Outspoken: A Journey from Olympic Athlete to Activist

An Olympian recounts her experiences as a young gay athlete and coach in the 70s and 80s, turning discrimination into celebration.

When Betty Baxter was hired to coach the Canadian women’s volleyball team in 1980, she was met with a media frenzy as the first woman in the position. Then her career was cut short—Baxter was fired in January 1982 and tossed from volleyball at age twenty-nine because of rumours about her sexual orientation.

This personal memoir chronicles Baxter’s journey from a small-town prairie girl discovering her passion for sports, through the years of international success, including harsh coaches, excruciating training regimes and the inequities in the sports system, especially for a closeted gay athlete. After her abrupt dismissal, Baxter turned to activism, seeking equality for women, initiating a new coaching school and working for a healthy, visible LGBTQ+ community through the internationally recognized Gay Games.

Outspoken: A Journey from Olympic Athlete to Activist exposes the persistent flaws of elite sport in Canada. It lays bare a system so resistant to change that forty years later the same issues, particularly for women, remain under scrutiny. But it also highlights the resilience and perseverance required of marginalized athletes to survive. Most of all, it champions the capacity to succeed.

“One of the best books I have ever read about the helter-skelter creation of the Canadian sports system in the frantic buildup to the 1976 Olympics in Montreal, the state of international sport at the time and the making of a Canadian coach. I couldn’t put it down. A must for every student of Canadian sport.”

“A remarkable revelation of courage, grit and perseverance to overcome discrimination against the 2SLGBTQIA+ community in sports. Betty Baxter blazed a trail for change that benefits us all.”

“At times heartbreaking, Outspoken is an inspiring account of a dark period in Canadian sports history and the intestinal fortitude it takes to recover from bigotry’s injustice. Baxter’s story offers a useful roadmap for perseverance and dignity in the face of devastating loss and betrayal. The author’s commitment to fairness and ethics as bedrock principles, both for excellence in sport and for personal growth, shines through.”