Tom Daley subjected to homophobic abuse from ‘Christian group’ who blame his Rio 2016 Olympics exit on him being gay
TOM DALEY was subjected to horrific homophobic abuse after his shock Rio 2016 Olympics exit.
The 22-year-old Olympian finished last in his 10m platform diving semi-final on Saturday and vile trolls blamed his devastating defeat on him being gay.
A Twitter account called Christian Voice, which claims to be a UK-based prayer and lobby group seeking "national repentance", were among the trolls to hit out at Daley on Twitter.
They retweeted an article about the diver's loss and added the post: "Turning gay doesn't seem to have done Tom Daley any favours at #Rio2016"
The shocking comment provoked a huge backlash on Twitter from the likes of Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling and MP Stewart McDonald as well as many as Christians.
Rowling wrote: "Can't decide which is more offensive in this tweet, the stupidity or the spite."
McDonald tweeted: "Talk us through how one 'turns gay'."
One Twitter user wrote: "a Christian woman for some 30yrs & a senior soldier within the Salvation Army, I find your comment falls far from Grace. Appalled."
Another posted: "so the fact he broke a world record yesterday and won a bronze in anther diving event doesn't mean a thing?"
Daley's platform disappointment came after he took bronze in the synchronised 10m event with dive partner Dan Goodfellow.
On Friday, he qualified for the platform semi ahead of world champion Qiu Bo and fellow Chinese star Chen Aisen, scoring the highest points for a dive at Rio 2016.
But it wasn't to be in the semi-final as Daley finished 18th and last.
Afterwards, he said: "I want to be Olympic champion - that’s been my dream since I was a kid.
"At the Olympics you can get your dreams crushed in an instant so it’s tough.
"To think that Team GB has already got three diving medals from these Games is incredible and gives you a massive kick of motivation to want to be standing on top of that podium in 2020."
Daley released a YouTube video in December 2013 revealing he had been in a relationship with a man from earlier that year.
He got engaged to film producer Dustin Lance Black in October 2015.