Raygun: Rachael Gunn hits out at gender double standards, saying if she was a man she be a ‘larrikin’

B-Girl Rachael ‘Raygun’ Gunn has hit out at the gender double standards she was subjected to after her Paris Olympic performance, saying if she was a man she would be labelled a “larrikin”.

Gunn was thrust into the spotlight in August when she competed at the Olympics’ first-ever breaking event in Paris and failed to secure any points.

Her unique style and quirky moves went viral within minutes.

Singing superstar Adele stopped one of her concerts to say: “I can’t work out if it was a joke, but either way, it has made me very, very happy, and me and my friends have been sh*tting ourselves laughing for nearly 24 hours.”

However, 45,000 others signed a Change.org petition to “Hold Raygun Racheal Gunn & Anna Meares accountable for unethical conduct Olympic selection.”

Reflecting, Gunn says Paris was “the best and worst for gender equality.”

“I think if I was a man, I would have very quickly been given the larrikin title and people would have rallied behind me a lot more,” she told Stellar magazine.

“We had gender equity, which is huge. Absolutely huge. The Australian female Olympians did amazing in the medal tally, women’s sport reached new heights.

“But at the same time, you know, we need to police that there were awful reactions to the Algerian boxer Imane Khelif (the female gold medallist who was drawn into a gender row) and awful reactions to me.

“So it’s like two steps forward, one-and-a-half steps back.”

Gunn describes herself as “a confident woman who is 37, without kids, with a career, having fun.”

“Our culture is very obsessed with age,” says Gunn.

“I think it’s been a real sticking point for a lot of people: me essentially not knowing my place, what I should be doing with my time at this age; (in their view) it’s certainly not participating in that environment, even though I wasn’t the oldest there.”

“I had a few people tell me on Facebook and on Instagram what I should be doing — that I should be picking the kids up from school.”

Gunn explains that she has a folder on her phone that stores some of her favourite memes about her. Some good, others horrible.

One stood out to her amongst the sea of humour and hate.

“I saw a great meme that was like, ‘The world is hard on silly women’, with a photo of me. Women aren’t allowed to be silly,” she said.

Online, Raygun is tagged hundreds of thousands of times.

“People really tried to shame me,” Gunn said.

“This is a process that I’m working through, trying to resist that shame. I’m working through mental health stuff, seeing my psychologist, doing exercise when I don’t feel like it, doing breathing exercises. It’s definitely taken a toll.”

Gunn does not believe she is out of the woods yet.

“My whole world has changed. My identity has changed. My relationships have changed, for better or for worse,” she said.

It’s in times like these that you find out who your real friends are, unfortunately. And because things are still changing, it’s just impossible to wrap your head around.

“It’s hard to predict what it’s going to be like when I leave the house.”

Since returning to Australia in September, Gunn has flown under the radar, keeping a low profile and allowing everyone to “calm down”.

“There was so much hate and emotion that I needed to wait for everyone to calm down a bit,” Gunn said.

“The fact that I’ve been used to promote some reality TV series when I’m not going to be on them, I mean that’s crazy.”

Instead of enjoying five minutes of fame, Gunn has spent the time reading and “doing a big spring clean”.

Gunn says she doesn’t know “what the future holds”.

“There’s still a lot of work to be done in trying to rebuild my image,” she said.

“I’ll just let people get to know me a bit more, because they just don’t.

“I feel like every time I put myself out there again, it’s a bit of a power move.

“I think the haters want me to be locked away in a room, ashamed and quiet.

Every time I leave the house, go out for dinner, go to the shops or do a fashion shoot and pop my head back up, it’s saying, ‘No, you did not bring me down. You did not succeed. I still stand by what I did. It’s OK to be different. It’s OK to be yourself. You don’t have the power you think you do’.”

Gunn has signed with the talent agency Born Bred Talent.

“I’ve got a few new projects that I’m working on right now that I’m really excited about (that are) centred around self-expression and joyfulness. You should be hearing more about them in the next few months.”

“You should be hearing more about them in the next few months.”

The interview came as Gunnb debuted a stylish new look.

Wearing an elegant blue gown and strappy black sandals on the magazine cover, the athlete styled her new look with a slicked-back braided ponytail and a bold red lip.

The cover was posted to Instagram with the comment functionality turned off. Previews of other covers for the same magazine do not always have comments turned off.