"As a sport psychologist, I often work with athletes who look confident, powerful, and successful from the outside while quietly managing relentless internal strain. Many are navigating elite performance demands alongside identity-related stress, including sexual orientation, gender expression, race, and neurodivergence. For queer athletes, this labor is often invisible. It rarely involves dramatic coming-out moments. More often, it shows up in constant self-monitoring. What can I say? Who is safe? How much of myself is allowed here?"
"The series refuses to strip its characters of masculinity or competitiveness to make queerness palatable. They are strong, dominant, high-performing athletes. That matters, as research has consistently shown that rigid stereotypes linking athleticism with heterosexuality remain a core barrier to inclusion in sport environments (Anderson, 2009). At the same time, the show does not glorify hypermasculinity. It shows how emotional suppression and self-denial, while often rewarded in sport, quietly chip away at psychological well-being and relational health over time."
Queer athletes often present confidence and success externally while managing persistent internal identity stress alongside elite performance demands. Identity-related stress frequently appears as constant self-monitoring rather than visible coming-out moments, with decisions about safety and disclosure shaping daily behavior. Heterosexism in sport can harm mental health even without overt homophobia, through erasure and enforced emotional suppression. Representation that captures complexity and discomfort supports more accurate visibility and reduces harm. Emotional suppression and self-denial may sustain short-term performance but tend to erode psychological well-being and relational health over time, undermining long-term functioning.
Read at Psychology Today
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]