In an interview with The Detroit
News, out Olympian Adam Rippon said he always wanted to be a role
model for young LGBT people.
Rippon, who last week boycotted a White
House reception for Winter Olympians in protest of President Donald
Trump's LGBT policies, was the first openly gay American to medal at
the Winter Olympics in South Korea.
“When I came out, I hoped that one
day I would be a role model,” Rippon
told the daily.
“I'm the oldest of six kids in my
family, so I am sort of like an older brother – not sort of, I
literally am. I really like being an older brother and I like
sticking up for people, and the Olympics are an incredible platform
where you can really speak up and speak your mind and have a lot of
people listen.”
“When I was at the Olympics, I took
full advantage of that opportunity,” he said.
Rippon, 28, added that having a role
model young people can relate to can inspire confidence.
“As a young kid just hearing about
somebody that might be like you or come from the same place that you
came from, or you relate to on some level, can give a young kid a lot
of confidence or strength that they didn't know they had by just
having that little bit of a role model,” Rippon said.
(Related: Gus
Kenworthy, Adam Rippon respond to critics angry over White House
boycott.)