🌏 Mental Health And Equality At The Olympics, Argentina Introduces Gender-Neutral IDs And More

All the world news you should know about this week

Happy Friday! Here’s your weekly email to help you stay updated and make sense of important stories happening around the world including:

• 🌏 This Week’s Top Stories

• 👩 Women To Know

• 🙌 Good News For Your Weekend

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Japanese tennis player Naomi Osaka and US gymnast Simon Biles’ withdrawals from major sporting events have sparked a massive dialogue on athletes’ mental health.

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• 🇺🇸 Athletes, celebrities and politicians around the world are sharing their support for Biles, the most-decorated gymnast of all time, after she withdrew from two Olympic finals over her mental health. Speaking to press after the team final that she withdrew from, Biles said, “I think it shows power in the athlete. Protecting my mental and well-being, that I didn’t want to go out there and do something dumb and get hurt and be negligent. So I knew for myself that I had to take a step back.”

• 🇯🇵 World No. 2 tennis player Naomi Osaka, who lit the Olympic cauldron at the opening ceremony, was knocked out in the third round of the tennis tournament. “I should be used to it by now, but the scale of everything is a bit hard because of the break that I took,” Osaka said, addressing the scrutiny she has been under for withdrawing from the French Open earlier this year for her mental health.

👩 Women athletes around the world are taking a stance against the double standards they face when it comes to uniforms.

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• 🇩🇪 The German women’s gymnastics team competed in full-body leotards instead of the traditional leotards in a statement against the sexualization of the sport.

• 🇳🇴 Last week, the Norwegian women’s handball team wore shorts instead of the required bikini bottoms to protest double standards.

In a first in Latin America, Argentina has introduced gender-neutral IDs for nonbinary people.

• Announced by President Alberto Fernández on Wednesday July 22, the law will allow nonbinary people to choose to identify their gender as “X” instead of only “male” or “female”.

• The new law will also apply to foreign residents who will be able to modify their IDs at the migration office.

• “For the first time I can say my full name and feel like it’s legal,” Gerónimo Carolina González Devesa said. The 35-year-old doctor was one of the first people to receive the new national identity document. In 2018, González made history when they changed the gender on their birth certificate after winning a legal battle to be allowed to leave the field blank.

Also happening around the world

• 🇸🇱 Sierra Leone’s government unanimously voted to abolish the death penalty, making it the 23rd African country to end capital punishment, largely a legacy of colonial legal codes in Africa.

• 🇭🇰 Hong Kong police arrested five people for a children’s book about wolves and sheep for “inciting hatred of the government in children.”

13-year-old Japanese skateboarder Momiji Nishiya has become the first ever Olympic gold medalist in women’s street skateboarding.

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• In her – and the sport’s – Olympic debut, Nishiya skated to the top of the podium on Monday July 26. Despite a shaky start with falls on her first two attempts, Nishiya bounced back in style to clinch the lead.

• “I didn’t think I could win, but everyone around me cheered me on so I’m glad I was able to find my groove,” she said after her victory.

• Her win makes her the youngest Olympic gold medalist for Japan, and the third youngest gold medalist in Olympic history.

Dean Boxall, the coach of Australian swimmer Ariarne Titmus, went absolutely bonkers after Titmus won a gold medal at the Olympics.

• In an upset win over the US defending Olympic champion and world record holder Katie Ledecky, 20-year-old Titmus won the gold medal in the 400M freestyle final at the Tokyo Olympics on Sunday July 25.

• A clip of Boxall absolutely losing it while celebrating her win has gone viral on social media, becoming an instant meme. “If my coach doesn’t react like this when I have a big win then I don’t want it,” a person tweeted.

• “I can’t believe it, I’m trying to contain my emotions,” Titmus said after the race. 

More Good News For Your Weekend

• 🇭🇺 Thousands of people in Hungary held a massive pride march to protest a new law that bans LGTBQ content for children.

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