As Atletik Dildoa, we came together and started playing football during the Istanbul Trans Pride Week in 2015. Majority of us being women and members of the LGBTIQA+ community, we formed an amateur football team that fought against gender discrimination through sports, and until 2020, we regularly gathered and continued organizing events and matches. Like many places around the world, football in Turkey had become a norm of sexism, homophobia, biphobia, and transphobia, presenting itself as a male-dominated sphere. We know that despite many women and LGBTIQA+ individuals loving the game, they couldn’t find their place and eventually left this field. As a group consisting of individuals who had played football in their childhood but had to give it up at some point, we came together in 2015 and gradually grew in numbers. And we set out to create an autonomous sports space where people of all ages, genders, and gender expressions could feel comfortable. For us, playing is not just a pastime activity, nor is it merely a childhood nostalgia filled with beautiful memories; it’s a right that we still strive to gain and protect by carving out spaces for ourselves today. Although we are not actively functioning as the Atletik Dildoa team anymore, many of our friends who came together through this team continue to fight on the fields in solidarity with many teams and sports associations from within and outside Turkey, without tolerating any discourse or attitude that seeks to challenge this right, as we continue to fight on the fields.
