Homophobia in the music industry

Published on 2 February 2025 at 12:37

Homophobia in the music industry

It’s often said by many people that music artists can just come out if they want to and it’s their choice to stay in the closet or to be called a queerbaiter when they are flagging their sexuality through lyrics, on stage and via their music videos. Most people don’t care that the music industry is insanely homophobic and closeting is still a very real issue people in the music industry face when they are queer.

Many many artists have spoken up about it and if you listen to Copy of a Copy of a Copy, it tells the story of dreamers diving into an industry that uses them. The same industry shoves them in glass closets and doesn’t let them come out. The label executives, management companies and even other queer folk within the industry tell them that coming out will ruin them, end their career or cause irreparable damage to them.

The industry abuses them by working them to the point of exhaustion, exploits them by taking most of the money they make and can destroy them via the mainstream media, many of who work alongside the PR people, music managers and label bosses to control the narratives around their clients. Furthermore the music industry stops them living their lives as their authentic selves and can and does control everything, from their public image to their personal lives.

Cher Lloyd recently spoke about how she was told to hide the fact she was getting married because her label would do everything it could to stop her marrying her boyfriend. Cher’s label was Syco music and was very same label One Direction and Little Mix were signed to. If you think they didn’t do that and worse to Harry, Louis, Liam, Niall and Zayn then you are either wilfully naive, or plain ignorant.

While researching homophobia in the music industry it struck me how isolating and terrifying it is for someone in the queer community to come out, especially on the world stage. People such as Darren Hayes from Savage Garden spoke about how he was basically shelved in the US and Australia due to being gay and how he was in meetings where the label executives would make fun of another queer artist, Ricky Martin.

Lance Bass, Nsync member told Attitude magazine in 2019 that the music industry is still very homophobic and explained that he lost so much when he came out as queer. He’d recorded a pilot for the CW network but they dropped it after it was revealed that Lance was gay. Lance also said he used to cry himself to sleep every night while in Nsync and has opened up about the strict image management that closeted him because had complete control over his public image.

Another celebrity who struggled with being closeted was Mark Feehily from the boyband Westlife. Mark was managed by Simon Cowell’s good friend and colleague Louis Walsh and Simon was actually Westlife’s artist and repertoire person. The label RCA was under BMG which at the time was partnered with Sony as Sony/BMG. Mark felt incredibly lonely during his time in the band and spoke about how he felt so low and suicidal because he was closeted that it took therapy and years for him to feel okay in his own skin.

One other Irish boybander who was kept in the closet was Stephen Gately. Stephen was a member of boyband Boyzone and was eventually outed by Dan Wootten of The Sun newspaper which was devastating to Stephen. Louis Walsh also managed Boyzone prior to Westlife and has said on record that he wouldn’t have signed Stephen or Mark to his groups had he known they were gay which shows just how homophobic he is because Mark is absolutely phenomenal vocally and Stephen had the most beautiful voice. Unfortunately Stephen passed away at the age of 33 in extremely sad circumstances while on holiday with his partner.

Billy Porter has spoken about how the music industry is extremely homophobic and all about smoke and mirrors that existed to make the world think he was straight which was more important to the labels and music managers than his talent as a singer. Billy did listen to his label’s advice and it turned him into someone he didn’t even recognise. He had a song passed to Celine Dion and that was the final straw because he was being overlooked due to his sexuality which caused him to go leave and eventually record 3 independent albums without the support of a mainstream label.

Another artist who speaks on closeting in the music industry is Troy Sivan who states that the music industry still has a long way to go and while some artists might chose to be closeted, others are very much coerced or forced into it and once you’re in the closet, it becomes very difficult to get out. Many artists struggle to get that door open and like Louis Tomlison states in his song Copy of a Copy of a Copy, no matter how hard you howl, you can’t get through the glass.

The homophobia in the music industry even extends to songwriters with songwriters experiencing either passive or aggressive homophobia every single day. Justin Tratner is a famous songwriter who has penned hits for Britney Spears, Gwen Stefani, Kelly Clarkston, Selena Gomez and Justin Beiber to name but a few. When Justin was an artist it was so much worse- he’d be told to wear less makeup and not to use same sex pronouns which is why he stopped performing with the band because it was exhausting to him.

Parson James, a singer songwriter from the US was signed to, in his words a major music label- RCA (Sony) who he claims wouldn’t let him say too much about his sexuality and despite the label itself was being run by homosexual people. In Parson’s words it’s a dark industry to be in because of the monetization and the product that artists become that prevents them from] forcing the closet doors open.

More and more stars are coming out as queer which is wonderful, but when you hear George Shelley, for example, speak about his experience with Syco music and how they conditioned him to stay closeted because it would, in their words ruin the band he was part of, you see the level of control labels and management companies have over their artists.

Musicians are people just like us and deserve the freedom to live their lives as they please. The industry controls the narratives, controls the newsfeeds and plants bot accounts to sway public opinion on sites like Facebook and X. Then there is the entrenched homophobia of fans of artists where there is speculation they could be queer. These fans will call other fans who think those artists are queer delusional, fetishisers, or claim that it’s disgusting or wrong or disturbing to think these men and women could be queer.

People would rather artists like Harry Styles who has been called a queer baiter are not queer because they don’t want to believe they have been lied to for fifteen years, but it’s not Harry who has lied to them. Harry has been exceptionally open about his sexuality since he was a sixteen year old kid with a crush on his bandmate Louis and has come out time and again. People only need to pay attention to him to see it and yet he’s still closed because he too is signed to a homophobic label and still under contract with Simon Cowell.

One thing fans of Harry and Louis as a couple know for sure is that Simon Cowell abused all of the One Direction boys and is responsible for multiple traumas inflicted on them. He exploited the dreams of sixteen to eighteen year olds and had them sign a contract that gave Simon, Syco and Sony exclusive control over the boys’ public images and when you look into it, it becomes obvious that each time the boys rebelled they were punished for it.

So, no Harry Styles and Louis Tomlinson can’t just come out if they choose to. The can sing about how the music industry treats them as products like in Music For A Sushi Restaurant where Harry showed through the video that the contract had control over him and that once he’d lost his voice he was discarded and chopped into pieces.

Louis also shows this through the We Made It, Don’t Let It Break Your Heart and Kill My Mind music videos where he shows himself as a member of a mafia crew, used and controlled by the big bad bossman who tells the main character, “I decide what you do and when you do it. Understand?” This shows that in the music industry it’s not the artists who decide what they do or say, it’s their teams and the big boss man in control.

Most of the artists I’ve mentioned have been told to stay closeted by one label - Sony - and with the current explosion of queer artists such as Billie Elish, Troy Sivan, Demi Lovato, Renee Rapp and Chappel Roan it shows that their queerness isn’t going to destroy their careers but opens up a whole new audience to them and it’s time to let the homophobia go and embrace the queerness. The world is a dark and scary place for everyone to be just now, so maybe we could all be a little kinder to each other and allow people to be themselves regardless of how you personally feel about them because it’s not about you at the end of the day.

Love is love and that’s all that matters.

Until next time.

Take care

Behind The Curtains

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