Pride Tape: Edmonton Oilers First to Step up

Pride Tape: Edmonton Oilers Become 1st NHL Team to Promote the Movement

The Edmonton Oilers became the first team in NHL history to use “pride tape”, a multi-colored hockey tape used to promote the inclusion of the LGBTQ community within our game.

It was used at the team’s All-Star competition on Sunday, photo via Edmonton’s twitter account.

Andrew Ference via NHL.com,

“Many view professional hockey players as role models and our team felt this was a great initiative to let every person know they’re welcome in the game of hockey,” defenseman Andrew Ference told the Oilers website. “We’re all proud to play for a team and city that supports diversity and human rights.”

via NHL.com,

The Edmonton Oilers Community Foundation (EOCF) is also making a donation to become a Founding Partner of Pride Tape and help get the initiative across the goal line. The EOCF focuses on initiatives to promote education, health and wellness for youth.

What is Pride Tape’s Initiative?

For many years, those of a different sexual orientation have been forced to hide their identity in the sports community. Once frowned upon by society, the majority of people are accepting nowadays.

More from Puck Prose

• Detroit Red Wings 2023 Rookie Camp Has Plenty of Ups and Downs
• This Columbus Blue Jackets rookie doesn’t want to be forgotten
• 2 trades the Boston Bruins must make to secure the Stanley Cup
• 3 reasons the Avalanche won’t win the Stanley Cup in 2024
• This is a big year for Alex Turcotte and the Los Angeles Kings

We need to remember, people don’t choose their preference, they’re born that way. It’s no reason to make those people feel like they’re unable to participate in sports.

Back on November 21st, 2014, NBA’s Jason Collins became the first openly gay player in North American professional sports. Soon after, college football player Michael Sam followed suit. Both careers were cut short, but it had nothing to do with their preferences.

Pride Tape is a way for teams and players to show support to the LGBTQ community, in hopes of raising awareness for a socially controversial topic. It’s a way of saying “we don’t discriminate against various sexual orientations”.

Truth be told, when society looks back in 50 years, they’ll wonder how we ever debated such topics. Think of your grandparents twisted discriminatory beliefs from the early to mid 20th century. There’s likely to be a day when your/my views are interpreted the same way by a much younger generation.

This is a major step in helping raise a more global awareness for an issue preventing some of our youth’s participation in hockey. It’ll be great to see other NHL teams follow suit, the same way the NFL caught on wearing pink for breast cancer awareness. The MLB and NHL are still yet to have openly gay players go public, although we’d be naive to assume they don’t exist. Perhaps the movement of pride tape will change that.

Next: Connor McDavid Nearing Oilers Return

via NHL.com,

Wells and Calder Bateman Communications are working together on a Kickstarter campaign to raise enough funds to produce 10,000 rolls of the tape. As of Sunday, they have raised more than $40,000 of their $54,000 campaign goal.

Eventual proceeds from the rainbow colored tape are to be used in support of LGBTQ youth outreach programs (i.e. You Can Play and Institute for Sexual Minority Studies).