AfterElton has unveiled their Hot 100 for the year, and not surprisingly there are very few athletes on the list. Only three sports figures made it this year: Ben Cohen (No. 64, right), David Beckham (No. 24) and Matthew Mitcham (No. 15). According to AfterElton’s Michael Jensen, Mitcham has the highest debut of anyone on this year’s list. He’s also the fifth-highest out man on the list (not including Anderson Cooper). The AfterElton staff speculates why so few athletes are voted in by readers:
It’s interesting to speculate why more athletes aren’t among gay faves, but given both the lack of out gay men in professional sports and the fact the homophobia and sports still too often go hand-in-hand, it isn’t entirely surprising so few are on the Hot 100.
I don’t think homophobia has anything to do with it: The number of people who see sports and think “homophobia” is now a small minority.
AfterElton is an entertainment site that focuses almost exclusively on TV and movies, so that’s what their readers know and love, and the men from those worlds are whom they vote in. Musicians are under-represented on the list as well, probably because AfterElton doesn’t do much with music. If Outsports readers voted on a list of the hottest 100 men in the world, my guess is half would be from sports because our readers are more focused on sports. If Towleroad or Pam’s House Blend did the same voting, there would probably be more politicians on the list.
I’ve never heard of about 15 of the people on AfterElton’s list, and my guess is most of their readers have never heard of half of the men in the King of the Hardwood contest. When mainstream magazines like Entertainment Weekly and People come out with lists like these, athletes are always few and far between for the same reasons. It’s not bad, it’s just whom people know about and are familiar with.
AfterElton doesn’t use photos or lists to have people vote: Readers submit whatever name they like and the people with the most votes get on the list. But you tell me, if you saw these pairs of pictures and had to vote for the hotter person, whom would you choose:
Jason Mraz or Christiano Ronaldo
John Krasinski or David Williams
on May 12th, 2009 at 8:29 AM
The reason there are so few athletes on the list is because many gay men simply don’t follow sports. Most of my friends are from gay softball, basketball and volleyball leagues. So all of these guys play sports, but very few of them follow sports.
To illustrate the point consider this: I go to two different bars here in New York City to watch sports on TV – Gym Bar (Gay) and Landsdowne Road (Straight). Watching the crowds in both bars for years, it’s become clear that very few of the guys in Gym are ever watching a game. Almost everyone in Gym is socializing or cruising. While almost everyone in Landsdowne Road seems to be watching the game.
on May 12th, 2009 at 10:55 AM
I’ve been to many sports bars including Gym, and I’ve seen little difference between the sports-watching at a straight sports bar and a gay sports bar.
But it makes sense that there’s more ‘cruising’ going on a gay sports bar. Even at straight sports bars, 80% of the patrons are men: Without the object of their affection (women) walking around, they have little to ‘cruise.’ At a gay sports bar, you’ve got all guys who want other guys. Try watching a game at Hooters and you’ll get a slightly more analogous perspective.
on May 12th, 2009 at 1:17 PM
Point well taken about watching a game at Hooters being more analogous for a straight guy.
But that sort of contradicts your point that there is little difference between watching a game at a straight (non-Hooters) type sports bar and a gay sports bar.
To be fair, I’ve not been to many gay sports bars other than Gym. So it’s tough to make any concrete conclusions on such a small sample. And I wasn’t trying to make any value judgement about us gays. Just stating an observation I believe to be true.