Latest / gasp! the pod / "gay for paige": how the wnba keeps out-gaying itself

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"gay for paige": how the wnba keeps out-gaying itself · gasp! the pod

0:00
But yeah, it's just kind of wild how powerful young teen lesbians
0:05
who don't even know that they're lesbians are.
0:17
Hey guys, welcome back to GASP the Pod, the podcast for the
0:22
gays, the girls, and especially the gay girls today.
0:26
Of course, we're talking about gay girls.
0:28
We do this a lot on this podcast.
0:30
We're talking about the WNBA, we're talking about women's
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basketball, specifically the sapphic thirsting heard around
0:38
the world for specific players and also just the gay culture of
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the WNBA in general. I don't know if people like
0:46
fully understand that the WNBA is incredibly gay and a lot of
0:50
these players are gay. And we're going to just we're
0:53
just going to go into all of this, right?
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I want to talk about this because the WNBA draft happened
0:59
last week and Pagebackers was the number one pick.
1:04
She sat right next to her rumored girlfriend Arizona Fudd.
1:08
Now, when many people on the Internet pointed out that, you
1:12
know, Paige Becker's and Arizona look a little bit more than
1:16
friends, given the fact that Arizona is sitting at Paige's
1:20
table during the draft, which everyone who kind of watches
1:25
sports knows that whoever sits at that table is like very
1:29
important. More than just friends, OK?
1:32
Usually it's their family members or coach and their
1:34
significant other. So the fact that AZ walked the
1:37
red carpet with Paige sat next to her, you know, that's a very
1:40
fair assumption for people to think maybe they're dating.
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I want to dig into the WNBA, how fucking gay it is, and kind of
1:50
the rise of Sapphic thirsting for WNBA and like women's
1:54
basketball players over the last few years.
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And we're going to talk about Paige and Azie, why they're
2:00
probably dating. We're going to talk about
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Caitlin Clark. We're going to talk about Kate
2:03
Martin, and then we're going to talk about the OGWNBA players,
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OK? And of course, the center point
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of all of this is the fact that the WNBA is so inherently
2:15
lesbian. Let's get into it.
2:18
So First off, if you're new to this pod, thank you so much for
2:21
listening. This is a podcast, as I already
2:23
said, for the gays, the girls, and especially the gay girls.
2:26
I cover mostly pop culture topics that are inherently queer
2:31
and we deep dive into them every week.
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Each week I drop episodes on Tuesday.
2:36
The last few weeks. I am so sorry everyone, I've
2:39
been a little absent. I did post 2 bonus episodes on
2:44
my Patreon. You do have to be a subscriber
2:47
to watch those, and I heavily rely on my subscribers because
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putting on a podcast is very hard, difficult, time consuming,
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subscribe to my Patreon, subscribe to my Spotify or
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follow me on Spotify, subscribe to my YouTube, which is free.
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Do all those things. It means so much.
3:06
Yeah guys I'm back and I apologize for my brief
3:11
disappearance. I am in a new apartment.
3:13
Me and my girlfriend literally just closed long distance and
3:16
moved in with each other after 3 1/2 years of dating and this is
3:20
the new space so it's been kind of a lot.
3:23
We also had her law prom this weekend.
3:26
I came back from traveling and I have things everywhere.
3:29
I don't have my shit together. Like my tech was broken.
3:33
I had to get new equipment. It's been such a shit show.
3:36
And I apologize, but we are finally back on schedule.
3:40
So like I mentioned the two bonus episodes that I put on
3:43
Patreon if you want to listen to our Gaylord song of the month.
3:47
And I talked about the song Bolter by Taylor Swift and I
3:50
talked about why I think it's queer coded.
3:53
And I also have an outlandish theory post in this bonus
3:57
series. I'm going to like convince
3:59
people of an outlandish pop culture theory.
4:01
So go ahead and check those out after this.
4:04
If you wanted more content that's on my Patreon, I'm going
4:06
to link that also merges 20% off.
4:10
It is literally going once, going twice because I'm making a
4:12
Pride merch line. I will link that as well.
4:16
And final last thing before, before I get into the bulk of
4:20
our content today is Patreon #1 Gasper.
4:24
So these are my Patreon subscribers.
4:26
I call them #1 Gaspers this week I'm shouting out.
4:30
Rosie, thank you so much for being a number one Casper and
4:32
listening and making this podcast be what it is today.
4:35
So let's get into this topic, y'all.
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OK? Viewership of women's sports in
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the last few years has literally skyrocketed, OK?
4:44
Specifically women's basketball and women's soccer.
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With this attention obviously comes fame.
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And this fame for a few select players has like changed their
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lives. Specifically these gay players.
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To talk about women sports and to not talk about the queerness
5:02
entrenched in women's sports is such a disservice to the
5:06
conversation, OK? Because queerness has always
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been a part of women's sports. In the same way that we
5:13
acknowledge that, like, gay men and fashion go hand in hand, and
5:18
that like queerness is a part of fashion as well.
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There's certain industries that are just influenced by queer
5:24
people and we have to acknowledge that lesbians love
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sports, by girls love sports. Gay girls love sports.
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Not all gay girls, but a lot of them do.
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And it's not stereotyping to acknowledge that fact.
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OK. If you want an episode where I
5:39
talk more about like, why it's OK to speculate on sexuality and
5:42
like, why, you know, acknowledging this isn't
5:45
stereotyping, I have a whole episode on it.
5:47
It's called Why It's OK to Speculate on Sexuality.
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So go check that out if you're like, kind of questioning the
5:53
morality of like speculating on sexuality because like, it's
5:57
kind of part of everything thing I talk about.
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So that's why I made that episode.
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With this viewership increasing so much, these players now have
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literally thousands of even millions of fans around the
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world. A lot of those fans are queer
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women. Viewership of women's sports in
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general has literally tripled in the last five years.
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That's a real stat. Y'all know?
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I like some evidence based arguments because I went to
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liberal arts college and like it feels literally irresponsible
6:26
for me to make an argument that isn't based on facts.
6:29
So unfortunately I still do have to do that for my own sake, but
6:33
maybe not in TikTok so much. Oops.
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So why has viewership of women's sports tripled?
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I mean, people could argue a few different things here.
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We can talk about star power of these specific players growing
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momentum just of women's sports and the focus on it.
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Maybe talking about on social media a lot has really pushed it
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feminism, you know, people being like, wow, women athletes to be
6:57
paid as much as male athletes, especially because women's
7:00
sports are actually getting more viewership than the men's
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sports. So the argument that like, OK,
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they get paid more when, you know, people pay attention more,
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bitch, that's happening. So where's the money, right?
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And I would argue a big reason of why women's sports has had
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such an increase in viewership is from queer fans and like
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putting our energy, focus and resources towards women's
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sports. I mean, there's women's sports
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bars that are like being created across the country.
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And who are a lot of those fans and patrons?
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Queer women, queer women, like watching other queer women.
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I just want to add another reason why I'm so excited about
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this topic this week and like why I just love lesbian
7:43
basketball players is because basketball was like a huge part
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of my life growing up. I played basketball up until
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high school, never into college. And I did like competitive
7:53
leagues. Like, it was like my whole life.
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My dad was a big basketball player.
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My brother's a basketball player, so it was just a huge
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part of my life. And I also do think looking back
8:02
was a huge part of my understanding of my queerness as
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well. I didn't really realize it, but
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I had so much gay panic that was going on.
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Like at these tryouts, I would be so fucking nervous to play
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against some of these really good players.
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And I didn't even really realize this into the last few years.
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But it's because I was so nervous to be that close with
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these hot gay girls, especially these like mask or like stud
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players that I was like so intimidated by because I was
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fucking attracted to them. And that's just such a central
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part of basketball. Like gay girls love basketball
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and like, that's just a fact. Me and my girlfriend are also
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going to play in a basketball league the next upcoming winter.
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Like a fun league. And she's asking me to coach
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her. So now, like, we play basketball
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all the time. It's very fun for us.
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It's very cute for us. OK, let's get back to the topic
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at hand. So viewership of women's
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basketball, this is from front office sports.
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They say, quote, last year's women's basketball championship
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game was the first to draw more viewers than the men's title
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game. And the momentum has carried
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over. So there we go.
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Women's basketball is now actually getting up to the
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viewership level that men's basketball is.
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The women's championship game from last year literally outdrew
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the men's by more than 4 million views.
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That's insane. This is another quote from them.
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Women's college basketball ratings were up on ESPN this
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season despite Caitlin Clark moving on to the WNBA.
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So that's actually showing that it's more than just a star
9:38
player, right? It's this overall interest now
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in women's basketball, even if Caitlin Clark isn't playing,
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which of course she has a huge effect, the Caitlin Clark
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effect. And I think like focusing on
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these specific exceptional women's athletes is exciting and
9:54
fun and like, we deserve to have these star players.
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But it's also more than Caitlin Clark, and I think she knows
9:59
that too. ESPN says that the WNBA full
10:02
season averaged 1.2 million views, the most watched full
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season on ESPN platforms ever. This was in 2024 and up 155%
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from 2023. That's crazy.
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Women view viewership was up 164% and 165% year over year
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respectively. Even though we've seen this
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insane, insane rise in terms of focus and viewership of women's
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basketball, women players are still not paid nearly as much as
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NBA players. This is an insane stat.
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Are you guys ready? ESPN says that most NBA players
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make over 100 times more than what women's players will make
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100 times more than the women's players.
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That's fucking insane. Now do basketball players need
10:54
to be making $10 million? I don't think so, but I do think
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they need to be making more than $79,000.
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Like I don't think I'm pretty sure that's what Page Becker's
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is making this year. 79,000 for a year, which like would be a
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good salary if rent wasn't so expensive.
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And I understand she's doing a lot of brand deals and signed a
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contract with Unrivalled, but just the stark comparison with
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the men's and women's pay is ridiculous.
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Let's talk about how the WNBA is so lesbian.
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There's a lot of mixed information on the Internet in
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terms of like what percent of the WNBA is gay?
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Now, the most accurate one I've seen in terms of like actually
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calculating the players and not just like a general stat is from
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Inter Basket that says 38% of WNBA players are LGBTQ.
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Plus, this is from 2022. Now, let's remember, this is in
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terms of players that are publicly out.
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And what we know from like queer studies and just like an
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understanding of the queer community in general is that so
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many people are not out, especially by players.
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And, you know, there's a lot of players that are perhaps not
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necessarily closeted but aren't necessarily out in a way that we
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understand being out, or at least I think the media
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understands being out. So like, for example, this stat
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would not include pagebackers, even though, you know, most
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queer people, I think, would see her and be like, oh, gay, you
12:30
know, no question about it. But, you know, this stat is
12:33
literally who has made direct outward statements like, this is
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my sexuality, which, as we know, is not how the queer community
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works. And it's kind of an old
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fashioned way to understand who could be gay is if they tell the
12:49
media a very specific identity that they have.
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I've said this before and I'll say it again, But like, when I
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came out, I posted a picture of a rainbow and I thought it was
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like the most obvious thing ever.
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Like coming out being gay is sometimes not in the way that
13:05
straight people think coming out is.
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And, you know, we should not assume that people are like
13:12
closeted or straight until they make a press release.
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Her. Also, you know, a lot of these
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WNBA players are making money off of brand deals and stuff
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like that. And a lot of these brand deals
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don't really like gay people marketing their brands.
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Are these players making decisions that are financially
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good for them? Are they not necessarily
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closeted, but they're not necessarily out.
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I use quotes for that. You know, a lot of people say
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maybe Pagebackers isn't out because Madison Reed, you know,
13:46
one of the brands that she works with wouldn't want to work with
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like a lesbian basketball player.
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And before you say, oh, that would never affect business,
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you're so fucking wrong. Oh my God.
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Homophobia still very much exists and if anything is
14:01
getting a lot worse. So many corporations actually
14:03
pulled out of Pride this year, which there's an argument to say
14:07
we don't need corporations for the pride movement, but also
14:10
shows you that corporations don't really want to be
14:13
associated with Pride if that's not the way the culture is
14:17
moving. And the way the culture is
14:18
moving right now is very tragic. Head wife, Republican,
14:22
Christian, conservative, That's the vibe.
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That's all to say that this number is very, very
14:28
conservative. And it's probably more around
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like 60 to 70%. That's what a lot of players and
14:34
what a lot of people who are like familiar with the WNBA and
14:37
queer culture say. That is still one of the highest
14:40
numbers we've seen of at least documented numbers we've seen in
14:45
terms of a sports league in the US, It's very, very good.
14:48
That means literally more than 1/3 of all players are out.
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That's amazing. And in terms of like the stats
14:55
of like the US population, that's gay, that's insanely high
15:00
because Gallup says that in terms of the US population, only
15:04
7% of the US population is out. So 7% versus 38%.
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That means WNBA players are 30% more likely to be gay than the
15:16
average U.S. citizen. I mean, come on, the WNBA is so
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lesbian. Oh my God.
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The WNBA is also the first US professional sports league to
15:24
openly market to the LGBTQ community.
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I went to a Liberty game last year in New York and Oh my God,
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it was like a Pride rally. It was literally like a dyke
15:34
March. It was fucking amazing.
15:35
Like queer couples and their kids going like it was the most
15:40
gay place. And so when you are playing
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professional basketball, this is the culture.
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The culture of WNBA is queer. So if you are a player and
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you're playing amidst this, you might even think there's no need
15:54
for me to come out. I'm already playing in a game
15:56
league, so we have to put players in this context of the
16:01
WNBA, which is so much more progressive than a lot of other
16:05
sports leagues. And it's so normal and common to
16:09
be queer that if you're a queer player, you're like, this is
16:13
just so the culture, it's not even a question.
16:16
There's no need to come out. And that's what the feature
16:19
should be. By the way, I know a lot of
16:21
straight people forget on the Internet that we shouldn't have
16:24
to come out to be considered queer.
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It's very normal to just be gay in the WNBA.
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That's what the future should be, not having to make an
16:32
announcement. You know, you can just show up
16:34
on a carpet with your girlfriend and wear a suit, and that's your
16:37
life. OK?
16:39
Page Beckers. And as you guys can tell, I'm
16:42
very much centering Page Beckers in this conversation, not
16:46
because I think that she's like the only basketball player and
16:49
that the only one that we should be talking about right now, but
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I do think she's kind of central to talking about queerness right
16:55
now in the WNBA. And especially with the amount
16:58
of fans that are paying attention to her and Arizona, I
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think it's just like a good jumping off point to talk about
17:04
queerness in the WNBA. The WNBA is also black.
17:07
And I do very much appreciate the fact that Pagebackers made
17:11
an entire speech talking about how black women need way more
17:15
recognition when it comes to the sport because 60% of WNBA
17:18
players are black. This is according to Statista
17:21
2023. This conversation is also very
17:24
intersectional, right? So we're talking about
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queerness, we're talking about blackness, we're talking about
17:29
women, we're talking about a lot of different issues.
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Obviously we're focusing on the gayness of it all, but this is
17:35
an important point to mention, right?
17:39
You know that the WNBA is doing something right when
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conservatives are mad at the league for being all quote black
17:46
lesbians. Which by the way, not a bad
17:49
thing. I personally love black
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lesbians. My favorite 1 is my girlfriend.
17:53
And so this league is going to piss people off.
17:57
It's everything that that conservatives fucking hate.
18:01
There's such a racial divide, too, and also such a divide in
18:08
terms of who will be rooting for who.
18:12
Conservatives in America have literally pit Caitlin Clark and
18:17
Angel Reese against each other as, like, the white versus
18:21
black, like the good white player who's struggling to be in
18:25
this black lesbian league. And then this crazy, you know,
18:31
emotional black player Angel Reese, who, like, should not
18:35
even be in the same category, is Caitlin Clark.
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And you can acknowledge Caitlin Clark being a great player
18:41
without being so fucking racist. And they glom on to these
18:44
specifically white straight players, which, you know, some
18:48
people argue or think that Caitlin Clark is not straight.
18:52
I might be in that camp, but that they think she's the only
18:55
reason why anyone's paying attention to basketball.
18:58
And, you know, trying to push down any of the other players
19:02
that, you know, represent apparently the worst of America,
19:05
which is being black and being less.
19:07
And this is an example of that. Clay Travis, lol Travis, founder
19:12
of Outkick, I don't know what the fuck that is.
19:14
And a controversial right wing sports commentator.
19:17
He told Fox News that the then rookie quote, Caitlin Clark is a
19:22
quote, white heterosexual woman in a black lesbian league.
19:26
And they resent and are jealous of all the attention and the
19:30
shoe deal that she got. Oh, my God.
19:31
So that just goes to show you what conservatives think of the
19:36
sport and how that kind of impacts viewing the league in
19:40
the sport in general, right? You can talk about the issues of
19:44
racism without being like, Caitlin Clark sucks.
19:47
You know, it's not Caitlin Clark, it's the people assessing
19:52
over her and hating any other player.
19:54
You have to acknowledge that whiteness and perceived
19:59
straightness made Caitlin Clark get to the star level that she's
20:04
at. And it would be way more
20:06
difficult for a black or queer or Black queer player to get to
20:12
that same level of star. So anyways, the point is that
20:15
there's a lot to this conversation, right?
20:17
There's a lot of intersectionality going on when
20:20
we talk about. Women's sports, and now that
20:23
it's getting so much attention, how does that fit into our
20:27
current American culture? That really informs, you know,
20:30
the culture of how we're talking about women's sports and how
20:33
we're talking about specific women's basketball players and
20:37
how white ones and perceived straight ones get more
20:39
attention, right? Let's talk about some of these
20:41
famous queer WNBA players that have gotten a lot of attention,
20:45
and for good reason. Just to kind of show you guys
20:47
that a lot of these famous fucking players are fucking gay,
20:51
right? Sue Bird, who as we know, is
20:53
married to Megan Rapinoe. Britney Greiner, who is famous
20:57
and also infamous. Conservatives fucking hate her.
21:02
Diana Torasi, who is one of the best players of all time.
21:06
Brianna Stewart. DJI Carrington and she's dating
21:10
another player, Melissa Smith. And so they're a famous lesbian
21:14
couple in the WNBA. Kate Martin who got drafted last
21:18
year and she has a lot of thirsty WLW fans.
21:24
Alicia Clarendon is another famous player and actually they
21:27
became the first non binary player in the league's history.
21:30
So these are some of these iconic, you know, household
21:33
names, or at least if you pay attention to basketball,
21:36
household names of queer WNBA players.
21:40
I want to be focusing on a few of these new players and kind of
21:46
this huge bump in viewership that I think that they've given
21:50
the league. And I think a lot of it comes
21:53
from literally thirsty WLW sapphic young people and I'm
22:00
obsessed. Like you could argue OK I wish
22:03
it was just focus on basketball. There is nothing wrong with
22:07
little lesbians obsessing over lesbian basketball players or
22:12
even straight basketball players.
22:14
There's nothing wrong unless you're being fucking creepy as
22:16
fuck. We don't care when girls thirst
22:20
over men, we don't care when guys thirst over girls.
22:24
But right when it comes to basketball players, for some
22:28
reason we hate when lesbians are like Oh my gosh, pagebackers is
22:32
so hot. Like why does that matter to
22:34
anyone? I don't get it.
22:36
It's homophobia. I was trying to see if there
22:39
were stats in, like if queer viewership went up for women's
22:43
sports. I think it's kind of hard to
22:45
figure out who these fans are, right?
22:48
However, here's some headlines regarding that.
22:52
Refinery 29 says, quote, the WNBA has brought lesbian lust
22:57
mainstream for sure. Which if it's done anything,
23:02
that's amazing. And we can hold two things at
23:05
once. Oh my God.
23:06
We can acknowledge there's lesbian lust and we can
23:10
acknowledge that women basketball players are amazing
23:13
and we can talk about the sport personally, I'm not a sports
23:16
commentator, OK? That's why I'm talking about the
23:19
queerness aspect of it. But I think a lot of these
23:21
conversations online are always like, why aren't you focused on
23:25
page being #1 and I'm like, because I'm not a basketball
23:29
commentator, OK? I talk about the girl who's I
23:31
talk about the gates. I talk about pop culture.
23:34
Now I'll like, yes, a lot of people are talking about her
23:36
basketball and that's great. But like, what's the problem
23:39
with people saying that she's hot and thinking she's gay?
23:41
There's literally nothing wrong with that.
23:44
She's not closeted because if she was closeted, she would not
23:47
be wearing the outfits that she's wearing.
23:49
Fact. If she was concerned people
23:52
thought that she was dating easy, she wouldn't have her sit
23:55
at her table. That's why she's not closeted.
23:57
If she's straight, there should be no reason she should take
24:01
offense to lesbians thinking that she's hot or thinking that
24:04
she's dating her best friend. Because it's nothing offensive
24:07
about calling someone gay unless you know you're doing it in a
24:11
homophobic way, which none of these little bitches are OK them
24:15
says quote unrivaled. A new women's basketball league
24:18
is somehow even gayer than the WNBA.
24:21
Paige Becker's is going to unrivals Sports Illustrated says
24:26
quote LGBTQIA fans have made the WNBA what it is since its
24:31
inception. We started the WNBA.
24:33
I mean, not we necessarily, but our community is a huge reason
24:37
why the WNBA is what it is. And we are allowed to continue
24:41
to talk about it and acknowledge the queer aspect of WNBA.
24:47
We're not going to let it be erased, all right?
24:50
Queer social media, I think is also a huge driving force of
24:54
this viewership. You know, there's a lot of
24:56
accounts that specifically talk about queer women's sports, and
25:00
that's so, so, so fucking important.
25:03
It's so important even now to be louder than we ever were before.
25:07
And I think that whether or not people acknowledge it themselves
25:11
or about themselves or about other people, it is a fact that
25:16
Gen. Z is becoming more and more
25:19
conservative. And I think that's a huge reason
25:22
why these conversations, when we talk about queer sports or queer
25:25
celebrities or talking about queer things in general is being
25:29
very least, and it's giving don't say gay.
25:32
So whether or not you are consciously realizing that that
25:36
is why you are so uncomfortable with people talking about queer
25:40
basketball players or queer celebrities, whether or not you
25:43
realize that that's the case, that is the culture we are in
25:46
right now and that is having an impact on it.
25:50
There's no reason, if you are straight, why you should have
25:54
any fucking issue with queer people doing anything they want,
25:58
OK? It's not your place if you are
26:00
by, or you are a lesbian, or you are queer in general and you
26:04
find yourself so vehemently pissed off that people think 2
26:10
basketball players might be dating or, you know, this girl
26:12
wearing a suit could be a lesbian.
26:14
If that's pissing you off so much, you need to check yourself
26:19
and think if you have any internalized homophobia.
26:22
And it is possible that you had, you know, a traumatic experience
26:26
of being outed. And you are letting that project
26:29
itself on other people. If that happened to you, I'm so
26:32
sorry. But that does not mean we need
26:35
to be silent and private and scared to talk about queer
26:41
things on the Internet. And let's just remember and go
26:45
ahead and check out my episode on why it's OK to speculate on
26:48
sexuality. Let's just remember you can't
26:52
out someone you don't know. No one is out here trying to say
26:57
I have proof that Page Beckers is gay, that no one else does
27:01
because she said this to me. Personally, I've never claimed
27:04
that you can't out someone unless you have secret leaked
27:08
information. Now, if you are leaking that
27:11
information, I don't think that's OK saying that bitch is a
27:15
lesbian. There's no problem with that.
27:17
If you're gay, there's no problem with that.
27:20
That's not outing, that's calling someone gay.
27:22
We have to understand the distinction and it's so
27:25
important that we understand the distinction and we don't over
27:27
censor ourselves because now is the time to be as loud as
27:32
possible. Famous people can be gay,
27:34
celebrities are gay, basketball players are gay, basketball is
27:38
gay. Sports is gay.
27:41
All like gay people are in every aspect of our society.
27:45
And this is the time to be as loud as possible.
27:48
So I will never stop calling people gay.
27:51
I will never do it. Another account you guys can
27:54
follow that I really, really love is Coach Jackie.
27:57
She, I'm sure you guys have seen her.
27:58
She's on TikTok and she talks about queer women's sports.
28:02
And I just love her. And it's so important right now
28:05
to not back down about it. OK, We need to keep talking
28:08
about it online. OK, let's talk about some of
28:10
these young star players and like online buzz about them.
28:13
OK, so first let's start with Page backers.
28:16
As you guys know, Page Backers was the 2025 five number one
28:19
pick in the draft. She's going to play for Dallas
28:23
now. I think a lot of the online buzz
28:26
that came about her was just like thirsting over her, which
28:29
is so fair because she's hot as fuck and also because she's been
28:34
one of the most famous young players of the last few decades,
28:38
right? Some argue that she's better
28:41
than Caitlin Clark. We will see them play each other
28:45
this year. And I think, you know, buzz
28:47
around anyone drives social media, but also when there's so
28:53
many young lesbians wanting content.
28:56
What I think is really interesting about this whole
28:58
conversation online is the fact that there's so many
29:02
self-proclaimed straight girls saying, you know, I have to
29:06
convince myself that I'm straight this week or, you know,
29:11
I'm only gay for pagebackers or trust me, I'm straight.
29:14
And I think that's so amazing when there is a player that is
29:18
so hot that is helping people realize that there's they're
29:22
queer. I think that's so amazing.
29:24
I love that. I just love it.
29:27
And I'm so sorry to let you guys know if you're if anyone's
29:30
watching this and you think that you're straight and you are
29:33
obsessed with watching pagebackers edits, you are
29:36
probably on the spectrum of queerness.
29:40
And that is OK. And it makes you amazing.
29:44
So acknowledge that this is a happy moment.
29:47
OK, so of course, Paige and Arizona are rumored to be
29:51
dating. They've been best friends for so
29:55
long. I met in 2017 when Fudd was
29:58
Arizona was trying out for the USA Basketball team along with
30:02
Paige. And she described Paige as,
30:05
quote, this skinny little white girl, which is so funny and cute
30:10
now that they're like best friends and they, like, both
30:13
made the team. And then after that, Becker's
30:16
went to UConn in 2019. And what's so cute about the
30:21
entire story is that Paige, like, started this hashtag get
30:25
Arizona to UConn and started recruiting her and like, went to
30:29
her parents and like, sat them down and like, played a
30:32
slideshow of, like, her own moments and said, like, look at
30:37
all these assists I'm going to give to Arizona when we play
30:40
together. Just like, I think Paige's
30:44
earnestness and her obsession with Arizona, even if their
30:50
friends, is just so sweet and wholesome.
30:53
And that just whole relationship people love to follow a
30:58
relationship throughout the years.
31:00
I think that is obviously a huge driving force of why people like
31:03
Paige is like, it just seems like so wholesome.
31:05
And I think we need to remember, Oh my God, that like friendships
31:09
can turn into relationships. Me and my girlfriend met in 2016
31:12
and we didn't start dating until 2021.
31:15
So I feel very passionate about that because I literally feel
31:18
like me and my girlfriend are them reversed because my
31:21
girlfriend's like more sporty mask than me and I'm the white
31:26
1, you know what I mean? So it's like literally AZ and
31:29
Paige, except us reversed. Both AZ and Paige have been
31:33
injured multiple times throughout their college career
31:37
at UConn and then got to this point where finally they won a
31:41
championship is, I mean, it's so heartwarming.
31:44
So AZ is actually from Nova. I'm from Northern Virginia and
31:48
AZ's mom, I think played at my high school in 2025.
31:53
She was the Final Four most outstanding player.
31:56
And I think like the online buzz really of Asian Paige is the
32:01
fact that they're two of the best players in woman's
32:05
basketball right now, or at least in college woman's
32:08
basketball. And they're such good friends
32:11
with each other and they might be dating.
32:13
So the buzz about them, I mean, even besides the thirst traps
32:17
and the sexuality and everything has definitely given the league
32:22
more fans. I mean, I think that there's
32:24
queer people that were never involved in women's basketball
32:26
that are now fans because they just love these two so much or
32:31
are just loving the fact that there's like probably 2 queer
32:35
girls dating on like a team. Like it's so romantic.
32:38
Like, why aren't we accepting the fact that queer players are
32:43
bringing in queer fans to get more into women's basketball?
32:46
That's a great, that's a great thing.
32:48
And a lot of people online will say, but they're not even paying
32:51
attention to the basketball. Well, they're paying to watch
32:54
it. You know, they're going to games
32:58
to watch them and thirst over them.
33:00
What's wrong with that? That's great for the sport.
33:03
That's great for the sport. And then of course, we have
33:05
Caitlin Clark and the Caitlin Clark effect, which I feel like
33:08
I already mentioned. But the buzz about her is just
33:11
her being one of the best players of all time.
33:14
There's also a lot of queer thirsting going on for Caitlin
33:19
Clark. There's the rumors she was
33:21
dating someone else. She does have a public boyfriend
33:25
and listen, we need to remind ourselves by people exist.
33:28
She could totally be queer. I think she definitely looks gay
33:30
in the face for sure. The fact that she hung out with
33:34
Taylor Swift makes me feel like Taylor Swift recognized another
33:38
quote closeted girly and was like boom, let's be friends.
33:43
So there's the buzz about her and then of course, there's
33:46
conservatives that claim her and try to like pit her against
33:50
Angel Reese. And moving on to Angel Reese, I
33:53
feel like now a lot of her Internet presence has been like
33:58
filled with so much hatred and a lot of racism.
34:01
It's insane. And this is kind of the problem
34:04
with women's basketball getting now so big that kind of the
34:08
whole world is now watching content about these people and
34:13
they don't even necessarily watch women's basketball.
34:16
And so that's where we see kind of more racism because women's
34:21
basketball fans are very familiar with seeing black
34:25
players seed. The rest of the world is not as
34:29
familiar with that. And they're going to pit this
34:31
Caitlin Clark character over Angel Reese if they think that
34:36
there's a feud, right? And then we have Kate Martin,
34:39
who is gay and has a girlfriend and has a lot of WLW, you know,
34:44
thirsters on the Internet. These star players, all these
34:48
ones that I listed pagebackers, Azfud, Kaitlyn Clark Angel
34:52
Racing, Kate Martin. This roster of players is what I
34:56
see the most on the Internet when it comes to what goes viral
35:00
and what's not necessarily like women's basketball central.
35:05
Like this will come up on my 480 page even if no other basketball
35:08
content is coming up. And I think that's really
35:11
interesting. I think these specific star
35:12
players are our huge driving force when it comes to
35:16
viewership of women's basketball, even when it comes
35:18
from these feuds or idea of like speculating on sexuality and
35:23
like the controversy surrounding it, it's pushing more money and
35:27
more viewership towards women's basketball.
35:29
But what is a lot of this, guys? A lot of it is young queer
35:34
women. Thirsting young queer women, yet
35:37
again, are huge for the economy. We're behind Taylor Swift.
35:41
We're behind women's basketball. But yeah, it's just kind of wild
35:44
how powerful young teen lesbians who don't even know that they're
35:49
lesbians are. So as I've said, young, queer,
35:52
talented and famous players are changing the scene and I think
35:57
bringing so many more fans to the sport because of the fact
36:03
that they're hot and gay looking, which I love.
36:07
And of course a huge part of that is being really good at
36:11
basketball. Another thing that we need to
36:13
remind straight people is when we thirst over women, we don't
36:17
just see them in a sexual light, right?
36:21
People aren't just thirsting over these players because they
36:25
think that they're hot, it's because that they're like
36:28
earnest and sweet and kind and really good at playing
36:33
basketball. Because gay women thirsting is
36:37
multidimensional and men thirsting is one thing.
36:42
And I think that's what the straight community needs to
36:45
understand when it comes to queer thirsting, right?
36:49
Is that we can acknowledge all these things at once.
36:52
We can be like, Oh my God, it's so hot that Page Becker's
36:55
mentioned black woman in her speech.
36:57
It's so hot that she's so nice. It's so hot that she's earnest.
37:01
It's so hot that she's hot. All these things can exist at
37:04
once. But like, we just need to
37:06
normalize queer thirsting. We deserve it.
37:09
We also need to normalize shipping.
37:11
Asian page is a huge, huge part of I think that increased
37:17
viewership towards the sport. It's crazy, but it's true.
37:21
And that's OK, OK, it's not really hurting anyone except
37:25
I'll go in a little bit later about what I do think could hurt
37:28
someone. And then of course speculation
37:29
on sexuality. Besides just thirsting,
37:32
wondering are these players gay? Which is a very fair question
37:36
given the fact that 40% of the WNBA is gay.
37:41
Very, very, very fair question. And I also think a reminder is
37:46
that like, we're not even asking them to tell us their sexuality.
37:50
It's more like speculation with no need for result, OK.
37:57
And that's totally fine to wonder if these players are gay
38:01
or rather just to say, wow, that's a very gay suit that this
38:06
player is wearing. Page Becker's of the WNBA draft,
38:09
That's a gay ass suit. But like, I've really noticed
38:13
recently that there's so many fan feuds when it comes to these
38:17
star players and how specifically Gen.
38:19
Z and like younger people on the Internet are talking about
38:24
women's basketball. And that's that's how people are
38:28
getting access and entry into women's basketball now is queer
38:31
women. And I love that for us.
38:35
But I'm noticing feuds and perhaps St. fans versus queer
38:40
fans, the few that we're seeing a lot online, right, is stop
38:44
speculating on these sexuality. The same thing we're hearing
38:47
over and over and over again from young straight people on
38:51
the Internet. And even if you are queer,
38:54
you're acting very straight if you say that where queer fans
38:57
are the backbone of the WNBA. As you know, we've talked about
39:01
earlier, queer fans are bringing so many new fans into the sport.
39:07
And if you're thirsting, that's OK.
39:10
You can think people are hot and can think they're a great
39:14
basketball player. Two things can exist at once.
39:17
And we are literally bringing in so much money and awareness into
39:22
women's basketball. And that's so important.
39:25
And queer thirsting is so important and great and helpful
39:28
and amazing. And it's so important for us to
39:31
thirst right now. We need it.
39:32
And I don't know why the Internet has gotten so pure in
39:37
terms of like this purity culture of saying you can't call
39:42
a famous celebrity hot. It's so strange to me.
39:47
When I was younger, we were doing this all the time and no
39:50
one cared. There's a huge difference also
39:52
in terms of privacy, right? I'll get it into in a second.
39:56
But like, we have to have some reader comprehension.
39:59
It can't be like, oh, you can't say that at all because what is
40:03
that doing? We're stopping queer voices.
40:05
We're stopping queer thirsting. And it's always on queer people.
40:10
Why is the focus so much on queer people?
40:13
No one cares what men do anymore on the Internet.
40:16
It's only what a queer 16 year old says.
40:19
A queer 16 year old that thinks Page Beckers looks hot in a
40:22
suit, That's really who we're targeting right now.
40:25
That's not a problem that queer girls are thirsting over WNBA
40:29
players. So I want to talk about these
40:31
like, quotes that we hear, right, when it comes to queer
40:35
fans speculating on WNBA or college basketball players
40:40
sexualities, right? Stop speculating on sexuality,
40:43
which I've just said, which again, no, I will continue to do
40:47
that. I don't know where this word
40:50
speculation came from and why all of a sudden it's like the
40:53
number one most used word in my comments section.
40:57
But like, speculation is called wondering.
41:00
It's questioning, it's asking questions.
41:03
It's wondering what's wrong with that people.
41:06
Sexuality is not necessarily this private dirty secret.
41:10
OK, here's another one quote. Baggy clothes don't mean that
41:14
she's gay. I hear this a lot when people
41:16
talk about Page Beckers and her suits, right?
41:21
Page Beckers. No straight bitch is wearing an
41:25
outfit like that. And when I say the outfit like
41:28
that, I mean most of her outfits that she's ever worn.
41:32
It is true that some straight people wear baggy clothing.
41:38
It is so inherent to the queer community though, to strip away
41:42
the queerness from gay fashion. Makes me so upset How gay people
41:47
have been seeing and acknowledging other gay people
41:50
for centuries is being stripped away.
41:52
When I see a woman in a suit, I'm going to call her gay, OK?
41:57
And we all know the difference between a suit and a suit, you
42:03
know what I mean? And when Page Becker's wore that
42:05
black suit, that is not a straight suit.
42:08
That is not a straight girl wearing a suit.
42:10
And I don't have to use any more explanation for you to know
42:12
exactly what I mean. And I do think that straight
42:15
people know exactly what we mean, but they're just being
42:19
dense. Or not even straight people, you
42:22
know, the really straight people that are very passionate about
42:25
being straight, the homophobes. You're just being dense.
42:28
If you think that that girl looks straight.
42:30
You're just being dense. You know, gay women can have
42:33
pretty features. I think everyone like, Oh my
42:35
God, her face just looks so pretty.
42:38
Yeah, gay people are pretty hot take.
42:40
Here's another one quote. It's obvious that they're just
42:43
friends. No, it's not.
42:45
They look at each other romantically.
42:46
And when I say they, I mean AZ and Paige.
42:49
The way that AZ was looking at Paige while she was sitting next
42:53
to her at the table, it was crazy.
42:56
And then Paige goes up. I'm talking about the WNBA
42:58
draft, by the way. Sorry.
43:00
I'm like, no adding context. But at the WNBA draft, AZ is
43:04
sitting next to Paige where usually only girlfriends or
43:10
boyfriends or spouses sit there with their parents.
43:14
AZ sitting next to Paige. AZ got the first hug when Paige
43:18
was drafted as the number one. AZ got the first hug and then
43:23
later Paige when she was miked up came back and said to AZ I'm
43:27
miked up. I'm miked up.
43:29
Meaning like don't say anything gay.
43:31
It looked like they were about to kiss.
43:33
Is there a chance that they're straight and they just sat next
43:37
to each other at the draft and they're just such good best
43:39
friends and all of this stuff and, you know, hang out with
43:43
each other consistently. Like, after the draft, they've
43:45
been with each other every single day.
43:47
Is it possible that they're just best friends?
43:49
Sure. But I'm still going to call that
43:51
gay. And I think that's what straight
43:53
people are missing. It's not about evidence and
43:56
proof. You don't even need to convince
43:58
anyone. OK, so if you're listening to
44:01
this and you're so sick of like, people on the Internet being
44:04
like, Oh my God, show me evidence that like doesn't even
44:06
make any sense. Like that's not convincing
44:08
enough. It doesn't even matter, you
44:09
know? It's not about evidence and
44:11
proof. It's about vibes and it's always
44:14
been about vibes. So you don't need to convince
44:17
anyone because they're never really going to be convinced
44:19
because people are just dense these days.
44:22
The point is that it looks so gay and I'm going to call it
44:25
gay. I don't know for sure.
44:27
That's why it's speculation and not outing.
44:30
And also, let's stop assuming everyone is closeted.
44:34
There's a chance that she's queer.
44:36
Page, Beckers, or and Arizona in this case.
44:39
There's a chance that they're both queer and they're not fully
44:44
out in terms of the fact they're posting it on their social,
44:47
social media, but they're not necessarily closeted.
44:51
And that's where I think the conversations around this are
44:54
kind of very 2010. I guess.
44:56
There was some social media posts that Paige's cousin
45:00
commented on and said that like, Paige and Arizona weren't
45:03
dating. Now, let's talk about this for a
45:06
second. When I came out, I wasn't like
45:10
immediately texting everyone I knew.
45:13
It's a slow process. And there's also people that you
45:16
may not be necessarily telling, not because you're necessarily
45:20
closeted because you're just like, there's no point of
45:23
telling them. You know, that's so resonates
45:26
with how I was when me and my girlfriend started dating.
45:30
I didn't like immediately tell all my extended family.
45:32
I like waited seven months until there was like a family get
45:36
together. And I think still some people
45:38
didn't know. There is so much in between
45:41
announcing your exact identity to the Internet and to the world
45:46
and being closeted. And I know it's hard for, like,
45:49
people online and fans to remember that.
45:52
Like, we don't actually know these people.
45:56
Like, we don't actually know personally.
45:58
Paige and AZ. So what what people in their
46:02
life know versus what the public knows is maybe two different
46:06
things. And also there's tears of like
46:09
comfortability in people's life, right?
46:11
Like maybe Paige is not super close with her young cousin and
46:14
she just doesn't know their extent of their relationship.
46:18
It doesn't have to be like this personal coming out to every
46:21
single person. You're like, and that's
46:22
literally what happened with me, my girlfriend.
46:24
Sometimes I just forgot to tell people, you know, like that's
46:27
just realistic. It's like life for a gay person
46:30
is not closeted and then out. Sometimes it's like takes a long
46:34
time to tell everyone in your life what's going on with your
46:37
life. And also there's no expectation
46:40
for a queer person to have to expose themselves to everyone.
46:44
It doesn't mean they're closeted.
46:46
It just means that that's like, that's like an extra action and
46:49
it's labor and it's work. The larger thing is that there's
46:53
so much Gray area and a queer persons life and we have to stop
46:58
talking about gay people as if like they are closeted and
47:02
scared and sad and victims or they're out and everyone knows
47:07
and we know and it's a press release and we get like
47:11
information on when they came out, why they came out and all
47:14
that stuff. OK, That's not how queer people
47:17
work. And we have to get to a point in
47:19
society where there's no coming out.
47:22
And that's kind of, I think like what the WNBA is.
47:25
I think the WNBA is the closest we have right now to like where
47:30
we want our society to go. OK here's one more thing.
47:33
OK, two more quotes that I'll talk about. 1 Leave Paige alone,
47:37
leave them alone. Leave Arizona alone.
47:39
Leave them alone. I'm not knocking on their door.
47:43
I'm making a TikTok that they probably won't see and I would
47:46
be OK if they saw. I think this is a gay suit.
47:49
And then they look cute together.
47:50
Sue me. OK?
47:52
It's called the Internet. That's not invading someone's
47:56
privacy to talk about public figures.
47:59
If for some reason they didn't want to be public figures or
48:02
publicly associated with each other, she wouldn't have brought
48:05
her on the red carpet at a public televised event.
48:09
Oh my Lord. All right.
48:12
Two, she would be out by now if she was gay, No?
48:17
And remember what is out. Maybe she is technically out.
48:21
You just don't see that as out back in my day, which is 10
48:25
years ago, like in high school for me, if I wore a suit like
48:30
that, that would be my coming out.
48:32
But apparently that's not coming out.
48:34
Like what? I will leave y'all with my take
48:37
and my final take on the WNBA queer thirsting and then the
48:42
whole pagebackers AZ fudd situation.
48:45
A as long as you aren't sexualizing a player.
48:49
And what does sexualizing mean? What does it mean?
48:52
It means to view someone or treat them primarily or
48:56
exclusively in terms of their sexual characteristics or
49:01
potential for sexual activity. So as long as you are not
49:04
sexualizing a player AKA talking about what they might be doing
49:08
in bed or stalking them or DM ING them invasive things or
49:15
leaking private images, videos, texts, etcetera, then you're
49:19
good. And we have to understand and
49:21
distinguish the difference between all of that and being
49:25
like Page. Becker's is so hot I wonder if
49:28
Paige and Arizona are dating. Kate Martin and her girlfriend
49:31
are so fucking hot. All of that is OK.
49:33
And we need to allow space for queer women to be obsessed with
49:38
queer athletes or even women athletes in general.
49:41
B. The WNBA is gay, the WNBA is
49:45
lesbian, the WNBA is queer. And it will always be fact.
49:50
C Saying someone looks gay or is gay or looks like they're in a
49:56
relationship with someone is OK. Saying you think that someone
50:00
might be dating because they're publicly with them is totally
50:03
fine. And there's over policing right
50:06
now of queer women doing things that straight people do all the
50:11
time. And it's so hypocritical.
50:14
D And I will end with this. Normalize queer women thinking
50:19
women athletes are hot. Women do this with men athletes
50:23
all the time. But apparently we can't.
50:25
And it's creepy when we do it. You know why they think it's
50:28
creepy when we do it? Because they don't like gay
50:30
people and they think that we're creepy in general.
50:33
And that's on period. Go watch women's sports,
50:36
continue thinking women are hot, and have a wonderful week.
50:40
Reminder to subscribe to my Patreon in the link in my bio or
50:45
wherever this video is posted. It'll be the description notes
50:48
and subscribe on YouTube. Follow me on Spotify and let me
50:52
know what you guys think. OK, love you guys have an
50:54
amazing week.