Fan Reflections on Sexuality in Women's Football in the United Kingdom

Abstract

This article presents the responses of 1,432 male association football fans, collected via an online survey from March 2020 to April 2020, regarding their views on sexuality in women's football in the United Kingdom. The analysis focuses on two broad themes that emerged from the data: (1) the association of women footballers with masculinity and how they subsequently transgress the traditional characteristics of femininity; and (2) a reduced stigma surrounding sexuality in women's football given its lower profile in terms of coverage and the smaller number of fans in comparison to men's football. The article concludes by outlining how there is less homonegativity concerning sexuality in women's football in the United Kingdom, primarily because the heteromasculine position of male fans is not challenged, but fans also reaffirm the stereotypes and myths of nonheterosexual women playing a sport like football.

Inclusivity in sports: fan attitudes and behaviors towards nonbinary athletes

“…While there is limited research comparing the effects of public announcements related to nonbinary sexual orientations of athletes based on their assigned genders, Cleland et al (2021) found that nonbinary athletes in women's sports receive more support from fans; which is somewhat opposite of the results of this study revealing that support for nonbinary individuals in women's basketball was lower than for nonbinary individuals in men's basketball. In particular, fan support, in terms of team fanship and merchandise purchase intention, was significantly lower for nonbinary athletes in women's than men's basketball.…”

“…In particular, fan support, in terms of team fanship and merchandise purchase intention, was significantly lower for nonbinary athletes in women’s than men’s basketball. While existing literature has suggested that nonbinary individuals are more accepted in women’s sports (Cleland et al., 2021; Krane, 2016), these results show that this may not actually be the case. It is vital for sport marketers to understand their fan base in order to develop strategies, launch or modify campaigns to create nonbinary awareness and determine the level of open support they want to provide to nonbinary athletes.…”

“…In contrast, research indicates that a higher number of openly nonbinary athletes have come out in women's sports since the 1990s. Moreover, compared to their counterparts in men's sports, those athletes have received greater levels of social support (Cleland et al, 2021). Essentially, there is currently higher acceptance of nonbinary athletes in some women's sports.…”

Why are There STILL No Gay Professional Association Football Players in Men’s Major Leagues? Revisiting the Views of Football Fans in the United Kingdom

“…Conversely, we recognize that non-probability sampling techniques, like ours, cannot guarantee that all individuals in the population have an equal chance of being chosen, making the generalization of findings more difficult (Cleland et al, 2020;Gray, 2018). However, given that the intention of the work was to encourage a large sample of football fans to share their perspective, attitudes, behaviors, and experiences relative to a sensitive subject (attitudes towards gay football players), much like other research in this area, we 6 felt that a non-probability, self-selecting sample was the right approach (Walser et al, 2021;Cleland et al, 2021a;Cleland et al, 2021b;Cleland et al, 2021c;Cashmore & Cleland 2012). One of the advantages of online surveys is that they allow the participant to complete it in their own time and avoid the potential bias of social desirability that can occur on a subject like this with face-to-face research (Cleland et al, 2020).…”

Perceptions of football and fans of female footballers: metaphor analysis study

“…Argan et al (2018) In their study titled Metaphor Usage of Football News: Content analysis for newspapers in Turkey; They analyzed the violence content of the language used by the sports media from the metaphors used in sports news. Cleland et al (2021) in their study titled "Fan Reflections on Sexuality in Women's Football in the United Kingdom", consider the lower profile of women's football in terms of less number of fans and coverage compared to men's football, stated that women's football is less sexually and violently stigmatized. The fact that the sample group of our study was female football players may have caused the metaphors produced about fans to be concentrated in the Supportive/Directive category.…”