Raygun, the Australian breakdancer who went viral at the 2024 Paris Olympics for all the wrong reasons, has announced that she is retiring due to the backlash that has poured in over the past few months.
Raygun Retires
The breakdancer Raygun, 37, was widely mocked online after she received 0 points for her August performance in the competitive breakdancing event at the Paris Olympics. In the end, it seems that the mockery of her moves has gotten to be too much for her.
“I’m not going to compete anymore, no,” Raygun said. “I was going to keep competing, for sure, but that seems really difficult for me to do now to approach a battle.”
“Yeah, I mean I still dance, and I still break. But, you know, that’s like in my living room with my partner,” she continued. “It’s been really upsetting. I just didn’t have any control over how people saw me or who I was.”
Find out more about this in the video below.
Raygun Stunned By ‘Hate’ She Received
Raygun had previously spoken out back in August about the hate that she’d received. She also addressed the false allegations that she’d manipulated the selection process for the 2024 Paris Games by electing herself to represent Australia.
“I didn’t realize that that would also open the door to so much hate which has frankly been pretty devastating,” she said on Instagram at the time. “While, I went out there and I had fun, I did take it very seriously.”
“I worked my butt off, preparing for the Olympics and I gave my all truly,” she added. “I’m honored to have been a part of the Australian Olympic Team and to be part of breaking’s Olympic debut.”
Meanwhile, in a September interview, Raygun revealed that she had been chased down the streets of Paris by people holding cameras.
“That was really wild,” she said. “If people are chasing me, what do I do? That really did put me in a state of panic. I was nervous to be out in public. It was pretty nerve-wracking for a while.”
This came after the Australian breaking organization AUSBreak said that they “stand in solidarity” with Raygun. Indeed, they disputed the claims that she manipulated the Olympics’ selection process.
AUSBreak added that “in the lead-up to Paris, Raygun used her platform as the Australian Breaking representative to consistently advocate in the media for Breaking’s history, artistic and athletic values, and its cultural origins.”
Related: US Olympic Committee CEO Steps In To Fight For Jordan Chiles’ Bronze Medal: Can They Win Their Case?
Raygun Defends Herself
Raygun herself defended being on the Olympic team as well.
“I won the Oceania championships. It was a direct qualifier,” she explained. “There were nine judges, all from overseas. I knew my chances were slim as soon as I qualified,” for the Olympics.
“People didn’t understand breaking and were just angry about my performance,” Raygun added. “The conspiracy theories were just awful and that was really upsetting. People are now attacking our reputation and our integrity — none of them were grounded in facts.”
Clearly, all of this has taken a very heavy toll on Raygun. While we support her decision to retire, we certainly hope that she is someday able to mentally see the positives of this entire thing. After all, Raygun is still an Olympian, and nobody will ever be able to take that away from her!
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