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Christian Right Group: 'Turning Gay' Hurt Tom Daley at Olympics

The group has gotten plenty of heat for that comment as well as its dissing of Caster Semenya and athletes in same-sex marriages.

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A U.K. conservative Christian group is saying that "turning gay" hurt British diver Tom Daley's Olympic performance and that gold medal-winning South African runner Caster Semenya is not a woman.

Christian Voice released these tweets Saturday, after Daley finished 18th in the men's 10-meter diving event, failing to qualify for the finals. The "older man" it refers to is most likely Daley's fiance, Oscar-winning Milk screenwriter Dustin Lance Black.

\u201cTurning gay doesn't seem to have done Tom Daley any favours at #Rio2016 https://t.co/tdbT0Y5acx\u201d
— Christian Voice (@Christian Voice) 1471712968

\u201c#Rio2016 And we need to remember that Tom Daley only went gay because he was seduced by an older man: https://t.co/lsbQT1Jo3Z\u201d
— Christian Voice (@Christian Voice) 1471722859

It should be noted that the Rio Games weren't entirely a washout for Daley; early on, he won a bronze medal, along with Dan Goodfellow, in the men's 10-meter synchronized dive. And he performed impressively in the preliminaries for the 10-meter solo.

Supporters of Daley quickly responded with denunciations of Christian Voice, with some even wondering if its tweets were the work of a parody site, notes LGBTQ Nation -- but it is a real organization.

Among those who called out Christian Voice were best-selling author J.K. Rowling:

\u201cCan't decide which is more offensive in this tweet, the stupidity or the spite. https://t.co/ksqZp17drc\u201d
— J.K. Rowling (@J.K. Rowling) 1471714319

And Stewart McDonald, a member of the U.K. Parliament, who happens to be gay:

\u201c@UKCV Talk us through how one 'turns gay'.\u201d
— Christian Voice (@Christian Voice) 1471712968

Last week Christian Voice ran a piece on its website headlined "Sorry Caster Semenya, You Aren't a Woman." At issue is Semenya's testosterone level, which is higher than the average for women, and got her subjected to gender testing a few years ago. But testosterone is only one of many factors that can affect an athlete's performance, and it is unclear how much of an effect it has. Still, the group said Semenya should not be allowed to compete against "true women" and that by doing so she was defying God.

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Well, no matter -- Semenya won gold in the women's 800-meter race Saturday. Still, Christian Voice has continued to denounce her, saying on Twitter Sunday that it would be right for women's events to exclude her. The group also sent out a recent tweet denying the legitimacy of the marriages of athletes of the same sex. (Its piece on Semenya points to her marriage to a woman as evidence that she is not really a woman.) The gold medal win for Britain's women's field hockey team marked the first time a married same-sex couple had medaled.

\u201c#Rio2016 Semenya says Olympics is 'about not discriminating.' Er, women's events rightly discriminate against men: https://t.co/Z4V95adGkg\u201d
— Christian Voice (@Christian Voice) 1471800900

\u201c#Rio2016 We are hearing that some L&G athletes are 'married'. They are, of course, only gay-married: https://t.co/AovT1L4IAy\u201d
— Christian Voice (@Christian Voice) 1471723650

The group received some more spot-on responses, such as this one from British author Sally Abbott:.