Homophobia in Football

At this moment in time, 3% of the UK population – 1.5 million people – identify as LBGTQ+ (Office for National Statistics). However, there is only one professional male football player who openly identifies as gay.

Last year, On the 17th of May, 2022, Blackpool forward, Jake Daniels, came out as gay in an interview with Sky Sports. He was the first professional football player to come out as gay since 1990. Although his announcement was met with a lot of support from the football and sporting community, with players, managers, and many fans offering their congratulations, Daniels also received a lot of backlash.

Two TikToks posted by Sky Sports interviewing Daniels on his experience received so many homophobic hate comments that comments had to be disabled on both videos. The same story continued on Twitter with response threads swarming with Anti-LGBTQ slurs.

The positive responses that Jake Daniels received were overshadowed by the hate that was hurled at him online. Much of the hate he received came from football fans. On one TikTok covering the news from TV football presenter, Alison Bender, the top liked comment read “ending of football”. The comment highlights the sad reality that, although LGBTQ people have equal rights in this country, they are still not treated with equal respect as heterosexual individuals.

I wanted to talk with a gay footballer one to one to better understand how being openly homosexual affects life as a football player. I got in touch with a player from my hometown, Lichfield, to talk to him about his experiences in football since coming out.

20-year-old midfielder, David Byrne and I met up to discuss what it’s like to be a gay man in football.

Firstly, I asked David, “When did you first tell your team that you were gay?

David raised his eyebrows and smirked, “The whole team knew I was gay before I had my first training practice. I think most people can tell I’m gay just by talking to me, don’t ask me how – but they can, so I think because of that, after I met the coaches, word got around.”

David seemed pretty nonchalant about the rumours about his sexuality being passed around as gossip, I enquired – “How did you find out that the team had been talking about your sexuality?”

“After my first day of training with the team, I was in the changing rooms and one of my teammates made a comment about me, something like – don’t look at my d*** David – and the boys laughed. Even though he was joking around, I could tell by that reaction that they’d been talking about it so, yeah, at that point, it was fairly obvious.”

I considered that might’ve been a pretty uncomfortable situation for David, as a gay man, the stigma that he would automatically have sexual intentions with other men must’ve been frustrating to face, I asked him – “How did that make you feel?”

A little laugh escaped David and another smirk followed – “It pissed me off a bit but I just laughed and told him to shut up and that I wasn’t interested. Everyone thought that was pretty funny. I think, when it comes to homosexuality in sports, it becomes the elephant in the room, so once we had that little moment, the tension was gone.”

It was good to hear that David and his team were able to get past that comment but I wanted to find out if the discrimination that he faced went any further. “Since that incident, do you feel that you have ever been discriminated against as a player due to your sexuality?”

David paused to think – “Since then, I’ve only ever been treated as an equal by my teammates and coaches. I think everyone recognises that my sexuality shouldn’t come into the equation, I am a football player, and judging me on anything but that is unfair.”

I was pleasantly surprised by David’s response, I expected that he might have faced more ignorance. However, I was interested to know if he had experienced any discrimination from outside of the team. “How about outside of your team, have you faced any discrimination there?”

“Yes, the number one thing that I get is that when I tell people that I play football they say – but you’re gay! And I think, yes I am gay, and, I play football… the two aren’t mutually exclusive.”

I wondered what David’s take on that attitude was – “Why do you think a lot of people have that reaction?”

“I think, because football is seen as masculine and gay people, stereotypically, aren’t seen as masculine, people assume I wouldn’t be good at football or that I wouldn’t be interested in it.”

Unfortunately, I think David was right. These archaic views are still common in our society. In a sport like football, where coverage is dominated by straight men and, in the UK there are currently no openly gay, male pundits or commentators, representation of gay people who are interested in the sport, is very low and this reflects on to the attitudes of the public.

I was interested to find out if David had any opinions on how equality could be encouraged in the game. “What do you think we, as a society, can do to promote equality in football?”

“To me, Fans are the main cause of homophobia that I and other gay players face but, I think that they could also be the change so, if there are fans that are part of the LGBTQ+ community or even allies, they can be the ones to stand up and say to homophobic abuse – no, I’m not going to promote that kind of thing, I’m going to support my team, for that team and not because of whatever sexuality the players are. I also think gay players coming out can help toward promoting equality as coming out and being proud about who you are can disrupt that lad culture that can be so toxic and suppressive.”

After talking with David, I was interested to find out if any initiatives to encourage equality in football for gay people had been taken by any football organisations.

In a campaign launched by LGBTQ+ charity, Stonewall, football players have been encouraged to wear rainbow laces in support of LGBTQ+ players. The campaign that was initiated in 2013, teamed up with the Premier league last year and ,between October 22nd and October 30th, all 20 premiere league clubs wore rainbow laces. The act of solidarity drew much attention to the issues LGBTQ+ people face in football.

Although campaigns like this are a good start, it feels as though more should be done. Statistics found by YouGov in 2022 showing that only 16% of fans think they’ve seen a lot of campaigning against homophobia in football compared to (57%) of fans who say they’ve noticed a lot of campaigning aimed at tackling racism in professional football in the last year.

As supporters, we can listen to David’s advice: when we hear homophobic abuse at football matches, at sports bars or in any other situation, we can stand up and call it out. If we all do this, we can change attitudes toward LGBTQ+ people in football and promote equality.

Feature image of ‘One Love’ football captain’s armband, image from onelove.band