People's Ultimate League: Game-changer for LGBTQIA+

CHENNAI: In her eight years as an Ultimate Frisbee player, 20-year-old Uttara has been one of the few handlers (the player with the most disc time, responsible for facilitating movement), in the team, who identifies as a woman. This exclusivity seemed harmless until last year, when she came out as bisexual and embraced the possibility that she may transcend these gender binaries at some point in the future.
“I now began noticing when redundant, gender-specific strategies were employed on field; like men assumed to be stronger players and therefore dominating the field, and women being used as decoys.”

Now, thanks to People's Ultimate League (PUL), a grassroots initiative, players belonging to the LGBTQIA+ community can finally experience and demonstrate the essence of a truly mixed-gendered game like Ultimate Frisbee, what it can offer to the world of sport, and the groundswell of empowerment it can create within marginalized communities. Non-binary athlete Rasika Gopalakrishnan (she/her), Adwitiya Dawn and Megna Shankaranarayanan founded PUL in December 2020 as an enterprise to enable people traditionally sidelined in sport to access the opportunities they deserve. Now, with a grant from Netherlands-based Women Win, and supported by Ultimate Players Association of India (UPAI) - the national governing body for the sport in the country - PUL will introduce the game to non-binary and LGBTQIA+ players.
The new structure will aim to diversify the existing 4:3 gender ratio in Ultimate’s seven-member on-field teams, as set by the World Flying Disc Federation, which gives male and female players equal game time, alternating every two points.
As a mix-gendered, self-refereed, low-contact sport, Ultimate Frisbee has always been looked at hopefully for the safe space and level-playing field it could create for non-binary genders and sexual minorities. For more than 40 years, the game has had an ‘Open’ Division, alongside ‘Mixed’, ‘Women’, ‘Master’, and ‘Grandmaster’ divisions. Practically, however, the ‘Open’ category hasn’t been diversified as much as it has the potential to be, believe players.
It was just five years ago in 2016 that World Flying Disc Federation (WFDF) - the international authority governing Frisbee sports - released specific guidelines for transitioning trans athletes to compete in male, female or mixed divisions - a prospect that however hinged largely on their testosterone levels.
“This shut the door on players who identify as non-binary, and may not want to be categorized as male or female,” says Rasika, a national-level swimmer who started playing Ultimate Frisbee in 2016 when she joined Ashoka University. “I realized that if this sport had to truly become mixed gendered, it would have to recognize genders beyond the binary."
PUL’s new programme will open in a couple of months with trans players, in collaboration with the NGOs Basera, Aravani Art Project and Queerbatore. Coaches – also predominantly women and non-binary members – will be put through gender sensitization workshops before they start training.
“At least the first year, our objective would be to tap into the community and garner interest for the game. So, they will begin with playing recreationally, and as a long-term goal, may be trained to play competitively,” says Koka Mrinalini Siddhartha, who takes care of operations at PUL.
“Because, a key factor preventing queer people to inhabit their identities is the fear of not being received well, and the perception that the society is not ready for them yet. If the community sees us taking a step towards changing this, they may be encouraged to join the sport, and more significantly, add value as exactly the people that they are – nothing more, nothing less.”