The world’s leading LGBTQ+ sports publication, Outsports, has celebrated its 25th anniversary, marking a quarter of a century of game-changing journalism.
The online news outlet – which is owned and operated by San Francisco LGBTQ+ media company Q.Digital – was launched in November 1999 by Cyd Zeigler and Jim Buzinski, two “gay NFL fans looking to have some fun and find other fans like us”.
“Yet very quickly, we both understood that we had tapped into something no one else could see: Gay men, lesbians and other LGBTQ people were fans, athletes, coaches and executives across the sports world, and they each had an important story to share,” the pair wrote in a retrospective piece for the publication’s silver anniversary.
Zeigler and Buzinski said in 1999 and the early 2000s the intersection between the “gay community” and sports was never considered by mainstream news publications or ones marketed towards queer people.
“The sports media ignored “gay issues,” and the LGBTQ media ignored sports,” they noted. But that was 25 years ago and times have changed – because of Outsports.
Over the years, the publication has told countless coming out stories, highlighted queer folks sporting glories, called out bigotry and become the home of coverage for Team LGBTQ+ during the Olympic and Paralympic Games.
“When it began, it was a real innovation.” Outsports editor and founder of Sports Media LGBT+ Jon Holmes told the LGBTQ+ Journalism Network.
“In the late 90s there really wasn’t anything quite like it.
“They [Zeigler and Buzinski] have essentially carved out a niche in the industry that nobody else was filling. Of course, the way that sports media and the media in general has changed has meant that there are lots of other places now that do this kind of storytelling at different times, but not as consistently and as long-running as Outsports has been doing it.”
Holmes said one of the most impactful areas of the publication is its coverage of athletes coming out stories, particularly at the college-level.
“By reading these stories, by learning that there were other people out there who are like you and had maybe overcome challenges – or were still struggling to some extent – that would give you the courage and give you the understanding that you weren’t alone,” Holmes explained.
“The more that that went on, the more you could see the impact that the site was making.”
The brand’s tagline, “courage is contagious”, speaks to the unifying and empowering nature of living your authentic truth and the ripple effect being an out person in sport can have on another.
In their retrospective, Zeigler and Buzinski said of their coming out coverage: “It’s a domino effect that Outsports tapped into years ago in hopes of changing the face of American sports.
“We’re proud to say we’ve done just that.”
Looking to the future, Holmes noted we are still “relatively in the early days of having any significant representation”, particularly in men’s professional and semi-professional team sports.
He said: “We were looking back the other day at coming out stories in men’s pro sports and even in the last couple of years, there’s been relatively few, certainly in team sports.
“You would have thought that we’d be further along now than we are in terms of that representation.
“Of course, in women’s sports it’s a very different picture and the more that gets funding, increased media coverage and the more stories that are told from that part of the picture, I think that’s all the better.”
He added we are “moving towards a time of greater sensitivity” and “seeing less sensationalism around the fact that, yes LGBTQ plus people are in sports as well”.
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