“Progress … Slowly, but Surely”: The Sports Media Workplace, Gay Sports Journalists, and LGBT Media Representation in Sport

ABSTRACT

Sport has become an increasingly liberal environment for sexual minorities. This has resulted in an increase of LGBT athletes (especially gay male athletes) coming out of the closet, and being positively framed by sports media. Little is known, however, about how these shifts impact gay men in sports media. Through 12 semi-structured interviews, this article is the first empirical examination of openly gay male sports journalists’ experiences in the sports media workplace. Adopting inclusive masculinity theory (IMT), results indicate that, despite the continued presence of heterosexism, all participants were “out” to colleagues, and almost all were unconditionally accepted when doing so. Additionally, findings indicate a nuanced perspective that contrasts with the oft-sensationalist reporting of LGBT issues by sports media. This article therefore extends the current body of IMT research on improved attitudes toward sexual minorities in sports media.

KEYWORDS:

• Sports media
• homophobia
• representation
• journalism
• sport
• employment
• workplace

Acknowledgements

My special thanks go to Andrew Wort, Bill Cassidy, and the two anonymous reviewers.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 These events were the 2018 FIFA World Cup, Winter Olympics, Winter Paralympics, Commonwealth Games, Wimbledon, and European Championships.

2 This includes only three of a possible 63 at the 2018 World Cup in Russia.

3 Social attitude surveys—particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States—show that approximately only a fifth of the population to oppose same-sex rights, down from 75% in 1988 (see Clements and Field 2014; Twenge, Sherman, and Wells 2016).

4 I refer to a “closed” website as part of a Network’s webpage which only “members” of sports media have access to.

5 These are: familiarization with data; generating initial codes; searching and identifying themes; reviewing themes; defining and naming themes; writing the report.

6 In particular, points 26 through 28 of the British Sociological Association’s (BSA) Statement of Ethical Practice were closely followed.