Breaker Rachael “Raygun” Gunn no longer plans to compete after her controversial performance at the 2024 Paris Olympics went viral and led to a lot of backlash. On social media, people shared clips of the 37-year-old b-girl and college professor’s Olympic routine, which they mocked and criticized. Some people even questioned how Raygun qualified for the Olympics, and 50,000 people signed an online petition demanding someone look into how she “manipulated” the selection process so she’d qualify for the Olympics.
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Now, competing seems 'really difficult' for Raygun.
After Raygun’s unconventional breaking routine reached a global audience, she realized that competing again would be too challenging for her, she explained to Australian radio station 2DayFM on Wednesday, November 6. “I’m not going to compete any more, no,” she said on 2DayFM, per CNN. “I was going to keep competing, for sure, but that seems really difficult for me to do now.”
She continues to dance.
Though she no longer plans on competing, Raygun hasn’t given up on dancing completely. “Yeah, I mean I still dance, and I still break. But, you know, that’s like in my living room with my partner,” she explained to the radio station. She told 2DayFM she didn’t want to deal with the “level of scrutiny” that came from competing at the Olympics.
“I just didn’t have any control over how people saw me or who I was,” she said. “I think the level of scrutiny that’s going to be there, and people will be filming it, and it will go online.”
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Raygun previously defended her performance and said many people who were critical of it didn't understand breaking.
Breaking made its Olympic debut during the Paris Olympics, but the sport will not return for the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. Even if breakdancing becomes part of the Olympics again in the future, Raygun does not plan on competing. In September, she defended her performance when speaking to Australia’s Channel 10 TV. “It was really sad how much hate that it did evoke,” she said at the time, reported USA Today. “And a lot of the responses is also just due to people not being very familiar with breaking and the diversity of approaches in breaking.”
“I am very sorry for the backlash that the community has experienced, but I can’t control how people react,” she added.
In August, Raygun spoke about her performance in an Instagram video.
In a video shared on Instagram in August, Raygun addressed the backlash. She called the “hate” that she received “pretty devastating.”
“I just want to start by thanking all the people who have supported me. I really appreciate the positivity, and I’m glad I was able to bring some joy into your lives,” she said at the time. “That’s what I hoped. I didn’t realize that that would also open the door to so much hate, which has frankly been pretty devastating.”
She took the competition seriously.
After seeing her performance, some people were convinced that it had to be a joke or a skit. In her video, Raygun asserted that this was not the case. “While, I went out there and I had fun, I did take it very seriously,” she said. “I worked my butt off preparing for the Olympics, and I gave my all, truly.”
