Latest / gasp! the pod / why women are obsessed with heated rivalry

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why women are obsessed with heated rivalry · gasp! the pod

0:00
It seems like actually everyone wants to watch heated rivalry
0:03
except for closeted straight men.
0:05
I was going to say that's most people, but there's a lot of
0:08
closeted men so I take it back. Welcome back to season 4 of GASP
0:23
the Pod, the podcast for the gays, the girls, and especially
0:26
the gay girls. Over the holidays, something
0:28
extremely gay took place. It has taken over pop culture.
0:32
It has the girls, the gays, and especially the gay girls and a
0:34
chokehold. So it's perfect for this
0:36
podcast. It made fanfic culture
0:38
mainstream, which is really important to me, and it reminded
0:41
grown women of their days on Larry Stylinson Tumblr.
0:45
Of course we're talking about heated rivalry.
0:47
Today I'm going to talk about not just heated rivalry in
0:50
general and how much I love it. We're going to be talking about
0:52
some specific discourse revolving heated rivalry, OK?
0:57
We're talking about why it took Elia and Shane to make gay cool
1:01
again in the year of 2025, the final hour of 2025.
1:05
Where did this wave come from? How did it get so mainstream?
1:08
Why do women like watching gay sex?
1:10
That's the question we need to ask ourselves, and I have a
1:13
theory. OK?
1:14
Is it fetishizing? Is it going to make more famous
1:18
athletes come out? It's starting to.
1:20
We have yet to see huge major athlete come out from this, so
1:26
that would be interesting. And why are women, especially
1:29
queer women, losing their minds? I'm a queer woman who lost my
1:33
mind. I have some thoughts.
1:35
OK, and last question, why are some gay women pissed?
1:40
Let's break it down. First of all, very quick
1:41
updates. Happy season 4.
1:43
This is season 4 of my podcast. Seasons don't really matter in
1:47
podcasts, but I like to take a break, refresh, figure out what
1:50
I want to change in the podcast. I'm changing my setup because I
1:53
was getting super annoyed at my old camera.
1:55
I'm actually shooting on my iPhone right now and I have a
1:58
new camera I'm going to use, but I didn't get the right chords
2:00
yet. So I like the idea of having my
2:03
laptop set up here. And I feel like one of those
2:05
podcasts has like a producer on the side.
2:08
Then I'm like, can you look that up?
2:09
But I don't actually have a producer on the side.
2:12
A lot of those people just don't pay them anything.
2:13
By the way, for season 4, I've got some exciting topics and GAS
2:17
lined up. I'm excited for you guys to see
2:19
what I have in store. Here are freeways to support me.
2:22
OK, you can rate me 5 stars. You can follow me on Spotify.
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So follow me on Spotify and or subscribe on YouTube.
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That's all free to do and it helps me a lot.
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And if you're looking for bonus episodes, because I release
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subscription if you want to do that.
2:54
That's all LinkedIn, the show notes of wherever you're
2:56
listening to right now. And for reference, I just did a
2:59
bonus episode on the Blake and Taylor texts and I went through
3:03
and read all of them and gave my like nuanced opinions that per
3:07
usual, the Internet cannot handle nuanced opinions.
3:10
And I also did a bonus episode on Dear Reader and how gay it
3:14
is, so check those out. Finally, feedback.
3:17
If you're an avid listener or if you listened a few times, let me
3:20
know what you did or didn't like.
3:21
Let me know your favorite episodes and any topics you want
3:24
me to cover and any guests you want me to have on that would be
3:29
very helpful as well. OK, let's get into the heat of
3:33
heated rivalry. The final hour of 2025.
3:36
This like changed everything think and honestly was super
3:40
necessary. We really, really needed it.
3:42
There is a split I have noticed with like queer women where some
3:46
people are super obsessed and some are not and that's
3:50
discourse that I wanted to get into.
3:51
Like, there's been this question asked to mainstream media, and I
3:56
don't think mainstream media is equipped to answer the question,
3:59
which is why do women love heated rivalry?
4:03
I don't think they know the answer to that.
4:05
I don't think that they even predicted that heated rivalry
4:07
would get so big because they don't actually know what their
4:10
viewers want and they don't know how many people A are gay or B
4:15
tolerate and love gay people. I think there's this idea that
4:19
like, queer media is just queer media.
4:21
It's niche and so you're only pitching it to a queer audience.
4:25
And heated rivalry should be a very good example.
4:28
And hopefully this will like spur some change at least in
4:31
like television that like you don't need to just pitch queer
4:35
shows to queer people. Straight people will watch queer
4:38
shows. The question is, will they only
4:40
watch gay men? And is this question just for
4:43
straight women or is it for queer women?
4:45
A lot of the stats we have media just talks about like women love
4:48
heated rivalry. And I don't see a lot of media
4:52
understanding that a lot of those women are also queer.
4:55
Like that adds a lot to the conversation in my opinion.
4:58
Why do I think it took off? OK, Because truly mainstream
5:02
media and these big television houses, they did not think this
5:05
would be successful. And I still don't think they
5:08
understand why it's successful. I think they think it got so big
5:11
just because they're hot, they're gay and they had gay
5:14
sex. And I don't think that that's
5:16
the real reason and the differentiation for this show
5:20
versus why other shows haven't been successful.
5:23
So the first thing is that audiences want new actors.
5:27
We want new blood in the game. Like I truly think we had a an
5:33
apathy towards seeing the same faces in TV and we just recycled
5:39
the same like dozen under 35 actors and mismatched them in
5:44
different shit. And when we did have queer
5:47
stuff, it was made by people who were publicly straight.
5:52
And I'm not saying that these people like Paul Mescal, Jacob
5:55
Allordy, Barry Keegan, white boys, right, that are indie and
5:59
queer adjacent. I think they're like, OK, Like,
6:02
they're queer enough. Is it OK for straight people to
6:05
play gay characters? It's OK.
6:08
And the biggest issue with, like, casting, specifically gay
6:11
people, is that you can't ask in a casting call, are you gay?
6:16
Because we can only hire gay people so casting directors can
6:19
make their best guesses. And that's why, like, there
6:22
should be no flock on Hudson Williams for playing a gay
6:26
character because we also don't even know his sexuality.
6:29
He's probably bi. And I also do think if you were
6:32
wanting this early in your career to play a gay character
6:36
and be known for gay sex, either you're a huge ally and it's
6:41
totally OK with me or B, you are probably either bisexual or bi
6:45
curious. That's kind of a whole other
6:47
conversation. But we see this same like indie
6:51
queer adjacent actors playing these gay roles, I think almost
6:55
in their mind to expand their portfolio.
6:58
And like, it just gets tiring. And also not every gay show
7:03
needs to be indie like a 24. Sometimes it can just be
7:09
mainstream romance. And I think that's a huge reason
7:13
of why Heated Rivalry did so well, not only with gay
7:16
audiences but mainstream audiences.
7:18
It wasn't treated like a nice show.
7:20
It was just treated like a hot, erotic, tension building
7:24
romance, which gay people do not have.
7:28
We do not have that. And then I'll talk about
7:30
specifically lesbian media at the end of the episode.
7:32
But you can point out dozens of shows or movies where either the
7:36
gay character is the main person and they are troubled and it's a
7:41
horrifying, sad film, right? The whole story is about coming
7:46
out and it's dramatized in a sad way.
7:49
Or they are not the main character and they have a love
7:52
story. But it's very rare.
7:54
I literally don't think ever that we've seen a TV show where
7:58
the main, main, main characters are gay.
8:02
It ends up happy and they're in a relationship.
8:05
Like we never see that. So that's what I think TV
8:09
producers are not understanding with this.
8:12
It's not just the gay part. It's all these other factors
8:15
that are so new to queer media that we usually don't see.
8:18
And this is not really a critique to queer media because
8:20
I do think that queer people feel the need and want to tell
8:24
how challenging you know it is to be queer.
8:28
However, it gets a little exhausting when every piece of
8:32
media is super sad, depressing, or from the 1800s, right?
8:37
Saoirse Ronan, New actors, new blood.
8:40
We needed new people. We can't keep recycling the same
8:44
people. And I think this comes down to
8:46
TV houses not wanting to take a risk because they need
8:50
everything to make money. So again, what?
8:53
Who's to blame? Capitalism.
8:55
But executives don't want to take risks on new actors.
8:57
And that's why we see Crave Media making this.
9:01
This wouldn't have been made by Netflix.
9:03
They would have casted people we already knew or it wouldn't have
9:06
been as just like good as this. Like I truly believe that.
9:10
So people want new people to be obsessed with.
9:13
We want new people to be interested in.
9:15
We want to be like, oh, look at this new actor.
9:17
Wonder if he'd be good in this. Like it generates it makes
9:20
people excited. It makes people interested.
9:23
I think TV house has completely forgot about that.
9:25
Hollywood truly forgot about that.
9:28
They just want to use their same fucking people.
9:30
Also genuine tension building. And then I'll get into like the
9:34
tea and why I think women like gay sex but genuine tension
9:38
building. This is not just a show of gay
9:41
sex for the sake of sex. And even though Hudson and
9:45
Connor, they got matching tattoos, saying like sex cells,
9:47
I think that that's iconic and funny.
9:49
I don't think that that's the pure reason why this got so
9:53
popular. If they hadn't been such good
9:55
actors. I think that's a huge element as
9:58
well, that they're genuinely very talented.
10:01
So seeing the tension build is what made sex scenes
10:07
interesting. Good.
10:08
And also, I saw an interview with the intimacy coordinator
10:11
and she was talking about like how much work went into all the
10:15
intimate scenes. That's a huge element to like.
10:18
It wasn't just like the same sex we see in shows, which is
10:22
usually straight, kind of like the basic sex scenes we've been
10:25
seeing since the seven days. Like usually people don't change
10:30
it up. So it just felt genuine.
10:33
We had this genuine tension building.
10:35
Their acting was so good. So that the sex wasn't the
10:40
vulnerable part. It was the emotional aspect that
10:43
was vulnerable. So it was like a new take on a
10:46
sex romance story that I do feel like is very specific for gay
10:50
men. A lot of gay men talk about how
10:53
like sex is very easily come by and like, that's not to say a
10:56
stereotype. That's just like what my gay
10:58
friends tell me. It is the vulnerability that
11:01
like deviates the tension. So they're so quick to have sex,
11:04
but they're not quick to be vulnerable with their feelings.
11:07
And that's a story we haven't really seen, like in media,
11:11
right? The romantic build up we usually
11:13
see is a girl pining after a guy or vice versa.
11:17
And there's build up, there's build up, there's build up.
11:19
And then all of a sudden they have sex and then they live
11:21
happily ever after together. And like if you don't shake that
11:26
up for a century, people are going to get bored.
11:29
So then when you shake that up, people are like, this is very
11:32
interesting, even if it's gay and they haven't maybe watched a
11:36
gay show before. Like the difference is
11:39
intriguing. And then finally, it wasn't made
11:42
by a huge production house. And I do think that this would
11:45
have been watered down. They wouldn't have been as
11:47
risky. They wouldn't have taken as many
11:49
like chances if this was made by Netflix or if HBO had its whole
11:55
hand on it, which they didn't. They just like delivered it,
11:58
right? So I think the fact that it was
12:00
Crave and Canada, huge influence there.
12:03
So that's what I don't think TV executives understand.
12:07
There was this New York Times article saying the popularity of
12:10
heated rivalry has surprised even TV executives.
12:13
It's like, well, duh. Like once I watched it, I'm
12:16
like, this makes so much sense. Why it became successful And I
12:22
do think there's a lot of these just old white men that do not
12:25
understand that people will watch stuff that isn't just
12:29
pertaining to their exact identity.
12:31
Right. Just because you are a straight
12:32
woman doesn't mean you won't watch gay sex.
12:35
It seems like actually everyone wants to watch heated rivalry
12:38
except for closeted straight men.
12:42
That's kind of, I was going to say that's most people, but
12:44
there's a lot of closeted men, so I take it back.
12:46
But yeah, like what made it go mainstream?
12:48
It has a 98% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
12:51
It is a top five DBO on HBO Max. On IMDb it is a 9.9 out of 10
12:57
rating for episode 5. It did have a tan rating and
13:01
since episode 5 came out it is now I think down to 9.9.
13:05
The only show beating this is Breaking Bad.
13:07
Like that's crazy and it's beyond niche queer media.
13:11
Some argue the reason why it went so big and so mainstream is
13:15
because of women. I'm not going to say it's all
13:18
women like the whole show is a gay.
13:20
It's about gay men and the specific, very specific niche
13:25
issues of being queer in a very masculine, patriarchal
13:31
environment, which is hockey or like, sports in general.
13:35
So I'm hesitant to be like, women are the reason that this
13:38
is like, I do think there's a lot of women fans.
13:41
And apparently by the finale, 2/3 of viewers were women.
13:45
And maybe that's just because there's more women than there
13:48
are gay men in our population. Do you know what I mean?
13:50
There's a huge conversation here about women, but I don't think
13:54
women just deserve to, like, take all the credit for heated
13:56
rivals. There's also some tea around the
14:00
author and like if she's bisexual or not.
14:04
This was initially a book, right?
14:05
This was an erotic novel by Rachel Reid.
14:08
Apparently she has not been open with her sexuality.
14:11
I'm trying to look this up. Some people think that she's
14:13
bisexual. Show is created by a gay man,
14:16
Jacob Tierney. And so it's a gay man who who
14:19
created the show, of course, adopted it from the novels.
14:23
And obviously the novels are, you know, what made the show.
14:26
But it's not just women in this, like, it's deeply gay, right?
14:31
Even if a woman wrote it, when we're hearing that, like, women
14:35
watch someone cheated rivalry, we're not asking in those
14:38
demographics. Like, none of these stats that I
14:40
found, no one's asking, oh, are these women gay?
14:44
And I do feel like the media completely forgets about the
14:47
population of queer women. Truly, it is classically gay men
14:53
and women watching gay men. It's like, have you guys heard
14:56
of gay women? I don't think they have.
14:58
So it's hard to know and it's hard to say.
15:01
This is all straight women being obsessed with heated rivalry
15:05
because queer women, even if they are two gay men or they are
15:10
two men together, queer women historically flock to that.
15:16
And it's not necessarily because they are attracted to those men,
15:22
but also because we share a huge similarity.
15:25
And that is being queer. I do feel like this is forgotten
15:29
a lot. You guys ever see those tik toks
15:30
that are like oh gay men and straight women what do they have
15:33
in common? They both like men and men and
15:36
lesbians. What do they have in common?
15:38
They both like women but what do gay men and lesbians have
15:42
together? They have nothing in common.
15:45
I just think this is the most straight take, the most
15:49
misogynistic take. First of all, what do you mean
15:52
have things in common? The only things you can think of
15:55
being in common are the person that you're attracted to, the
15:58
gender you're attracted to. That's like a very small
16:00
proportion of life. First of all, what is a larger
16:04
part of life? Your friends, your culture, your
16:08
everywhere you hang out, what you like to do for fun.
16:11
Gay men and lesbians, I think get along great.
16:15
And I, I'm in multiple friend groups with gay men and
16:18
lesbians. And so this like media push that
16:22
like gay men and straight women are friends and then lesbians
16:24
like hang out with no one else is just false and untrue and
16:27
lesbians. And not saying lesbians, but I
16:29
really just mean sapphic women because I'm not even a lesbian.
16:32
And when I say gay, I just mean gay in general, right?
16:34
Sapphics love the gays, the gays love the sapphics.
16:37
And so this idea that it's all straight women, I think is
16:40
false. And I think that's a huge reason
16:43
why women loved Call Me By Your Name.
16:45
It's not all straight women for me, When I watched Call Me By
16:48
Your Name, it changed my life. OK, we're talking about why
16:52
women like to watch gay sex. Why do women like to watch gay
16:56
stories in general? And I mean gay men's stories,
16:59
right? Of course we would love to watch
17:01
Tafik stories, but there's barely any of them.
17:03
So and they're usually done in like weird indie horror ways.
17:09
We can't ever have a lovely romance.
17:12
I think a lot of this stems back to fanfic culture.
17:16
And it's not just straight women that love fanfic culture.
17:19
I think a lot of this community is queer.
17:22
Someone do a test on this. Someone find out the stats on
17:26
like how many people are queer. There's something going on with
17:29
fanfic. I don't know if it's like,
17:31
because women are more romantic, it's hard to say that I don't
17:35
want to make this observation that like gay men aren't
17:37
romantic. But I also do think like
17:40
adolescent young women, if they are queer, are writing up these
17:45
stories that make more sense to them than what they're already
17:49
seeing on mainstream media. Hence, fanfic is created.
17:54
And I do think there's an element of writing specifically
17:57
gay fanfic stories that aren't even sapphic, that are gay men
18:01
fanfic stories. Because in this conversation,
18:04
we've kind of been having of like women decentering
18:07
themselves out of a love story. Women are always a the muse, the
18:12
object, or like the victim. And I think even sapphic women
18:15
kind of get tired of seeing women played out in a certain
18:19
specific naive way and want to lose that story and write
18:25
something romantic, something they can't see in other types of
18:29
media and write gay fanfic. Hence Larry shippers, right?
18:35
Hence Call Me by your Name. So many women being being
18:38
obsessed with Call Me by your Name.
18:39
I couldn't understand why I was obsessed with Call Me by your
18:42
Name. I wasn't out yet.
18:43
And I was like, I don't even want to be with them.
18:47
Why am I so obsessed with this? And I think it's this romantic
18:51
story that women are not a part of and that genuinely makes us
18:56
feel free, like we are not the object.
19:00
I think it takes the danger away from romance that a women often
19:04
feel and even queer women. And then there's a larger
19:07
conversation here where maybe this is super by right?
19:12
Like perhaps there's an element of like, oh, look, I can see why
19:17
this man is attracted to this man because this man is
19:19
attractive, right? And I'm queer and so I
19:24
understand queer love. Maybe there is just something so
19:27
inherently by about fanfic. I think so.
19:31
So I don't know why this is shocking.
19:32
TV executives. It is a community that is so
19:35
powerful and not represented in mainstream media.
19:38
So this shouldn't be shocking for anyone.
19:40
Like women love to read. Women love romance.
19:43
And a lot of these women who are creative and write stories and
19:47
are out of box thinkers are queer.
19:51
Another element of like queer love is queer love.
19:53
And I don't want to hear like, oh, love is love, yeah, blah,
19:55
blah, blah. We all know that, but it
19:57
shouldn't be confusing that queer women and lesbians, even
20:01
when they're not attracted to the men in the story.
20:04
So for example, heated rivalry, there's a lot of lesbians that
20:07
are obsessed with the show, lesbians that are not attracted
20:10
to men. You don't have to be attracted
20:13
to someone in a story to think something is hot and to resonate
20:19
with the story in general. Like I feel like this is a
20:22
concept we all understand yet. T VS confused by it.
20:26
When there's a queer love story, lesbians are going to resonate
20:30
with that because they're all so queer we see each other.
20:34
This begs the question for the women that are attracted to men,
20:38
is it fetishizing gay men to be this obsessed with a show?
20:43
What if I just didn't answer it at all?
20:45
Asking this question as if it is the same as straight men
20:51
watching lesbians is a poorly set up question.
20:55
Men straight men watching lesbian porn for example, and
20:59
not seeing lesbians as valid. That is fetishizing, that is
21:06
invalidating queer relationships, that is
21:09
misogynistic, etcetera. Right?
21:12
That is not the same thing as what is happening with the
21:17
majority of heated rivalry queer women or women's stands that are
21:23
obsessed with the show, attracted to the show.
21:27
And a lot of these women are equally if not more obsessed
21:32
with the romantic aspect of it and the heartfelt storyline.
21:37
And so is it fetishizing if you view this couple as like valid,
21:44
whole not needing of a woman? And if it turns a girl on, is
21:50
that fetishizing? I really don't think so, because
21:53
I do think fetishizing has to do with the with reducing someone
21:58
down to only their sexuality and not them being a whole person,
22:02
which I don't think most stands of the show are doing.
22:05
And I think in fact, the desire and like the the romance aspect.
22:10
Without that, I don't think there would be as many fans.
22:13
Like, I think there would be a significant less amount of women
22:16
fans. So I think it's hard to to
22:18
reduce women being like obsessed and going crazy with it as like
22:22
just fetishizing gay men. I'm also not a gay man, but I'm
22:26
queer. So yeah.
22:27
I think the reason why so many women are kind of like losing
22:30
their minds, like in a sexual way because of the show is they
22:35
may not be realizing that they might be having a queer
22:37
awakening. I know it seems impossible that
22:39
they would be having a queer awakening by watching men.
22:42
But again, that was my experience with Call Me By Your
22:44
Name. And I think like it is these
22:47
like forbidden love stories, seeing that might be opening up
22:52
their third eye a little bit. But also I think seeing hot men
22:57
and then not seeing a woman be the the subordinate or being
23:01
like the sub, right? Or being like the naive girl.
23:05
Not seeing a woman be the object of sexual attraction might make
23:09
women more attracted to these men because they don't see them
23:14
self in it. And I think women are sick of
23:18
the hyper masculinity and performance of straight men.
23:22
And I think that's another element too.
23:24
And like, maybe this is not the same thing.
23:27
But like, you know, when women freaked out about Elvis Presley,
23:30
like just moving his hips a little bit because he moved out
23:33
of the classic masculine role and like of men who didn't
23:36
dance. I don't know.
23:37
I mean, I wasn't alive then, but I feel like that's kind of the
23:40
same thing too. So like, I just think women are
23:43
fed up. I mean women that date men I
23:45
wouldn't know fed put up with the same brand of misogynistic
23:50
masculine man straight man. And that doesn't necessarily
23:55
mean they want to sleep with a gay man.
23:56
Maybe they just want a slightly more feminine man.
23:59
Maybe they actually want a woman.
24:01
Maybe they want someone non binary.
24:03
I just think the shackles the media is holding ourselves to of
24:09
like, wait, why are women interested in this?
24:12
Wait? Like there are multitudes of how
24:14
to express sexuality and gender. And I think that's why it's
24:19
giving everyone so much confusion.
24:20
And I think at the end of the day, hot people having sex is
24:23
just going to be hot people having sex.
24:25
You know what I mean? We don't need to police
24:26
ourselves on like why someone feels that way.
24:29
Unless, and I have seen some women do this, unless they are
24:34
centering themselves like in a gay story.
24:36
I have seen it go a little bit too far.
24:39
But women love romance and this is a romantic story and when
24:43
we're going to flock to it, I want to talk about how this has
24:47
led to a snowball effect of people coming out and also
24:52
revealing more about themselves than we knew before.
24:55
And I want to know how big this snowball can get.
24:59
I really feel like this is the time if you are a super famous
25:03
athlete that's closeted to come out because so many famous
25:07
athletes they truly have no one. As an example that is currently
25:13
playing, there have been gay players that have come out after
25:17
they retire. OK I just looked it up to
25:19
confirm. Please let me know if I'm wrong.
25:21
But like the multiple times I've confirmed I've come up with the
25:25
same answer. There is not one currently
25:28
playing out queer male athlete in all of the NFLNBA, MLB or
25:38
NHL. That's so sad.
25:40
They've had very few representations of what their
25:44
life could look like if they came out.
25:47
And when those people are out, it's after they retire.
25:51
They know the media will be too hard.
25:52
The male fans, this patriarchal masculine energy of billion
25:57
dollar industry which is sports would demolish them.
26:01
And if you don't believe me, just go on any comment section
26:06
of an NFL team right now that hired a male cheerleader and you
26:10
will see how much homophobia there still is in the NFL.
26:14
And it might be even reinvigorated with Trump and the
26:16
conservative movement we're seeing over the last two years.
26:20
So gay players, they have never really been told, oh, this could
26:26
work for you. That's why I always say, like,
26:30
who knows if Travis Kelsey is gay?
26:32
You don't know who's gay or not. And it's not necessarily because
26:36
they're closeted and no one in their life knows, but it might
26:40
be because they know they can't publicly come out to the extent
26:44
that they want until they're out of the NFL because of fans.
26:49
Like it might not even be because of other players or
26:52
their coaches, it might just be because of the fucking fans and
26:56
know that they'll lose brand deals and stuff.
26:58
I think people don't understand modern coming out is not
27:01
necessarily out of fear of like attacking, but also loss of
27:07
income and credibility in your career.
27:10
And when it comes to professional athletes, male
27:13
professional athletes, masculinity is so important to
27:18
that. We did see Jesse Kortum, who was
27:22
a hockey player, come out after heated rivalry and he said it
27:26
was because of heated rivalry that he came out.
27:30
I really hope we see more of this.
27:33
I think it just makes so much sense.
27:35
And if people are worried about losing brand deals and stuff
27:39
like that, I think this would be a super good time to do it.
27:43
Any money that you might potentially lose from coming
27:47
out, you may gain because now you can attach yourself to
27:50
heated rivalry, even in like a business decision.
27:53
I think it would be a great thing to do for someone and I
27:57
hope more athletes decide to do it.
27:59
This hockey player that came out, I mean, of course he didn't
28:02
come out before. You wouldn't even know that fans
28:05
would be OK with that, let alone celebrate and want that.
28:09
So this is so new for the world of sports.
28:13
I mean, we're seeing at hockey games, they're playing the
28:15
heated rivalry music like it's bringing fans to hockey.
28:19
And you would have never expected that to happen.
28:22
Like sports now they're needing women and queer people in order
28:27
to like seem hip and popular media, they're doing this weird
28:30
balance where they're like trying to appeal to queer
28:33
people. The NFL is doing that with like
28:35
Swifties and women while also balancing a bunch of these
28:39
masculine homophobe Trump supporters that watch.
28:44
And it's a weird, it's an interesting conflict.
28:47
Build this, move the lever and move people towards coming out
28:52
for this new audience. Or are they still not going to
28:54
be convinced that this will last?
28:56
Like there is probably conversations happening with
28:58
these closeted athletes. Like is this going to last?
29:01
Is this just like a bubble that's going to burst?
29:03
And then in one year I can't play without being called a
29:07
homophobic slur by my fan. Like you don't really know or
29:11
will I ever be able to work again?
29:13
Especially when someone is branded themselves as a straight
29:16
athlete and that's their lane, it is really hard to switch the
29:21
other side. And it may not just be because
29:23
like they're scared to be gay, but more it's like, oh, you
29:28
literally can't do that in the industry.
29:30
This is also kind of stemming from the 2016 nostalgia that I
29:33
that I think is really interesting for 2026 that we're
29:36
all like being nostalgic over 2016, which I kind of get like
29:41
at the time, it really was pretty awesome.
29:44
And I remember like the summer of 2016, it was between high
29:47
school and college for me. And I was like, this is the best
29:51
summer of my life. And I felt like I knew that and
29:53
not that it actually was necessarily, but I don't know.
29:57
I like it's up there. I don't know if you guys saw
29:59
this, but via the 2016 trend, Tobin Heath and Kristen Press,
30:04
who are obviously married. If you guys didn't know, they
30:07
are famous soccer players, women gay and and in 2016 a lot of
30:13
soccer fans, specifically gay women because of course we're
30:17
being like we is there lore here?
30:20
Are they together? What's going on?
30:22
And Tobin and Kristen like released a picture of them like
30:24
kissing from 2016, so people didn't know how far back they
30:28
had been together. First of all, it proves shippers
30:31
right and shippers and fanfic people like same thing, right?
30:37
And I just don't think shippers are wrong.
30:39
I don't think it's bad. I think the only time it can be
30:42
bad is when you think someone is in an unsafe situation.
30:46
And I hate to say this, but if you are a celebrity and you're
30:50
really rich, usually you're not coming out, not because you're
30:55
in an unsafe situation, not because you're like fearful of
30:58
the people around you, because usually the people around you
31:01
know, the team around you knows, and not because of any of that.
31:04
It's usually because you don't want to lose money.
31:06
I think that that can be a valid reason, but it doesn't mean that
31:10
everyone's scared for their life.
31:12
Teams are going to tell people to not come out if they don't
31:14
think that there's money in it. Again, it all comes back to
31:16
capitalism, but the point is that Tobin and Kristen prove the
31:20
shippers right. And I just think we're in a
31:23
really interesting time where, like this is when athletes
31:26
should be coming out. Like this is when we're all
31:29
talking about queer people in sports.
31:30
We're already talking about a WLW version of this.
31:34
And I think it's specifically interesting to talk about queer
31:37
stories in places where we think that they're the least likely to
31:41
happen. So obviously we know there's a
31:43
lot of gays and women's soccer and the WNBA, like blah, blah,
31:47
blah, blah, blah. I think it would be really
31:49
interesting if we did like a Victoria's Secret, like modeling
31:53
sapphic show. I did a Victoria's Secret
31:58
episode if you guys want to check it out, talking about how
32:01
gay Victoria's Secret is not just because of the branding,
32:03
but also because of the actual models that are gay.
32:06
And I think it's interesting in these industries that are very
32:09
specifically gendered, right? Like modeling is like women,
32:13
right? Them women.
32:15
Hockey is like masculine men. And it's really interesting when
32:18
there's queer stories built from places that you would think in a
32:23
patriarchal mind, that would be the least likely for queer
32:26
people to be because apparently 2 hockey players can't be gay
32:30
because they are masculine. You know what I mean?
32:33
So I think that would be interesting.
32:35
Yeah. I just really hope that more
32:38
athletes continue to come out and see that there is, like, a
32:41
community in a fandom waiting for them if they were to
32:45
abandon, excuse me, their old brands or old reputation, Right.
32:51
There's a new path waiting for you.
32:53
OK. And then finally, I just want to
32:56
talk about like how there are a lot of Saphix that are mad.
33:00
And listen, I understand. I do think there is some
33:05
misogyny coming from like the Internet and pop culture in
33:08
general that we will so quickly obsess over these hot new stars,
33:14
Connor Story and Hudson Williams.
33:15
Yet there's often a lot of critique over any two female
33:21
stars that are starring in a show that are maybe overly
33:23
touchy with each other. Like Hudson and Connor have a
33:25
very close friendship. Some people have said, oh,
33:28
people were being so rude to Cynthia and Ariana for being
33:31
close, but not for Connor and Hudson.
33:33
Like, I think there's some truth to that.
33:35
There's also a lot of people that I think are bitter.
33:38
And I do see this like rightful bitterness where women and gay
33:44
men and culture in general is so ready to be obsessed with two
33:51
men and bring them to popular media and that we can't get that
33:55
for a sapphic story. I understand that.
33:58
And I think all these things can be true.
34:00
Like, I think this is a groundbreaking show, and I think
34:02
it's super important. And it does show the fact that
34:06
we have, I've really never seen a lesbian story like this in
34:09
popular media. And why is it that women are so
34:14
quick to watch and maybe straight women are so quick to
34:16
watch gay men and not necessarily lesbians?
34:19
Like, is there internalized misogyny in that?
34:22
Is it because they're attracted to men?
34:23
And that's the issue I brought up on the Internet that I don't
34:27
see a lot of gay men supporting lesbian shows.
34:31
Like I think the reason why there is maybe better stats for
34:35
gay men shows is because Saphix will watch any queer media and
34:41
we will watch their shit. Do they watch ours?
34:43
Gay men speak up for yourself. This is obviously not to say
34:46
that all gay men but like it is sad when we see the one fucking
34:49
show we had which is the queer ultimatum which is like the
34:51
worst show to have for Saphix and these people were so fucking
34:55
annoying. Peace and love, sorry.
34:57
And it gets cancelled and it's like, was it because it was only
35:00
lesbians watching? Are straight women comfortable
35:02
watching lesbians as much as they're comfortable watching gay
35:05
men? Do gay men watch lesbian shows?
35:08
You know what I mean? Because by the way, straight men
35:11
are not watching those shows. They're just watching porn.
35:14
They're not watching lesbian queer ultimatum actual stories.
35:18
So the problem is we have a lack of viewership compared to gay
35:22
men shows. But again, this could be an
35:24
example of like, TV execs seeing this is a niche concept, just
35:27
like how people thought with rivalry.
35:29
And it can't be expanded to the masses, which I think it should
35:32
be. And I think that that does
35:34
expose a lot of misogyny and lesbophobia because I think
35:37
there's a lot of people that don't care to watch Suffix.
35:42
And I honestly wonder if it's because straight women are, I
35:46
don't know, worried that it's going to make them feel
35:48
something in the way that straight men don't watch heated
35:51
rivalry. Or is it because women are
35:54
really obsessed with men, even if they're gay?
35:56
Like pour that obsession into women sometimes.
35:59
And when anyone brings up other lesbian shows, I see this in the
36:02
comments all the time. It's so annoying.
36:03
People are like, well, what about this?
36:05
What about this? What about this?
36:06
And I bet you money like Killing Eve or Portrait of a Lady on
36:11
Fire or one of these random other sitcoms where we have a
36:13
lesbian side character. One of these three things that's
36:16
happening, right? One, they're not taking place in
36:19
this century. It's the 1800s.
36:21
It's the 1700s, OK, two or B, it's horror.
36:27
For some reason, producers love to make lesbian horror movies.
36:32
I don't know if it's because they think we're like crazy
36:34
little creatures and that saphics don't exist in like
36:37
normal life, but it's always horror or devil or like evil or
36:41
some weird. A 24 twist.
36:43
Peace and love to a 24 or three or C.
36:46
That person is a side character. Wait or four.
36:49
It ends up horribly. So I understand there's
36:54
bitterness from Saphix. However, I think the goods
36:58
drastically outweigh the bads. But I think a lot of the valid
37:01
critiques are over the fandom and not necessarily over the
37:05
show. I do think it's a very
37:07
interesting phenomenon that we're seeing a gay show have so
37:12
many women so obsessed. At the end of the day, a lot of
37:15
these women are queer themselves.
37:17
A lot of these women are so sick of patriarchal ideas of romance
37:22
that seeing anything that doesn't even involve them in the
37:26
relationship feels refreshing to them.
37:29
And women love erotic romance. Women and fanfic, specifically
37:34
queer women and fanfic. We go way back, OK, And it's
37:39
time that TV producers realize that and understand that.
37:42
So that is my episode. There's so much going on with
37:46
heated rivalry, so much discourse.
37:48
I'm sure I will continue my thoughts over on TikTok.
37:51
If you don't already follow me. Yeah, let me know what you guys
37:54
think. I know there's controversy and I
37:58
will see you in two weeks. In the meantime, if you want
38:00
bonus content, go to my Spotify or Patreon.
38:03
Follow me on YouTube, follow me on Spotify.
38:06
It really helps out a lot. Read me 5 stars.
38:09
Excited to be back for season 4 and continue to gap with you
38:12
all. OK, see you soon.
38:13
Bye.