The mountains are missing economic opportunities of diversity

By Tri-Cities News |

It seems odd to be thinking about skiing in August, but here I am reading an article in SKI Magazine watching my hobby collide with my work.

The ski community in North America, a community I’ve been a part of for more decades than I care to admit, has been reckoning with allyship. It started with an instagram post linking to an article in SKI. The article explored how ski towns could be queer friendly year-round rather than just at annual events.

But “the overwhelming response to this post was a comment feed full of mean-spirited, hateful, and bigoted rhetoric,” according to a follow up article. I don’t have the time or energy to get into how awful human beings can be when they’re squirreled away banging out hate speech from underneath a rock.

I do, however, have the time to process my shock at how the ski and snowboard industry has missed an incredible opportunity to expand its market. As a lesbian in North Vancouver I have spent most of my life with the mountains as my backyard. I feel very comfortable at ski resorts and have had the privilege of skiing all over the country. But if I pause and look around, I don’t see a lot of diversity or other LGBTQ+ folks, at least not regularly.

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