"The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle. The essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well." _ Baron Pierre de Coubertin, 1894. This is the Olympic Creed. The Opening Ceremonies of Atlanta's Summer Games are two years away, but the fighting already has begun. Already, there are struggles over human rights issues not related to sport, but interlocked nonetheless with the five rings. The preliminary rounds of volleyball are scheduled for the Cobb Galleria Centre, northwest of Atlanta. In August 1993, the Cobb County Commission adopted an anti-gay resolution, decrying the "gay lifestyle" as incompatible with community standards. Since February, community activists have fought to rescind the resolution and implored the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games to choose a new venue for volleyball. The protest gained national attention July 7 at the Olympic Festival in St. Louis, when four-time Olympic gold-medal diver Greg Louganis _ who is gay _ spoke out against the venue after accepting the Robert J. Kane Award, presented annually to an American athlete who exemplifies "a commitment to excellence and dedication to sport." Louganis said he thought the U.S. Olympic Committee sent a message of tolerance by giving an openly gay athlete the Kane award. "Now you can reinforce that message by encouraging (ACOG) to move the volleyball preliminaries to a venue that welcomes all athletes, including gay and lesbian athletes," Louganis said. "Now, added to the normal pressures of competition, gay men and women who will participate will have the pressure of knowing that they are not wanted in Cobb County." Louganis does not stand alone. The world's most renowned gay athlete, Martina Navratilova, defended him. But under her contract with the New Jersey Stars of World TeamTennis, Navratilova must play in Cobb County next week. She put it into perspective: "I think if you boycott you are just running away from the problem," Navratilova said in a conference call earlier this month. "And that's what these people want. They want to get rid of us. "The Cobb County people are ignorant, and they are being rewarded for being ignorant. I don't think they should have awarded Cobb County the venue in the first place." But the issue transcends sports, as shown by the outcry from the National Organization for Women, one of the first national organizations not devoted specifically to gay rights to protest. At its annual convention two weeks ago, NOW called the Cobb County venue an "international disgrace." "The Cobb resolution sets a dangerous precedent," said Georgia NOW President Vicki McLennon. "Who is next? Will single moms be next? Will non-Christians be welcome there? History has shown that bigots with power are dangerous and that they don't stop after attacking one group." Cobb County is an affluent, politically conservative suburb northwest of Atlanta _ population 450,000 _ blending old town squares with shiny office buildings and new housing developments. On Aug. 10, 1993, the Cobb County Commission voted 4-1 on the anti-gay resolution. The document was sponsored by commissioner Gordon Wysong and co-authored by Nelson Price, a televangelist from Roswell Baptist Church _ a member of the right-wing Christian Coalition. Two events made Wysong rush into action. On Aug. 2, 1993, Atlanta agreed to provide insurance benefits for unmarried partners of city workers. In the spring, Marietta's Theatre in the Square produced the acclaimed off-Broadway show Lips Together, Teeth Apart, which discusses homosexuality but has no gay characters. It was the theater's most popular play, but Wysong thought it was part of a "gay agenda" in Cobb County. In July he proposed the resolution, and in August it passed. "We were totally blindsided last July with this," said Elaine Hill, co-chairwoman of the Cobb Citizens Coalition, formed in response to the resolution. "I thought we're going to vote on this, right? No, they just passed it." Without provocation from an organized gay community, she added. "They have given approval to people who hate," said Hill, who recently installed an alarm system in her Cobb County home. Last month, a Coalition meeting received threats and sought police protection. "It allows people to say, "Well, our government says that gays don't belong in Cobb, so we can do what we want.' That's the atmosphere they created." The resolution created an especially uncomfortable atmosphere for the daughter of commission chairman Bill Byrne, who supported the resolution. Shannon Byrne, 24, is a lesbian. In June she held a press conference to announce she was gay (she told her family four years before) and to protest the resolution. "These commissioners are speaking about family values and saying that gays are incompatible with community standards. That's very hurtful and hypocritical since they are condemning their own child," Shannon Byrne said. "A lot of people didn't think about that. I thought that I could make a difference and hopefully change some views." But Shannon Byrne did not change the views of the commission and only moved her father to author what was termed a "compromise" amendment. The amendment was supposed to calm tempers by stating the county's commitment to human rights, yet it reinforced the resolution's stance on so-called family values. The amendment did not pass. Byrne has since directed all calls to Wysong, saying that since he was outvoted (3-2), he was no longer the leader of the commission. Wysong believed there was no room for compromise. He shrugs his shoulders at protests from such groups as the Cobb Citizens Coalition, Olympics Out of Cobb and the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation. "The reaction is predictable," Wysong said. "Any time you take any stand against the gay community, you are vilified for it." He refused to concede that with ACOG seeking other venues because of his resolution, the issue has become contentious. "Cobb County doesn't have any controversy with ACOG," he said. "This has little or no concern to the citizens of Cobb. The site of the Olympic volleyball games is not an important issue to citizens of the county. We're just hosting a preliminary round; we did not get a gold-medal round." By the end of the year, the brand new, built-for-volleyball Cobb Centre Galleria may not have any round of Olympic games. "My feeling is that Cobb County doesn't hold the Olympic spirit," Shannon said. "If it can't even welcome its own citizens, how can it welcome the world?" Since March, ACOG has been looking for alternate sites for the preliminary rounds. When the commission did not approve the amendment, ACOG knew the problem was not going to go away. "The interests of the athletes are paramount as we look at the situation in Cobb County," ACOG president Billy Payne said in a written statement. "Certainly, we are disappointed that no compromise has been forthcoming between the Cobb County Commission and special-interest groups involved in the debate there. The lack of any movement toward resolving the situation gives even more urgency to our efforts to explore all possible alternatives." Although Payne added that the committee will decide by the end of the year, last week ACOG said it was close to finding a new site. Jon Ivan Weaver, co-chairman of the Olympics Out of Cobb committee, was skeptical of Payne's announcement. "It's not done until it's done," he said. "We want it to be publicly and formally moved." Weaver is still planning long-term strategy. At Stonewall 25, a parade and rally in New York celebrating the gay rights movement, Weaver spoke to the crowd of 800,000 and asked for its support. If ACOG keeps the site in Cobb County, the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force plans to organize a protest during the Olympics. Meanwhile, on Aug. 28, Olympics Out of Cobb will stage a march with community Jewish leaders. ACOG may not have made a decision yet, but recently one group left the Galleria. The Atlanta Pet Show pulled out of a contract for a September show at the $48-million convention center. Weaver said he wished ACOG had had the foresight to recognize the resolution would be a human-rights violation. Although the International Volleyball Federation approved the Galleria for an Olympic site in March 1993, ACOG did not finalize plans until late fall. It announced the venue Jan. 31. Frankly, the Olympic committee never saw the resolution as a problem, says ACOG spokeswoman Lyn May. "I don't know if the gay and lesbian community had given (the venue) much thought People who it was affecting most didn't come to us before." "The issue has nothing to do with the games," said ACOG spokesman Scott Mall. "We are the conduit for everything. We are the political football. The parties involved in rescinding and passing _ we were looking for them to take action because it was not our place to tell them what to do." Politicians in Georgia and Cobb County are divided on the issue. Three mayors of cities in the county are against the resolution; three favor it. Newt Gingrich, the House Republican whip who represents Cobb County in Congress, has loudly supported the venue, saying the Olympics have refused to consider human-rights issues in the former Soviet Union and China. ACOG was not surprised by such a controversy, considering the history of the Olympics. But its business, staffers say, is putting on the best Games possible for the athletes. Louganis says that means moving them out of Cobb County. He is suggesting that ACOG intercede not simply for the safety of the athletes, but because it is the committee's place to make a statement. "It is not an issue of politics," he said. "But fairness." _ Other news organizations contributed to this report.