[OPINION] 'Is Carlos Yulo gay?' and other questions that don’t matter
Just two months after his historic double gold medal win at the 2024 Paris Olympics, gymnast Carlos Yulo is once again in the news for reasons completely unrelated to being arguably the most decorated Filipino athlete in history.
At the scene of the crime this time is a photo of Yulo posted on his Instagram a few days ago. The photo, taken during his vacation to South Korea, shows the gymnast decked out in wide-legged jeans, black boots, and the object of everybody’s attention: a blue crop top.
Immediately upon posting what posited to be a harmless OOTD, Yulo’s supporters and haters alike rushed to the comment section to air their thoughts on the choice of top, and what it meant for masculinity. For half of the world, the crop top represented the best of masculinity—bold, unafraid, and confident enough to wear things conventionally considered feminine. For the other half, the crop top was a betrayal of masculinity and a weak submission to the effeminate. What should’ve been a simple little fit pic escalated into a battleground of gender and identity politics. Do any cursory search through the comments of the outfit picture or of any reposts of it on social media, and you’ll find plenty of comments asking different iterations of a simple, but often malicious question: Bakit siya naka-crop top, bakla ba si Caloy?
Yulo is of course, no stranger to being at the center of culture wars. It’s hard to imagine that the Olympics was barely eight weeks ago, with the way his ongoing family drama has captured the collective Filipino imagination since then. Similarly, this likely isn’t Yulo’s first experience dealing with society’s arbitrary gendering of innately gender-neutral things. While I don’t know Yulo personally, I imagine that rendering gymnastics as his choice of sport has, at different points in his life, raised eyebrows due to its common connotation as a “feminine” sport.
And the commotion surrounding Yulo’s crop top is also just one instance in a larger trend of questioning athletes’ sexuality. In just the past year, Philadelphia 76ers guard Jared McCain and Chicago Bears’ quarterback Caleb Williams were both the subject of similar lines of questioning due to their penchant for painting their nails. Newly-acquired New York Knick Karl-Anthony Towns has also often dealt with questions about his sexuality as a result of the way his voice sounded in some postgame interviews.
All four of these athletes, including Yulo, seem to be, for all intents and purposes, straight men. Yet, time and time again, social media demonstrates that there’s still a long way to go before society at large fully embraces a more sophisticated understanding of gender. That Yulo, Towns, and others receive questions about their sexuality based on certain ways they express themselves demonstrates how much nuance still needs to be developed in the way we view and talk gender.
Ultimately, the issue of Yulo's crop top can really be boiled down to the following points:
First, wearing a crop top in his case, or painting your nails in the cases of McCain and Williams, don’t make a person gay. Being gay is about a person’s attraction to the same sex, and it has nothing to do with the way a person chooses to express themselves externally. A person’s choice of clothing, or physical augmentations, reflects nothing about who they’re attracted to, or how they identify. These are independent variables, which don’t necessarily need to align.
Secondly, Yulo isn’t gay. At least, not that we know of. Really, only he knows how he identifies. All we really know is that he seems to be in a loving relationship with a woman, and there really isn’t any reason to question his sexuality until he himself corrects us.
Thirdly, even if Yulo were gay, it fundamentally does not matter. If hypothetically, he were gay, the color of that rainbow would just be gold. It’s worth reminding everyone that Yulo—gay, straight, or anything in between—is a two-time Olympic champion. However he identifies, or whomever he purports to be, will never change the success he’s already achieved.
Finally, there is absolutely no reason any of us should even be talking about this. At the end of the day, it’s a crop top. Men of all shapes and sizes, from Sylvester Stallone to Kid Cudi to The Blue Meanie have worn crop tops and made it work. There is nothing about it that should be deemed inherently feminine, or should have led us to having this conversation in the first place.
In fact, when you really think about it, it’s almost a little upsetting that an ostensibly straight man like Yulo wears a completely innocuous piece of clothing and gets praised for “breaking gender stereotypes” or “battling toxic masculinity.” Queer people have pushed the envelope of gender-defying fashion for ages. Queer musicians, fashion designers, and drag queens have worked tirelessly to keep the world of fashion moving and evolving; but the moment a straight man like Yulo puts on a crop top and jeans, it’s seen as a shining example of breaking the mold.
All of this is to say that maybe we can finally just put the Yulo crop top issue to rest. When he posted the outfit on Instagram, his caption said nothing except a simple emoji of the South Korean flag. For anyone who’s commented anything on the outfit, we all probably should’ve said less than that.
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the opinions of PhilSTAR L!fe, its parent company and affiliates, or its staff.