Mr. Gay Ireland, Stephen Lehane, competed against representatives from across Europe to finish first runner-up at Mr. Gay Europe over the long weekend.
Stephen was up against 10 other contestants from across Europe in a five-day long contest, eventually finishing second to Matthew Rood from England.
Telling JOE what the contest entailed, Stephen went into graphic detail about how the road to being crowned Mr. Gay Europe is far more gruelling than a simple beauty contest.
“The hardest challenge was by far the Sports Challenge. What we were doing was a surprise until the last minute, when we rocked up to the pitch and saw the Stockholm Gay Rugby team waiting for us. They put us through our paces: tackling bags as many times as we could, throwing 20kg bags over our shoulders, sprinting.”
Stephen didn’t come out on top of that challenge, but explained to us why he maintained a sense of accomplishment: “Three of the contestants had to get sick in a bin afterwards All in the same bin, it was like that scene from Stand By Me. As one of the smallest guys, I didn’t win that challenge but at least I didn’t throw up.”
Lehane was full of praise for the eventual champion, Mr. Gay England Matthew Rood, but did say “I will admit though, as an Irishman, it does sting a little to be beaten by the English…”
Stephen still has over half a year left as Mr. Gay Ireland and has said that his primary focus in the role is educating young people in Ireland about STD testing, and trying to remove the stigma around young people looking out for their own sexual health through regular checks.
Stephen is also working on something called the Activist’s Toolkit, an online resource designed to help people get involved in activism. The toolkit will provide tips on “how to organise a protest, templates for writing to government officials, a list of the best platform for raising money for a charity…”
“No one takes a class to be an activist, you just feel passionately enough about something and learn as you go.”
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