an extremely successful tennis career, winning 24 singles and 40 doubles Grand Slam titles, she later became a Pentecostal pastor and is now notorious for her anti-LGBT+ views.
Margaret Court believes trans children are ‘of the devil’
Margaret Court opened her own pentecostal church, the Victory Life Centre in Perth, Australia, in 1995.
Court has previously called homosexuality an “abominable sexual practice”, likened gay people to Hitler, claimed lesbian tennis players “recruit” younger athletes, and suggested transgender children are “of the devil”.
In 2019, the homophobic tennis champion inexplicably became the honorary consul of the African republic of Burundi, where LGBT+ people have been tortured and queer children are expelled from school.
At the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, the 78-year-old flouted restrictions and insisted that her church would continue to hold services because the “blood of Jesus” will protect her from COVID-19.
Daniel Andrews, the premier of the Australian state of Victoria, wrote on Twitter: “I don’t want to give this person’s disgraceful, bigoted views any oxygen.
“But when others insist on rewarding them with this country’s highest honour – I think it’s worth saying again: Grand Slam wins don’t give you some right to spew hatred and create division.
“Nothing does.”
I don't want to give this person's disgraceful, bigoted views any oxygen.
But when others insist on rewarding them with this country's highest honour – I think it's worth saying again:
Grand Slam wins don't give you some right to spew hatred and create division.
Nothing does.
— Dan Andrews (@DanielAndrewsMP) January 22, 2021
