Back in February, you couldn’t Google the Sochi Olympics without the majority of results including some reference to gay rights. A month ago, the only mention gay issues got in World Cup coverage was that Mexico fans may or may have not shouted gay slurs at opposing team’s players. Today is the opening ceremonies for the Commonwealth Games, a sort of mini-Olympics for Great Britain and those nations that, historically, were once Britain’s bitch. And things don’t look good for the gays. There is some lip service being paid to gay rights by event organizers, but 42 of the 54 countries that are member states criminalize homosexuality. Including Uganda, a country that makes Russia look like a gay rights paradise. And Brunei where the sentence for engaging in homosexual activities is death by stoning. When it comes to human rights, the nations that make up the Commonwealth are not exactly up to gold medal standards.

Sure, the Scottish Government has raised a rainbow flag outside St. Andrew’s House, the country’s headquarters building, alongside the Commonwealth flag. And unlike in Sochi, at the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow there is a Pride House where gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender athletes – and visitors – can gather. But that doesn’t mean much to Thierry Essamba, an internationally competitive runner in the 110-meter hurdles, who was suspended from the Cameroonian track squad on May 24 because of rumors about his alleged homosexuality. Or to India’s 100 meter sprinter, Dutee Chand, who has been barred from the games by her country’s Commonwealth Games selectors because she is intersex. For an international sporting organization whose motto is Humanity, Equality, Destiny. you’d think, at the very least, it would ensure gay athletes would be provided with an even playing field. But instead, while trumpeting its ideals of equality and inclusion, it openly embraces its member countries where being gay is a criminal offense.

Of course when most of those laws against homosexuality are a hold-over from the days of British rule, it’s a bit dicey to start pointing fingers. Ditto for when your queen is also considered to be the sovereign of twelve countries of the Commonwealth realm where homosexuality is still a jailable offense. Evidently, ‘equality’ has a different meaning in English than it does in, um, English. Still, when yours is a country that likes to believe it is a champion of human rights, you’d think you’d take a harder line against those countries that are more likely to jail gay athletes than allow them to participate in the Commonwealth Games.

Article 7 of the Constitution of the Commonwealth Games Federation states: “There shall be no discrimination against any country or person on any grounds whatsoever. And yet in seven of the nations participating at the games in Glasgow, life imprisonment is the penalty for being gay. And in three – so far – gay people can face execution for being who they are. It may not be right to hold the organizers of the Commonwealth Games responsible for the discriminatory laws of its member nations, but neither is it unreasonable for the organization to ban those countries that refuse to support and adhere to the governing documents of the Games. But then that would leave only twelve countries eligible to send their athletes to the Games.

The Commonwealth Games is the fourth largest international multi-sport event in the world; it is estimated that between 100 million and 1.8 billion people will tune in to watch the events as they occur in Glasgow. That’s an incredibly large number of people to reach with a statement in favor of human rights. Is it fair to place that burden on the organizers of the Games? When your motto includes equality as one of its three precepts, I’d say yes, it is. And when by association, yours is the nation responsible for the implementation of the anti-gay laws that exists in 80% of participating countries then promoting the universal human rights values of the Commonwealth Charter is not only the right thing to do, but it is your responsibility too.

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