Gay footballer Marcus Urban to live-tweet during Euro game

BY NATASHA BARSOTTI – Almost two weeks into the Euro 2012 football tournament, activists are ensuring the spotlight on the fight against homophobia remains prominent.

Today, during the Ukraine-England match (7:30pm GMT UK; 2:30pm EST USA and 11:30am PST), Germany’s first openly gay footballer, Marcus Urban, will join allout.org for a live Twitter chat to raise awareness about the anti-gay measures making their way through the parliament of Euro co-host Ukraine.

Urban, who played for a second-division German club team in the 1990s, came out in an era when being a gay footballer was virtually unheard of. Just days ago, Italian footballer Antonio Cassano said he hoped there were no queers on his Euro squad. He later apologized for his comments.

Join the conversation at twitter.com/allout.

Natasha Barsotti is originally from Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean. She had high aspirations of representing her country in Olympic Games sprint events, but after a while the firing of the starting gun proved too much for her nerves. So she went off to university instead. Her first professional love has always been journalism. After pursuing a Master of Journalism at UBC , she began freelancing at Xtra West — now Xtra Vancouver — in 2006, becoming a full-time reporter there in 2008.

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