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When I first had the idea to write a novel about a gay male AFL player, back in 2011, I was sure that by the time the book got published, the footy world would have moved on.听

I could not have been more wrong: that novel, Yeah the Boys, has just been released into a peak moment for gay men in footy in this country.听聽

The fallout from a years-long string of homophobic slurs in the AFL rages on. It is a bushfire nobody seems capable of extinguishing, aided and abetted by a new dunderheaded player every few weeks making the suboptimal decision to hurl the word 鈥渇aggot鈥� on field.听

This against the backdrop of the recent coming-out of former players Mitch Brown as bisexual and Leigh Ryswyk as gay, and of Sydney鈥檚 pride game against St Kilda being shifted this year to the Doggies.听

If this wasn鈥檛 already feeling like a watershed year for gay men in sport, during the time I鈥檝e been writing this article, more has unfolded.听

Over the weekend, another slur in the AFL is being investigated.听

And on Monday night, though it鈥檚 from a different code, there was an emotional bombshell from former NRL player Kane Evans who came out as gay in an interview on Channel 9鈥檚 100% Footy.听

With so much unfolding on various fronts, the same question continues to hound the AFL: why is no current male player willing to come out when we are reasonably certain, statistically, that there are several playing at AFL level?聽

The conclusion we reach, inevitably, is 鈥渂ecause homophobia鈥� 鈥� not least because all us gays know this to be substantially true and self-evident.听

But as a gay bloke, a footy fan (AFL; I barrack for Collingwood), and a past player of social footy, I reckon always landing so quickly on this reductive answer is why we keep missing the whole bloody point.

When we talk about these faceless, downlow gay AFL players, we infantilise them as trapped in a closet, or being helpless victims of a homophobic system. We fail to consider them as capable, adult men who have assessed the climate and decided not to come out.听

No doubt homophobic attitudes are part of their risk assessment. Many would not want to bring that wave of bullshit upon themselves. I am not saying homophobia is not an accurate reason for footy players staying in the closet 鈥� but it is an incomplete answer. There is more at stake for them than simply facing bigoted commentary from the peanut gallery.听

These players are also weighing their legacy, because those of us on the pro-gay side have driven ourselves into a slightly unhinged frenzy about a gay player, and our collective anticipation is heavy with expectations.

People are champing at the bit for a role model. A poster boy for the cause. One of my past footy teammates once declared that any current gay players 鈥渙wed it to us鈥� to come out publicly and be a spokesman, activist and leader. (I disagreed.)

But it is clear a current AFL player who comes out will be branded as 鈥渢he gay footy player鈥�. He is going to be co-opted and used as a human battering ram for advancing any given activism campaign du jour. If he doesn鈥檛 comply, they鈥檒l unfairly eat him alive as a 鈥渟elf-loathing gay鈥�. His achievements as a footballer will be overshadowed: a footnote to the headline of his sexual orientation and his utility to identity politics.听

But most footy players want to be seen, first and foremost, as footy players.

I don鈥檛 blame any elite athlete for wanting to be known more for his sporting prowess than for who he prefers to root. I loathed the few years that the literary community tried to hold me up as a gay poster boy. I was one-dimensionalised as 鈥渢he gay writer鈥�; I was used by so many people to push agendas; I was misread and projected upon on a daily basis by so-called allies; and I was put on panel after panel about 17c起草社区IA+ identity rather than a panel about, you know, actually being a writer.听

I have been openly gay for eighteen years: I am married and my husband and I are proudly ourselves in public. But being held up as a 鈥減rofessional homosexual鈥� in my career was not something I enjoyed; in fact, it was retraumatising and kinda horrible.听

I eventually spat the dummy, publicly called myself a bogan not a role model, and carved out my own path without people鈥檚 expectations drowning me. I have enough lived experience of this space that I would not judge a gay AFL player for shunning this mantle.听

But the expectations for a gay AFL player run deeper than what the public would like to see them do or say.听

The Australian public has an atrophied cultural imagination of what a homosexual man looks, sounds and acts like. Many still fall back on dated stereotypes of gay guys as being camp, effete and inherently unmasculine 鈥� the opposite of the toughness characteristic of elite contact sports.听

For conservatives, this is a reason to justify gay men鈥檚 absence, and exclusion, from team sports. For progressives, it is seen as a reason to rescue the victim gays from the scary blokey spaces where they are ostensibly trapped.听

But neither side ever seems to imagine that closeted gay AFL players might be traditionally masculine men who actually like being in a hyper-masculine environment, and enjoy the male camaraderie of it, and love being one of the boys.听

That is to say: gay footy players are unlikely to come out while our only cultural narrative treats 鈥済ay鈥� as a synonym for 鈥渦nmasculine鈥�. That conflation itself is keeping them in the closet.听

Our culture defaults to the most visible guys who take part in the gay scene as representing what all male homosexuality looks like. They don鈥檛. And there鈥檚 nothing wrong with being on the scene 鈥� but there鈥檚 more than one way to be proudly gay.听

Through publishing my books about gay men like me 鈥� blokes who happen to like blokes, guys who identify as masculine and enjoy blokey spaces and like being one of the boys 鈥� I鈥檝e found thousands of us across Australia. In my book tour signing lines, I have met gay soldiers and veterans, gay tradies, gay FIFO workers, gay farmers, gay truckers, and yes 鈥� several gay footy players. At grassroots level across the country, there are tons of us, which is why I have no doubt there are several at AFL level, too.听

Most of us have struggled in ways similar to how I struggled growing up as a country boy in Geraldton, Western Australia.听

It was not purely homophobia that had me locked in a closet when I was a Collingwood-mad, Emu Export-swilling piss tank of an earthmoving labourer at the age of nineteen.听

It was the knowledge that if I came out, even the people who accepted me would see me as some stereotype, rather than who I was.听

This is what ultimately made me suicidal for several years. Not the idea of having someone shout 鈥渇aggot鈥� at me, but the notion that coming out seemed to require accepting that everyone would permanently misread me. It felt like such a profound loss to exchange my masculinity for being openly gay that the math just wasn鈥檛 mathing for me. Coming out would have been a pyrrhic victory.听

Or, as the closeted gay AFL player in Yeah the Boys puts it, 鈥淣obody believes you can be the gay footy guy and still be the big alpha dog 鈥� nobody. The world forces you to give up one for the other, and I already chose the one that matters most to me.鈥澛�

I wish people would consider that current gay AFL players might be weighing up the exact same calculus and, like me, concluding that being understood as a masculine bloke is simply more important and valuable to them than coming out and losing that.听

Of course, it is a false dichotomy. When I eventually reached out to a mental health crisis service, I realised I wanted to live authentically without compromising either my sexuality or my masculinity. It meant fighting off people鈥檚 reductive attitudes, but son-of-a-bitch, it worked. I got tougher and learned to march to my own drum. I found a husband and mates and family who accepted me for who I am.听

I am an example of refusing to let the world kill me or define me. This is why I feel so invested in this conversation about gay AFL players. I know that so much suffering 鈥� depression, anxiety, suicidal ideation 鈥� comes from believing that false dichotomy. And I know from the reactions of my readers that just showing up as yourself and talking openly can help other blokes feel seen, and that is what I am hoping to achieve by writing this.

I was heartened last night by the way Kane Evans referred to his own coming out as a 鈥済angsta鈥� thing to do. What a spectacularly tough way of framing it.听

Just as cool was interviewer James Bracey鈥檚 response: 鈥淵ou鈥檙e as gangsta as it gets, bro.鈥澛�

Imagine the good these two have just done: a gay bloke coming out and a straight bloke showing him he still has his respect.听

Despite individual past players coming out in both the AFL and NRL, the homophobia problem continues to haunt both codes, with the AFL particularly under the microscope.听

How can the league help make this football code safe for all its players?聽

You let them hear from people who have gone through it. You assure them their private life can stay private if they wish. You assure them their mental health matters more than being made a spectacle. You assure them that if they come out, they don鈥檛 need to be a public spokesman. You assure them it鈥檚 possible to just rock up to Brownlow medal night with a bloke on your arm instead of a sheila, and not have to enter into public debate about it.听

You assure them they鈥檒l be supported to remain one of the boys, not 鈥渙thered鈥�.听

Many of my mates would argue that an AFL Pride Round would also help. I confess I鈥檝e never had an appetite for this. Excessively marking gay players as 鈥渄ifferent鈥� 鈥� even if we鈥檙e celebrating it 鈥� can be so alienating. The gaudy idea of a rainbow boundary line, pride guernseys and some form of glitter thrown across the MCG feels like a profound misreading of what a gay footy player represents. And respectfully, I don鈥檛 think we can coax a current player out of the closet by hyper-beaming him with rainbows.听

No shade on my mates who do want a Pride Round 鈥� but for me, as a gay footy fan, I鈥檝e always truly loved that all I need to do to belong to my footy team is pull on my team鈥檚 colours. When I go to the G and barrack for Collingwood in black and white, those colours unite me with every other Collingwood fan there wearing them. Gay or straight, left-wing or right-wing: at the footy, none of that matters, and we are temporarily united by our love for the Pies. To me, that is the cohesive power of sport.听

Speaking of cohesion, I have much more appetite for Bailey Smith鈥檚 timely suggestion of a Men鈥檚 Mental Health Round in the AFL. There is so much evidence this is needed 鈥� both with respect to current players鈥� experiences and the mental health of men at a population level. And there is no reason such a round couldn鈥檛 include past and present players sharing their mental health battles 鈥� gay or straight.听

After all, every footballer who has come out has shared some form of mental health struggle: this aligns perfectly with a mental health round. Telling these stories and encouraging blokes to open up would shine a light on what so many men go through in silence, open some minds, and make us realise how much we have in common, rather than highlighting our differences.听

I do hope a current AFL player eventually feels comfortable to come out 鈥� if he wishes to. But we need to broaden our minds about what he might look like and what he might want.听

And we need to consider that, gay or not, as an AFL player he might be more focused on a premiership flag than a rainbow one.

Holden Sheppard is an award-winning novelist of four books, including Invisible Boys, now a Peabody Award-nominated TV series on Stan. His new novel Yeah the Boys is 鈥渁 celebration of masculinity and male camaraderie鈥�. He barracks for the Collingwood Football Club.