Editing Gay Games (section)

=== Lawsuit over 'Gay Olympics' name{{anchor | Naming controversy}} ===
[[Tom Waddell]], the former Olympian who helped found the games, intended them to be called the "Gay Olympics", but a lawsuit filed less than three weeks before 1982's inaugural Gay Olympics forced the name change.<ref name="sfbg">{{cite news |first=Savannah |last=Blackwell |url=http://www.sfbg.com/News/35/49/49olysb2.html |title=Crushing the Gay Olympics: The USOC's homophobic past |publisher=[[San Francisco Bay Guardian]] |date=September 5, 2001 |access-date=January 4, 2006 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20060527003250/http://www.sfbg.com/News/35/49/49olysb2.html <!-- Bot retrieved archive --> |archive-date = May 27, 2006}}</ref>  This forced volunteers to suspend the sales of buttons and t-shirts in order to remove the terms "Olympic" and "Olympiad" from medals, souvenirs, t-shirts, signs, and programs, which would cost the organization an estimated loss between $15,000 and $30,000.<ref name="edited by Rita Liberti and Maureen M. Smith"/>

Event organizers were sued by the [[International Olympic Committee]] (IOC) under the U.S. [[Amateur Sports Act of 1978]], which gave the [[United States Olympic Committee]] (USOC) exclusive rights to the word ''Olympic'' in the United States. Defendants of the lawsuit contended that the law was capriciously applied and that if the [[Special Olympics]] were not similarly prohibited, the Gay Olympics should not be either.<ref name="joeclark">{{cite news |first=Joe |last=Clark |url=http://www.joeclark.org/glory.html |title=Glory of the Gay Games |year=1994 |access-date=January 4, 2006}}</ref>

Others, like Daniel Bell, cite the IOC's long history of protecting the Olympics brand as evidence that the lawsuit against the "Gay Olympics" was not motivated by discrimination against gays. Since 1910 the IOC has taken action, including lawsuits and expulsion from the IOC, to stop certain organizations from using the word "Olympics."<ref name="danbell">{{Cite web|author=Bell, Daniel |year=1998 |url=http://www.internationalgames.net/topics/gayolympics.htm  |title=Why Can't the Gay Games Be the Gay Olympics? |access-date=June 12, 2010 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20060307090517/http://www.internationalgames.net/topics/gayolympics.htm |archive-date = March 7, 2006}}</ref>  Annual "California Police Olympics" were held for 22 years, from 1967 through 1989, after which, the word Olympics was no longer used for the event<!-- run by the California Police Athletic Federation, called, since 2012, the "United States Police and Fire Championships"-->.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://uspfc.org/about-us/history |title=History |access-date=2012-12-25 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130508160710/http://uspfc.org/about-us/history |archive-date=May 8, 2013 |df=mdy }}</ref> The Supreme Court ruled for the USOC in ''[[San Francisco Arts & Athletics, Inc. v. United States Olympic Committee]]''.

A 2009 documentary film, ''Claiming the Title: Gay Olympics on Trial'', was created in the United States and was previewed at several film festivals.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.claimingthetitle.com/Claiming_The_Title/Home.html|title=Home|publisher=Acquarius Media|access-date=June 7, 2011|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110528113047/http://claimingthetitle.com/Claiming_The_Title/Home.html|archive-date=May 28, 2011|df=mdy-all}}</ref><ref>{{IMDb title|qid=Q115627211|title=Claiming the Title}}</ref> The subject was also included in a 2005 film by David Sector, ''Take the Flame! Gay Games: Grace Grit & Glory''.<ref>{{IMDb title|qid=Q115627233|title=Take the Flame! Gay Games: Grace Grit & Glory}}</ref>

In the years since the lawsuit, the Olympics and the Gay Games have set aside their initial hostilities and worked cooperatively together, successfully lobbying to have HIV travel restrictions waived for the 1994 Gay Games in New York and the [[1996 Summer Olympics]] in Atlanta.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Brigham |first1=Roger |title=Invading the Comfort Zone |url=https://www.ebar.com/story.php?ch=columns&sc=sports&sc2=&id=234642&invading_the_comfort_zone |access-date=30 March 2023 |publisher=Bay Area Reporter |date=17 June 2009}}</ref>